invoice automation. tested perfectly. deployed confidently. day 3: "nothing is processing" the problem: gmail auth expired. workflow silently failed. no alerts. no retries. nothing. client discovered it when invoices piled up. i discovered it when client messaged me. so embarrassing. THE FIX added error handling in 20 minutes: - retry 3 times if extraction fails - slack alert if still broken - failed invoices go to review sheet also added daily summary: "processed 47 invoices, 2 failed" so i know before client does lesson: test for success. build for failure. anyone else learn error handling the hard way?

I’m sure I’m not the first one realizing this, but the more different types of people you work with, the more you start to see who is a good fit and who isn’t. The perfect-fit client will be so happy with the results that they’ll come back for more. So a $100 client turns into $1000 for me instead. Also, offering things for free is a must. I call it the pizza effect. If you’ve ever been to a pizzeria in Sweden, the guys working behind the counter will joke with you and take care of you in a way that makes you want to go back. At the end of the day, I’ve noticed that some of my older clients come back because they enjoy working with me and because, at times, I’ll offer free services and handle things for them. I know most people hate offering free things, but it’s a huge unlock if you can do it. I worked for free for 3 months and got a $1500 contract afterward, plus shares in a company. If you’re the type of person who can overdeliver while working for free, and you’ve done it before, keep doing it. Besides that I'm in a perfect loop of do more > get better > client gets happy > clients come back and order more

Just landed a new client to help activate a workflow on n8n. But instead of being a simple job of activating a template he found on n8n… It turned out to be, “hey can we change this and add this?” So in the end, we went from “just activate this workflow” to “I need to build out extra workflows and create new logic for things to work.” Here’s the thing: I know the deal is dead. Because if I don’t 100% satisfy him, I’ll get a 1–4 star rating, and anything besides 5 stars is bad on Upwork. I don’t want to risk my score, so instead of continuing, I dropped the project and handed over the work I already did so he can keep at it. But the lesson I’ve learned is this: it’s so important to have repeat customers and 5-star ratings. If it’s not possible, it’s best to drop out right away. Because one-off customers or constantly getting new customers is not a great place to be. The goal should be to have people return. Which is why when one of my earlier clients came back and said, “hey I have another project,” I knew I did a good job. Because I didn’t need to sell him on working with me, he simply asked for help. So for me, the goal is: how many people can return for a second round or even more after the first project? Because at that point, it’s easy money.

Hey everyone I was enjoying this community and started building my business but I keep thinking that I am doing way too much too soon and I want to get on a call with someone that is actually making money with this to basically share my thoughts and see if they hold water, I have a background in sales so I am happy to help anyone if you have any questions towards the sales side of businesses. If anyone would be down to do this shoot me a message 😁

Some lessons I’ve learned this week: - When it comes to automating, a huge chunk of it is about bringing people back to reality about what’s possible and what’s not. - There is always some edge case. Even when a job sounds easy on paper, there’s always a curveball. - The more work I have, the less time I have to get more jobs. - Know your inputs for how to get jobs. If you don’t know these, it will never work.