242. How To Become an Independent Software Developer

[@JigneshKhatri95]

Nice explanation and tips to get started with Indie development, Tim. But, the main part of it is "customers" or "clients". How do we get them as an indie developer who is just getting started? Where do we find them? Platforms like Upwork, freelancer, etc. are already packed up. LinkedIn also doesn't seem to be working.

[@IAmTimCorey]

Point #3 - build up your network of contacts. That means go out and meet people. Go to meetups, join the chamber of commerce, volunteer at a food pantry, participate in the city council, volunteer at a church, etc. Find out where business people are and then meet them. Work alongside them. Meet fellow developers. These are all things you do locally, not online. In the online apps, you are competing with the world. In your town or city, you are competing with very few other people/groups. In a lot of cases, you will be the only developer people know that is offering their services. That is much better odds. It will take time and you shouldn't just be doing things to pitch your services, but over time it will be an incredibly valuable network of relationships.

[@faisalalhoqani6151]

Great episode thank you, dear Tim, and keep it up.

[@IAmTimCorey]

Thank you!

[@khaledbika2169]

Mr. Tim, I thank you because you have addressed several sensitive points. Your perspective resonates with many developers in the USA. However, in other countries, we suffer from numerous issues: The work of developers is no longer protected by law. Fierce competition arises from Asian countries. Major corporations no longer trust independent developers and instead turn to well-known companies, for example, in the ERP market or in data storage and protection. Independent developers find themselves caught between a rock and a hard place, even though large firms rely on them to find solutions. But the competition is tough.

[@IAmTimCorey]

Unless I am misunderstanding, all of those apply to US-based developers as well. There are a few keys to overcoming these issues. One, stand out from the crowd. If you do the same thing as everyone else, you will get treated poorly. You need to be better at something. Sometimes, that can be as simple as a personalized service rather than the faceless work of big corporations. Two, focus on the smaller niches. Don't try to land the huge jobs with the large companies. Focus on helping out small businesses. Offer them services that they cannot afford from the large companies. Help them succeed. Three, turn your services into a commodity. Package up what you do in a way that allows you to resell custom code more than once and it allows your customers to get a semi-custom solution for a fraction of the price. Everyone wins.

[@ericritter46]

2:20 - oh yes. I tried putting my first app onto the Microsoft app store and it was a learning curve. I still haven't successfully gotten it uploaded, either.

[@IAmTimCorey]

It definitely is a learning curve. Once you get it, it becomes easier.

[@petrzurek5713]

Love the Tim-shirt!

[@IAmTimCorey]

Thanks!

[@sohanrahman1897]

Thank you ❤

[@IAmTimCorey]

You are welcome.

[@domingos_m]

Interesting. Thank you Tim for these tips

[@IAmTimCorey]

You are welcome.

[@Nessy211]

Loved that! Thanks.

[@IAmTimCorey]

You are welcome.

[@waqarkabir]

Thanks for sharing. I think I am already on this way.

[@IAmTimCorey]

You are welcome.

[@cissemy]

Hi Tim Do you recommend a sole proprietorship for that ? You do not want to hand over for social sec.# to every customer.

[@IAmTimCorey]

There is a balance you need to work through. When I started, I was a sole proprietorship with just my Social Security Number as my identifier. In the US, you don't need to get an EIN under certain circumstances. That was the best solution at first. An EIN is very similar to an SSN, so either way you are giving customers sensitive information. But yes, I recommend a sole proprietorship and keeping your business and personal taxes together for as long as possible. It keeps your tax payments much simpler. I also recommend getting a good accountant that can help you navigate all of this.

[@adam4733]

Great job Tim!

[@IAmTimCorey]

Thank you!

[@runtimmytimer]

When I started my first business I had 2 years of living expenses stuck away in a money market account. That fallback was essential to being able to focus on the business rather than focusing on eating. When I went full time I was at around 50% income replacement. I've been debt free, house and everything since 2009. It's the greatest thing ever. So I agree 100% with everything you've said. I've been down that road and have the tshirt to prove it.

[@IAmTimCorey]

Thanks for sharing!

[@michaelastl]

I agree, most important thing is: get the money right.

[@IAmTimCorey]

It will make or break your business.

