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Ready to build a thriving freelance business doing what you love? Read the articles below to leverage my 20+ years of experience freelancing and start your own journey to freelance freedom.

What WordPress Theme Should Developers Use?

I used the wrong WordPress theme for about 3 years and it made my life miserable. Finally, I switched it

What Elance and oDesk Won’t Tell You About Freelancing on Their Sites

Have you experienced this too? I know the company line, but this seems to be more of the reality they

Need help with MySQL?

I’ll keep this short this week because my wife is out of town again so it’s just me and this

Do You Have the Geek Gene?

Do you have the “geek gene”? Find out in this video, then check out the full episode for my step-by-step

I’d never heard anyone talk like that before – This Week on JMO.com

The guy obviously knew what he was talking about… I’d just never heard anything like it before. And, as I

The Truth About the Complete Web Developer Course 2.0 by Rob Percival

This is my review of Rob Percival’s Complete Web Developer Course 2.0 on Udemy. I’m writing this review because I

What Makes Elance Clients Say Yes – This Week on JohnMorrisOnline.com

Lots going on on JMO.com this week. Here’s a recap: A lot of web designer asking the wrong question about

Mark Zuckerberg

4 Keys to Developing a Profitable Web Application

Building a profitable web application is often the fastest way to notoriety as a developer (just ask Mark Zuckerberg or

7 Steps to Get New Web Design Clients on Autopilot

When I first got into the online business/internet marketing space (way back in 2004) one of the ideas I saw

WARNING: Are You Ruining Your Career by Following This Common Piece of Freelancing Advice?

When I first entered the web design world, I felt like a fish out of water. For a long time,

How can a newbie freelancer become popular in freelancing websites?

Watch on YouTube: http://youtu.be/RpgTS3VZltA Listen on SoundCloud: http://soundcloud.com You gain popularity by doing more work and getting good reviews and recommendations

My Closest Friends Said I’d Never Make It as a Web Designer… Then I Did This!

In this episode of the John Morris Show, I teach you how to use Elance and ODesk to build a

How to Avoid Clients From Hell BEFORE They Ever Hire You

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/164185751″ params=”color=2eaef0&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /] Some clients just suck. There’s really no nice way to put it. Learning

How to Get Your First Web Design Client (Step #2 is especially important)

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/162810026″ params=”color=2eaef0&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /] Getting your first PAID web design client is the most important action you can

How to Position Yourself to Get More Freelance Jobs

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/161948278″ params=”color=2eaef0&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /] I was recently asked: “How do I fill out my profile on sites

Most Web Designers Don’t Do This… But It’s How I Get 99% of My Freelance Jobs

Most freelancers and web designers immediately roll their eyes when I say the word, “branding”. Mostly because they’re thinking of

The Most Important Freelance Job Getting Activity You’re Not Doing

Most web designers don’t this. Most web designers think it’s dumb or not necessary. Most web designers roll their eyes when I

2014 Trends That Could Make You Obsolete, Should You Use Code Frameworks, and How to Attract High-Paying Clients Using Content

Segment 1: Web Design Trends You Need to Watch Out For (2:56) Several years ago when the “Web 2.0” movement

How to Get Hired on Elance and oDesk

Why You’re Not Getting Hired on Elance and oDesk When I first started out on Elance, I really had no

Be Remarkable… Or Don’t Be a Coder

remarkable(adj): worthy of attention; unlikely or surprising; likely to be noticed It was Iraq 2005 and there was a girl

Separation of Concerns, MVC, and How to Get Started as a Freelance Coder

Build Better Websites Using a Separation of Concerns Easily one of the biggest mistakes new coders make… inter-mingling content, presentation,

Why Does Coding Take Forever to Learn? You’re Making THIS Mistake

This cost me 4 years of my life… 4 years I could have been doing what I loved for a

Have You Lost Your Passion for Coding?

