Full Stack Dev, InfoSec Specialist, and Insurance Carrier?

[AlfaStream]

So to be short, web design/development and multimedia has been a long standing "hobby" of mine, along with an obsession in information security, particularly, social engineering, and web application pentesting.

As of recent; I've taken a few courses, including the straight line system from Jordan Belfort, and Chris Voss's Program surrounding negotiation.

I'm thinking about bundling everything I've got together; however pricing seems to be the thing kicking my a$$.

 

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[LaneMan]

Take on a couple projects and see how it goes. Don't worry about pricing at the beginning because right now people don't trust you and will only pay the bare minimum.

 

[Rabby]

Can you focus on back end development, front end development, database design, database security, pen testing, and multimedia (streaming? hosting? creation?) all at the same time?

Bundling might be a long term strategy, but if you're starting out as one person, you might want to do the opposite. Focus, niche down enough that your service is easy to understand. Meet the people who focus on those other things (the ones you're not doing) and get their referrals.

Very few companies are trying to be an MSP, pen tester, auditor, web developer, etc all at once. If nothing else, because all the task switching, non-standard process, and vague marketing would bleed them dry.

 

[AlfaStream]

Can you focus on back end development, front end development, database design, database security, pen testing, and multimedia (streaming? hosting? creation?) all at the same time?

Bundling might be a long term strategy, but if you're starting out as one person, you might want to do the opposite. Focus, niche down enough that your service is easy to understand. Meet the people who focus on those other things (the ones you're not doing) and get their referrals.

Very few companies are trying to be an MSP, pen tester, auditor, web developer, etc all at once. If nothing else, because all the task switching, non-standard process, and vague marketing would bleed them dry.

Honestly, yes this is possible for me. I've been an IT hobbyist since age 14, my focus has been web technology, and infosec. I've been through a trade school to become a web dev, and even a boot camp for a programming company, though they went with another candidate. I've managed to nail down SQL, familiarity with MS-SQL, MySQL, HTML, XHTML, HTML5, CSS, CSS3, Javascript, Jquery, PHP, C# (and its use with MVC 5 for 'razor') for developing applications for IIS servers, my biggest obsession with infosec however is not web based pen testing, I love social engineering, however I am adept with security audits, and looking for things such as different types of SQLi, XSS, LFI/RFI, etc, etc. Including configuration of WAF's, Maintaining Servers, Installing different types of web server daemons such as setting up NGINX, and Apache Webservers.

Is this is not something adept to solopreneuring?

 

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[Rabby]

How do you know you're adept at security audits? I like your confidence, but if I were a customer I would want to know what audits you have done on other companies to make that claim.

Any of those things is fine for solopreneuring. Having exposure to them is useful, so that you can understand the things you're interfacing with. However, you can't focus on all of them. Being broader doesn't necessarily make your business offering better. In many cases it makes it seem confusing and unlikely to the customer.

Are they hiring you to do a security audit, or to call their secretary at home and try to get her password, or to set up an nginx server to stream video? No one customer wants you to do all of these things right now (probably), and mentioning too much of what they don't want makes them evaporate.

PS: I'm poking in the spirit of helpfulness. Read it as a challenge, but a good natured one.