As a website developer, I am always looking for new clients, and recently I decided to start combing Craig's List. At first, I thought I had found this great resource and I would be able to locate new clients without having to advertise, cold-call or be referred by an existing client.
In the end, that does not seem to be. For contract developers not seeking full time employment, Craig's List is a vast wasteland of cheapskates and people who want the world for nothing. I have answered hundreds of postings, even offering my services at cut rates which I would never normally charge, and I still end up losing out to some high school hack designer with no experience because they'll offer to do it for almost no pay.
Or there are the people who have an exxagerated sense of self-importance. Take for example, the guy who offered $1000 for a fairly complicated and large website that he could update himself. It was the type of job I would usually do for around $2500-$3000. He loved my portfolio, I agreed to his price, I gave him a lot of technical knowledge about how this website could be built for that price and still be updatable, etc. and we were in final stages of closing the deal. He then informed me that it was between me and two other people - that's usually par for the course, mind you, so I wasn't surprised by that. Then he asked all three of us to do a mock-up of the home page so he could see what we might do with it. I told him no, that if he wanted to see what I would do he could look at my portfolio, and if that wasn't sufficient, good luck with his project and have a nice day. I had been burned before by spending hours on a mock-up and not getting the job, so I wasn't about to again - at least not for a measly $1000 job that would take many hours to complete beyond the price he wanted to pay. He said he understood, then continued to try to shoplift my ideas on building the site after we had already decided I wasn't going to do the job.
It doesn't help that there are always people who will do the job for whatever someone will pay. But you get what you pay for, and I have seen a lot of postings and talked to a lot of people who have said that they have been burned by flaky designers they found on Craig's List. Well, if they went with the lowest price instead of the most skilled designer with the best portfolio and references, they got what they paid for.
In the end, I have decided to stick with what has worked for me for the last ten years, which is word of mouth references based on my current clients satisfaction. There are more no-talent web jockeys or programmers who think they are designers because they can use Photoshop than ever before, so the web development industry is getting crowded. That's why I will continue to get my jobs from current clients reccomendations, and will stop wasting time on Craig's List competing with the unwashed masses.