Ever felt unmotivated or uninspired while working on a project? You felt it at first… you were super excited to

Stage 1: How to Discover Your Passion

These 5 steps fast-track your coding career

One of the biggest mistakes I think coders make is getting so caught up in the technical side of their

I Was Lost and Didn’t Know What to Do Next…

A few years ago, I was really lost in my coding career. I had spent so much time mastering the

How to Set Yourself Apart and Get Clients to Chase You

Several years ago, I was in a really tough spot with my freelance coding business. I kept getting undercut by

How I Get Clients to Chase Me

Notes: Here’s the link to Michael Hyatt’s FREE Platform Revolution Series: http://j.mp/1gaFYwX The transcript of this video is posted below for

Interview With Mike Lopez: How to Build Scalable PHP Applications Using Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) Concepts

In this video, Mike Lopez of WishList Products explains how to use OOP concepts to make your applications scalable and

Interview With Mike Lopez: What Happens When You Don’t Use Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) To Build Your PHP Applications

In this video, I interview Mike Lopez of WishList Products (the creator of WishList Member) and discuss the value of

Why Outsourcing Is Your Fault

Why YOUR Freelance Jobs are Getting Outsourced to Someone Who’ll Do It Cheaper

The answer: You’re not branding yourself effectively. If you were, your potential clients would never hire another developer just because they’re

Justin Bieber: Bad-Ass Coder?

Justin Bieber Should Learn How to Code

Apparently, the Biebs was arrested this morning in Miami for drag racing and driving under the influence. If you’ve paid

Give Up Coding

Should You Just Give Up Learning How to Code?

I was recently asked: Man… I truly hope I can just know what to do at some point without having

Handling Checkboxes in PHP Forms

PHP Multiple Checkbox Array Handling

I tend to get a lot of questions around checkbox handling when submitting forms to PHP. Here’s a simple snippet

Why I Code

Why I Code

It was mid-June 2011 in Texas. I had just been released from Active Duty for the Army and was on

Bring back single column

Force a Single (2, 3, 4…) Column Dashboard Layout in WordPress 3.8

Prior to WordPress 3.8, you had the option to select the number of columns you wanted on your admin dashboard.

PHP Prepared Statements Class

A Simple PHP Class For Prepared Statements in MySQLi

Prepared statements are all the rage right now in PHP development… and for good reason. Not only do prepared statements

How to Get a Post Thumbnail Source URL in WordPress

How to Get the Post Thumbnail Source URL in WordPress

Often, when working with WordPress, you’ll find the need to grab a post’s thumbnail source URL. Unfortunately, the_post_thumbnail() and get_the_post_thumbnail()

How to Use Media Queries

How to Use Media Queries to Build a Responsive Web Site

Media queries are the cornerstone of responsive web design. They are what make the kind of advanced responsive design we

Coding Isn't For You

Coding Isn’t For You

I’ve been coding for almost 10 years now and I’m finally fully embracing that coding isn’t for me. It’s taken

Responsive Web Design

How to Fail in 2014

Brace for impact. As we near the end of 2013, you’re going to be hit with an onslaught of “how

PHP Code Snippet

How to Calculate an Age By Birthday Using PHP

This PHP function accepts a birthday as a parameter and will return the age based on that birthday. Handy for

How Fear Can Kill Your Coding Career and How You Can Easily Overcome It

How Fear Can Kill Your Coding Career and How You Can Easily Overcome It

[powerpress] How to Subscribe to the Podcast Subscribe on iTunes Subscribe on Stitcher (Android) Subscribe via RSS It’s Really All

How Targeting Can Trump Credibility as a Freelancer

How Targeting Can Trump Credibility As a Freelancer

[powerpress] Awhile back, I posted a video talking about how you can make more money in web design by laser-targeting

Genesis Theme: Move Navigation to Top of Page

Genesis: Move Navigation to Top

Here’s a little code snippet to move the primary navigation in the Geneses theme to the top of your pages:

Dead End

WordPress Plugins Are Dead

iOS and Android have forever changed what people expect from their technology. For the most part, however, that wave of expectations

PHP Prepared Statements

Should I Use mysqli_real_escape_string With Prepared Statements in PHP?

Graham recently asked me: Do I still need to used mysqli_real_escape_string when used prepared statements in PHP? The simple answer

How to Stop Procrastinating

How Being Lazy Can Help You Stop Procrastinating

Listen to the Full 30-Minute Podcast Version [powerpress] Let me give you an example: Yesterday, I was feeling completely burnt

John Morris TV Episode 001

How to Make More Money in Web Design

Listen to the Full 30-Minute Podcast Version [powerpress] Are You Losing Money Trying to Be Everything to Everybody? I have

How Wealthy Developers REALLY Succeed

You know, I’ve spent a lot of time teaching coders technical skills. How to upload files using PHP, how to

Hi, I’m John. I’m a freelance web developer and online teacher. I help aspiring freelance web developers go full-time as freelancers. I’m on the social media sites below and look forward to connecting with you there.

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