Show HN: we like to work from coffee shops, so we made this
freelancersticker.comI'd be very curious about the viability of clients who approach you in a coffee shop. Seems like you'd get an awful lot of, "So hey, I have this idea that's like Facebook and Youtube combined and I think it could be the next big thing".
That's not to say you won't ever find a good client in a coffee shop, but I suspect it has a lower viability rate than a Craigslist ad, and at least on Craigslist I don't have to spend any real time talking to the people who are clearly not serious clients.
But it's not always about professional connections IMHO. This sticker has the potential to signal 'geek/programmer', and I would very much welcome a fellow hacker coming up to me and having a chat because of it. I agree that it seems like a so-so way of getting quality clients.
@spqr Your comment is informative, but your account has been hellbanned for quite a while it seems. Only users with showdead can read your replies. Maybe you'd like to look into that.
If you want qualified developers to talk to you, I recommend a sticker that says "PHP Developer" or "I Write Objective C" or whatever as opposed to a generic "I make websites" type slogan. Not only will this weed out the people who just assume you "do computers", but frankly there is a lot of division within the dev community and just because you're sitting over there writing javascript doesn't mean you want to talk to me about EAV databases.
You forgot the part about the idea being worth one hundred billion dollars!
Aimed at all the people in China! Think of the money!
And the part where you sign an NDA
I've been running the sticker, "Hi, I build software. Come talk to me!" at a high end coffee shop in my town (Nashville) for 2 weeks and it's generated 3 good conversations. I would say I'm very satisfied with how it's gone so far.
I'm moving to Nashville in two weeks! and I want to know what are the best coffee shops to work from! What coffee shop do you work from? I'll come find you :-)
How about something a little... bolder:
https://twitter.com/iWaffles/status/256984030552129537/photo...
This will not work! You missed the Apple logo.
I'm truly amazed that this made the top of Hacker News. A $5 decal that advertises services. We've officially come full circle. I hear that people have even tried approaching potential clients and talking to them and once one crazy person actually spent money on soliciting business in a printed periodical with somewhat widespread distribution.
get something we already have, apply a use case nobody should care, make a nice website with a video and promote it like a great idea, overprice it = success.
"overprice it"
Why do you feel it's overpriced exactly? If someone thinks it's a good idea to try $5 isn't exactly a big risk to take to have a turnkey product.
it's not overpriced in the meaning that it will make you go bankrupt but I think you can buy adhesive paper for much less that fits in any printer.
This just looks like another generic meaningless sticker that people stick all over their laptops.
If you really want people in coffeeshops to approach you try something more personal and direct. "I'm xxxx. I build websites/applications, feel free to say hi,let's chat!" or whatever.
Yeah. For a long time I had a crude X in black duct tape on my laptop, and no other stickers. Almost everybody asks what it means because... it looks like it means something.
It doesn't mean anything; I bought this laptop & went directly to a conference, and just wanted it to look slightly distinctive, and the duct tape was all I had. It does cover the Apple logo so it looks like I hate Apple or something (I do hate excessive and ostentatious branding).
I kept it because I kept having conversations about it. Even baristas remember me as the guy with the X.
It's odd but I don't think a logo has any meaning any more, because real life turned into Nascar.
Yeah. For a long time I had a crude X in black duct tape on my laptop, and no other stickers. Almost everybody asks what it means because... it looks like it means something.
If I saw that, I would probably have assumed you were just a huge X-Files fan or something.
Actually, thinking about it now, I think the next laptop I buy, I'm going to put an X like that on there, along with a small sticker that just says "I Want To Believe".
FYI: it didn't hurt my laptop, but, over time, the glue from the duct tape melts and fills the depression in the Apple logo. Removing it is not fun.
the depression in the Apple logo
Well, that's one problem I won't have to worry about. :-)
Agreed. Or what Github did with their t-shirts, where it said, "github.com/________" and you filled it in with a sharpie.
That's a lot to put on a sticker -- people aren't going to read that. Maybe something a bit snappier, e.g. "Freelance coder: available for gigs" or something.
I would question, however, whether putting a sticker of any kind is gonna help you score gigs. I mean, if you were looking for a coder, would you really approach some random guy/gal in a coffee shop based solely on a sticker on their laptop and knowing nothing else about them?
Maybe having a sticker with a link to your github, as suggested by others, would be more useful (if your user id is memorable).
Depends what you are going for, unless you are looking for people who are already reasonably tech savvy your potential customers might not know that github is a thing.
I full sentence briefly explaining what you do, and more importantly giving people permission to interrupt you would stand out more than just some random sticker.
It's more than usual, but most people don't stop reading small bits of text mid-sentence. Plus, serendipity is a wonderful thing.
I've got a Github sticker on my laptop. It's sort of a "Hey, I'm a developer" flag, maybe it'll lead to some good conversation one day.
