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Thanks for the advice. I do plan to work as a freelancer and with local businesses. I also want to create some cool website templates and sell them on themefore

Thanks for the advice. I do plan to work as a freelancer and with local businesses. I also want to create some cool website templates and sell them on themeforest.net etc. Do you think making 2000-3000 bucks a month feasible by selling themes? I saved wisely during my financial services days and if I can reach $2000 per month figure then I will focus 100% on programming. Once again thanks for the advice.

vicks711 14y ago
P.S. Yes I feel a burning desire to program.
lifeisstillgood 14y ago
2K on themes - I have no idea but I suspect not - its a competitive marketplace. I think you can make 2000 USD a month by creating tools for your local businesses. Here is my suggestion: go buy a list of businesses in your area for about 200 USD. You will get something like 5000 businesses for that in suburban area. Split them into industry, and find their websites (most likely provided as the email addresses). Visit each site in an industry and work out which ones are just brochures and whoch ones actually take money online (customer signin, has visa paypal on page) Now you have two groups. The brochure-ware group you can approach with examples from the other group saying "your competitors are doing this online - want me to help?" The second group you can approach with "Do you know how many customers visited your site - and I can improve this" (bonus points for actually dividing this group into those who have google analytics and those who dont) No one pays for cool themes anymore (well 20 bucks is not really paying). People will pay through the nose if you up their sales. Try looking at www.kalzumeus.com for an intro.
- vicks711 14y ago
  Sounds like a good idea. I will do this for 3 months and measure my performance. I agree with your point that it is easier to charge money when the problem being solved is business critical.
  - lifeisstillgood 14y ago
    post your results here in three months :-)
    - vicks711 14y ago
      Will do that! If it works I will buy you a beer!

vicks711 14y ago

P.S. Yes I feel a burning desire to program.

lifeisstillgood 14y ago

2K on themes - I have no idea but I suspect not - its a competitive marketplace. I think you can make 2000 USD a month by creating tools for your local businesses. Here is my suggestion: go buy a list of businesses in your area for about 200 USD. You will get something like 5000 businesses for that in suburban area. Split them into industry, and find their websites (most likely provided as the email addresses). Visit each site in an industry and work out which ones are just brochures and whoch ones actually take money online (customer signin, has visa paypal on page) Now you have two groups. The brochure-ware group you can approach with examples from the other group saying "your competitors are doing this online - want me to help?" The second group you can approach with "Do you know how many customers visited your site - and I can improve this" (bonus points for actually dividing this group into those who have google analytics and those who dont) No one pays for cool themes anymore (well 20 bucks is not really paying). People will pay through the nose if you up their sales. Try looking at www.kalzumeus.com for an intro.

vicks711 14y ago
Sounds like a good idea. I will do this for 3 months and measure my performance. I agree with your point that it is easier to charge money when the problem being solved is business critical.
- lifeisstillgood 14y ago
  post your results here in three months :-)
  - vicks711 14y ago
    Will do that! If it works I will buy you a beer!