“Site Maintenance”, or – How to keep getting paid after the job is done
This post was originally published in 2009
The tips and techniques explained may be outdated.
The normal workflow as a freelancer [At least for me] is build new website [by modifying existing CMS or building new one], guide the client to use your CMS and then move on to the next project.
Lets say you client is CEO of some company, or maybe runs little lawyers office. He don’t really has the time to maintain he’s website, so he got 2 choices:
- Hire some one to add/remove/edit content in the new website [most of the time it may be son of some friend or even new employee at the office]
- Let existing employee do this job.
OR! you can offer him 3rd choice. The site maintenance service.
Site Maintenance
The “Site Maintenance” service, as I see it, meant only to keep getting paid each month. This is quite smart too – you develop this kick-ass CMS, install it and modify it so it fits your new client, then you offer him your special service – site maintenance. All you do in this service is getting content changes and modifications from your client, use your kick-ass CMS to apply them. And get paid for it.
[This service may include also SEO]
Really smart.
The client already knows you, he trusts you, you know how to work with the CMS you’ve built, then you are a natural option. You just need to sell him this service right.
There is several methods for this service to work, you can get paid each month for X dollars for SEO and Content Management, or you can get paid per-hour for the job you getting done each month.
Expand your business
This service is great for expanding you business.
Lets say you charge 250$ for maintenance service, you hire other freelancer [or if it only content management within your system then even your little brother can do this] pay him 100$ for this job you pass him each time, and your clean revenue is 150$.
Even if you don’t want to expand – this option lets you spend some more time on doing whatever you want and still get paid.
Why I don’t do it anymore
Just so you know, in the last few years I stopped on working hard in the webdev industry. The main reason is the time – I’m a soldier now, so I can only work half-day. This half day I rather spend on my projects then working on my business. Managing people can be hard. So if I build a website for a client, I guide them to use the CMS rather then maintain a site by myself. This way I can move on, working on a different projects and not being held back by my old projects.