Me too! I've had a few 'why's there a weird cat sticker on your laptop' comments but it's also generated a handful of double takes / knowing smiles at University, and has sparked several interesting conversations on trains between Manchester and London, in one of which I was offered a job.
Conversations with other developers, yes.
If you are working, do you necessarily want to be bothered?
If you don't want to be bothered, why would you be working on a coffee shop? Libraries (or pretty much anywhere else) offer more privacy for real work.
I find I work better in places with hustle and bustle. It doesn't mean I want to talk to other people or be interrupted.
with more offers?
yes!
I'm curious of what the conversion funnel would be from people inquiring to becoming new clients. Someone should test this.
I think people who go to work to coffee shops are there to be noticed. There's plenty of places you can work at without the bother. Let's be real about this.
I go to coffee shops because it's close and a break from working from my otherwise empty apartment.
I like the idea, but the execution not so much. A round sticker would be better in my view.
What has been your conversion rate so far using it? Since this is a marketing/sales practice, I'd love to know what the funnel looks like for this.
Do coffee shops really want this? We all use them from time to time to meet clients, or sneak in some work but I highly doubt most shops would want you building your business (by advertising your availability) around them.
They probably won't care unless you are making an online version of starbucks.
I liked the video especially the bit at 0:32 seconds.
Right below this sticker you should probably list your hourly rate, otherwise you're making yourself a magnet for the wrong kinds of clients.
This is a great (and virtually free) way to pick up business. I don't see a downside.
Downside: you're meeting with a potential investor or client for your start-up and you've got to pull your laptop out.
Other possible downsides include, people coming up to you and bothering you with non-relevant "work" or "free work for equity" which you're not interested in.
There is also the exclusivity thing, where a potential client might perceive you as "too eager" for work, and you end up loosing a gig you might have gotten otherwise. (Granted, I'm reaching on this one).
I think it's a neat idea, but you have to be judicious when putting on any overt "label" on yourself or on the tools of your trade. I only bring this up due to my own experiences with stickers on my laptop. Getting them off is no easy task either (glue residue and such).
It also has a bit of a "will code for food" vibe to it. And yep, you're gonna get "oh, you work in IT? Maybe you can tell me why my laptop won't connect to the wireless here..."
Velcro would work.
Now that's a neat Idea, you could be a billboard when the time is right and take it down at other times... You might even get more creative and hook up your smartphone or tablet as a display on the other side with whatever wording you want.
Maybe a scrolling marquee app. Heck, you could advertise whatever you want on your display at that point.
If it then becomes a trend, one could pay people small amounts of money for becoming mobile billboards on location enabled devices.
Maybe you could make an app for laptops with a reverse-facing screen (http://blog.parts-people.com/2012/06/22/dual-display-laptops...).
The velcro yes, but please, please no on the other idea.
Next time I can't find a table to eat lunch at Panera the guy entrenched at a 4-person table for hours with a laptop and single coffee cup is going to try and make me read ADS? This... would be unwise.
I think you're on to something
There's also those window stickers that adhere to a lot of things but peel off easily.
I thought it was a new band :)
Wouldn't coffee shop owners use this to kick you out?
"Oh, it's that guy again."
The stuff some coffee shops put up with is truly bewildering.
They only come in black, so you wouldn't be able to see it on my laptop.
"My laptop is full of valuable code. Please come steal it."
Excuse me. Stealing a laptop for the valuable code it contains?
You might actually reduce the chance of theft, if you put the sticker over the Apple logo :P
Laptop thefts never(may be 0.05% of them..) look at your code. So do not let your laptop unattended even you use this sticker or not..
Would this sticker be visible on a black thinkpad?
Yes, get the white one: http://instagram.com/p/XzdnxHut8u/
I'd buy that for a dollar; but five? Not so much.
$5 for a sticker... Someone said profit margins?
well, intergalactic shipping costs more than you'd think...
I would rather go for "We are hiring"
To the OP:
Good idea but you need some contact info on your site and please remove the "whois privacy" from your whois record for the domain.
In all but a limited amount of cases you don't need that. Use a separate gmail account that forwards to your real email to filter if you are worried about spam. Put another address into the whois and google voice number if you are worried about phone calls. To begin you won't get that many with one domain and you also are preventing anyone who wants to get in touch with you from contacting you.
Also, why should someone give you money if you don't even have any info as to who you are that they can trace on your website? (which to repeat I like the idea).
Registrars (I run an ICANN registrar) typically push privacy because it's good for them. I've seen privacy on records with businesses that want the exact opposite.
Anyone who disagrees please post your thoughts and I will address them individually based on my years in this business. (I'd actually like to hear new reasons why people do this that I haven't heard before).
The timing of this is interesting to me because I recently registered a new domain, opted to leave my contact info public, and have since received an unending barrage of spam emails that I have to attribute to the WHOIS record due to the timing.
I agree about publicly displaying contact info, but would like to know some good suggestions for filtering out the crap that comes with it.
