这个梗是什么意思

Question

I'm a programmer and I have a year of experience in building small projects for clients. I've always tried to give my 100% on client projects and many times hit the GitHub codespaces monthly free usage limit.

But I find it hard to commit to my own side projects. I start with tons of motivation but eventually it dies out and starts to feel like a grind due to the lack of payment and I never end up finishing it. I've got a pretty empty portfolio because of this and I currently have to depend on word of mouth for getting clients.

I'm thinking of starting a blog where I can just talk about anything tech related on my mind. Or I could post about specific problems and how I found their solutions.

I feel like clients would be interested in seeing how my thought process for programming functions and will be impressed by my posts. I learn a lot from other people's own blogs so this would also be a way for me to give back to the community.

But I don't know if this would be sufficient to convince clients that I can actually finish what they pay me to code.

Answer 1

This all depends on your purpose for doing either of them.

If your purpose is to convince clients that you can solve their problems, then you need to get something in front of those potential clients. Few clients look to GitHub first when looking for software help. Some look there after you have contacted them in some other way (if you point them to your portfolio).

A blog is useful only if people read it. Thus, you would need to promote the blog till you get quite a number of readers. The reason most blogs are not read is because the authors don't promote them.

You might benefit from turning the problem around. Ask who are your potential clients and where do they get information about software help. The next step is to put information into that channel.

For example, if your potential clients are in the local area and they get information from their existing contacts, then joining the local Chamber of Commerce and participating in all the events, speaking up at networking breakfasts, etc. will put information into the local contacts. Over a couple of years, a lot of people will have heard about you.

Another option is to send out an email newsletter where you ask each person if they would like to receive it. (Don't buy a mailing list as the places that send out email newsletters are quite touchy about that. Mailing lists that you can buy are full of outdated email addresses and many of the rest of the people on those lists resent getting new newsletters.)

If, on the other hand, your purpose in building code on GitHub is for your own gratification or to give back to the programming community, then build what you like and put it up there. My GitHub has projects that I wrote for my own use.