[@codefoxtrot]

Trying to go independent sounds like a nightmare. Everywhere I've worked where a service provider or contractor was involved or previously involved, the solution(s) look like spaghetti vomit. I feel like contractors take no pride, lack principles, lack necessary skills, and lack ownership or attention to detail. If I were a contractor, I feel like I would struggle to focus across multiple clients while simultaneously trying to deliver work done the right way-following proper conventions, sound architectural decisions, and well-established design patterns. I believe quality software requires true ownership. Only a dedicated steward can deliver solutions that are not just functional, but also scalable, cohesive, reliable, and designed to evolve.

[@IAmTimCorey]

I think that's an unfair assessment of contractors. I've worked with a lot and I'm friends with even more of them. They deeply care about doing things the right way. However, code does not get written in a vacuum. Imagine you own a business. You want an application written. The consultant says it will take one year and cost $500,000 to complete. If, as the owner, you could squeeze them into agreeing to 6 months and $250,000, wouldn't you do that? Of course. Now as the owner, you don't understand code quality. You just understand that the code works. That's one possibility. Another likely possibility is that the owner kept asking for more changes as they went. This caused the original, carefully laid plan to get overwritten and changed multiple times. That led to a mess of workarounds to reuse what they could. Along with these is the possibility that things didn't go well in the initial build. Maybe some assumptions were wrong. Maybe code took longer to write in certain sections. That meant that the deadline to get the code done was quickly approaching and they didn't have enough time for everything so they rushed. If you have ever built software in production in more than a couple of different environments, you recognize each of these scenarios (and more). Writing code in production is hard. It is almost never neat and tidy. It is messy, buggy, and convoluted. However, every line of code has a story and rarely is that story that the developer just didn't care about quality.

[@codefoxtrot]

@@IAmTimCorey In my experience there are significantly more terrible contractors than there are good ones. You're correct, of course, that my comment need not apply to all contracting, but allow me to explain my perspective. Firstly, the corner-cutting/cost-cutting, changing requirements, competing and changing priorities applies, in my opinion, apply much more to a full-time employee than it does a contractor. Contracts keep parties to agreements, and full-time employees don't have the luxury-- the boss can change the priorities, requirements or design, anytime they wish. Although I work for the company, I really work for my boss. Though as a competent employee, I would never allow my boss to cut corners on security and vulnerabilities, at least to the best I can anticipate them. Which brings the next point, using your example of a business negotiating with a consultant to cut costs and timeframe in half. I would expect a good consultant to accurately articulate the trade-offs of that decision, including the short and long-term effects it will have. If both parties agree, then fine. However, if the contractor can't articulate the trade-offs, or is uncomfortable with them, they should not enter into the agreement. Contractors have to become somewhat of an expert at contracts and language within the contract. Obviously situational dependent, but a change in project direction or scope will impact the agreed-upon timelines, so either the work is much more straightforward, or the contract must allow some ambiguity and re-negotiation along the way. Personally, I would be a bit nervous about building myself enough protections, while remaining flexible and not allowing the company to railroad my reputation. Software isn't finite anymore. A contractor could deliver a brand-new system or application, the contract could be completed, and a week later there's a critical CVE in a nuget package. Unless maintenance is attached the contract, the brand-new system is flawed from the start. Systems today are never finished and require periodic maintenance. Advantage to the FT employee who is there to take care of that. Contractors can be divided into several categories-- onshore vs offshore and independents vs service providers. For offshore, whether you prefer it or not, there are cultural barriers. I find larger organizations prefer the cheaper costs associated with offshore development, but frankly, depending on where that development takes place, the quality is typically lower. Again, it's not an all or none thing, but the general sentiment holds. Also, independent developers feel more caring and tenacious compared to service providers. However, quite common I find with individual contractors are the, "one trick wonders". That is, every solution is from the same template. No matter what you need, you always get an MVC 5 app on .NET Framework using jQuery, even in 2024-25. A company I worked for in 2022 received a new reporting app from a contractor written in Web Forms. Out of principle, I rewrote about 80% of the app in server-side Blazor in a week, just to prove a point to the boss. Overall, I find contractors a bit like doordash- the drivers tend to pickup more capacity than they can handle reasonably delivering, and for anyone who notices, they just pass the blame along to the restaurant. When someone is trying to juggle multiple customers and deadlines, there is an inevitable loss of quality. So while I agree my assessment was potentially unfair, it's not unfounded. In fact, I would go one step further and say, while contracting will always exist, it will always be inferior work, because it has an expiry date, and modern software development is continuous.

[@rikudouensof]

Where did this intro come from? Nice!

[@IAmTimCorey]

We had it made by a designer.