I have my contact info publicly available on all of my domains, and I don't see any specific signs that any of the spam I get is directly attributable to that. But I did get an email from a guy in Canada a couple of weeks ago, asking about buying one of my domains, which I sold to him. Personally I think the benefits of having valid whois info outweigh the negatives, but that's just me...
Whois privacy email addresses will forward incoming mails to you as well.
A buying offer can be a smart way to probe the owner behind that privacy wall, who I guess most of the time is just a normal guy/gal...
"Whois privacy email addresses"
A turn off for many buyers. They look like bogus addresses. Makes much more sense to take the effort to get a gmail account that looks legit and use that to filter. Then if you get to much spam simply get another gmail and change the whois. Etc.
I'm actually receiving a whole load of spam on one of the email addresses provided by my registrar's whois privacy service. I'm guessing that spammers don't care how ugly an email address looks, as long as they reach someone.
The forwarding thing sounds like a good idea. Not turning off people interested in one of my domain names is an awesome bonus.
Interesting.. I didn't realize that, as I've never bothered to pay the extra fee for the "private" registration. But I do use a less-important GMail account for the email contact, so at least my main email doesn't get swamped. But the phone number on there is actually my personal cellphone, which could be annoying if a lot of people started calling, but so far that doesn't seem to happen.
"But it just doesn't happen at the moment."
(Can't reply to this below).
Want to point out though that once the info is slurped and appears elsewhere you won't be able to put the genie back in the bottle.
I many times pull up old info for domains in search.
Now that's a fair point. Now that you have me thinking about this, maybe I'll make it a point to change it sooner than later after all. :-)
Edit: Done. Thanks for the nudge, larrys.
"But the phone number on there is actually my personal cellphone"
Use google voice number that forwards to your cellphone. Or better use a google voice number that doesn't go anywhere.
Sounds like good advice. I'd invest the time to do that, if I had an actual problem with getting too many unsolicited / spam phone calls. But it just doesn't happen at the moment. If I get bored one day, maybe I'll take the time to switch it over.
"Personally I think the benefits of having valid whois info outweigh the negatives"
Agree with that. As both a domain owner, registrar as well as someone who buys domains. There are definitely cases where privacy is warranted but not for the majority of people.
"I agree about publicly displaying contact info, but would like to know some good suggestions for filtering out the crap that comes with it."
Gmail account which is setup to forward to your regular email account. Or simply change to a new gmail if you get to much spam. I register domains all the time and have a single email account that represents a large quantity of domains. I don't find the spam to be a big problem at all.
Thanks for the advice- I'll give that a try. I'm kind of pissed that I didn't think to do that in the first place.
> Put another address into the whois
If you run an ICANN registrar, you should be aware that ICANN requires whois information to be accurate. Providing incorrect data is grounds for cancellation of your domain name. I guess long as you can still be reached from the address it would be fine though?
Personally, I use whois privacy because I don't want my physical address (and identity) to be publicly available. I had one domain that didn't have privacy years ago, and I kept getting snail-mail spam every year asking me to "renew" it, from some registrar I'd never heard of.
"Providing incorrect data is grounds for cancellation of your domain name."
Not speaking for other registrars of course but what's the chance that we will cancel your domain because there is "inaccurate" info?
In order to do that someone would have to file a complaint with ICANN then ICANN contacts us and we send you an email telling you to fix the info. And we would bend over backwards before cancelling the domain because who wants to deal with how pissed you'd be if we did that? What do we have to gain vs. what do we have to lose.
Do a test. Register a name with, say namecheap or godaddy. Purposely put in bad info (not bogus looking but just wrong). The file an complaint with ICANN. See what happens. (And that's after someone files a complaint how or why would someone care to do that?)
Feel free to contact us at info@freelancersticker.com - obviously we missed it when we got the site up.
I think we got the WHOIS privacy by default on NameCheap. We're not hiding from anyone - our names and profiles are linked on the bottom of the page. I would, however, advise domain owners to be wary of information registered, as they may find their home address and phone number propagated all across the web, mirrored by tons of whois/rtld sites, never to be removed again.
"I think we got the WHOIS privacy by default on NameCheap."
Funny how that happens now isn't it? You have to ask yourself why are they so eager to give you that?
"our names and profiles are linked on the bottom of the page"
I was only able to bring up one profile. The rest you have to be connected or logged into linkedin. You have to link in to the linked in public profile. But even then the amount of info is limited unless you pay for the enhanced extra linkedin paid service. Makes much more sense to simply have some info on your site. And certainly not way at the bottom "below" the fold.
"as they may find their home address and phone number propagated all across the web"
That's definitely a valid concern.
My suggestion is simply to use a school address, po box or other contact address. For phone number as mentioned get a google voice number (or another service if you already have google voice.)
While it isn't advised and there are reasons not to do the following I can tell you that if you simply made up an address somewhere that would be fine as well. Nobody is policing that. In theory you could lose your domain but in practice that will never happen.