
Why Choose The Freelancer Bootcamp?
The Freelancer Bootcamp is a 3 month bootcamp that teaches you how to build incredible website and work with high paying clients. Our graduates leave this bootcamp with a minimum job rate of £1,200, ready for their first job.
Whether you choose our Coached Freelancer Bootcamp, or Flexi Freelancer, you will leave the course with more than just tech skills. You will leave our courses with the confidence and skills to work with clients, part of a community of freelancers who support you, and lifelong support from us to help you in each phase of your career.
Being a freelance web designer is so much more than making nice websites. It’s about building a marketable brand, understanding the needs of your clients, creating websites that make an impact, and being able to deliver a higher quality product than others in your field.
The Freelancer Bootcamp doesn’t just create web designers, it creates the best web designers!
Comprehensive Coursework With Personal Coaching
Our Coached Freelancer Bootcamp gives you personal support and coaching alongside our comprehensive SMLTB coursework. You get weekly 1:1 and group calls with our tech coaches, to ensure that you feel ready to work with clients after the course.
Weekly deadlines and goal setting means that you stay motivated throughout the course, and don’t feel out of your depth.
Freelancer Bootcamp gives you:
- Access to our Freelance Bootcamp coursework (18 modules and over 100 lessons, packed with knowledge!)
- Weekly one hour coaching sessions with our tech coaches (this can be on tech or freelancing skills)
- Weekly Group calls with Steph, with coaching around of working with clients after the course
- Access to the Freelancer Community Slack (to chat with other students on the same journey)
- Access to our tech support group (get unstuck and find the answers to simple questions any time you need help)
- Access to our website review inbox (submit your site for feedback to see if you’re on the right track)

Start Working With Clients Immediately
Our focus is not just teaching you the best skills - but showing you how to put them to use!
The coached Freelancer Bootcamp is split into two phases: Tech & Freelancing.
- Complete 9 weeks of Tech Training, to teach you how to create awesome websites.
- After this, receive 4 weeks of Freelancer Training while we get you your first paying client.
Our coursework covers setting up your business, creating your social media channels, identifying and pitching to potential clients. We show you how to get clients with your new skills, and land high paying (and fun) jobs in web development.
Starting a freelance career takes more than just having the right skills - we teach you the business and marketing side of working as a freelance web developer. Something that most tech courses don't do!
Course Requirements
Here is what you need to sign up for the course:
- A laptop or desktop with a reasonable amount of memory and the ability to install applications like Zoom
- Most Web development tasks can be completed with 8 GB of RAM, generally, more is better: Try to aim for having at least 16 GB of RAM in your system!
- It's not possible to complete the course on a tablet or Chromebook
- About 5/6 hours of free time during the week to do the coursework
- 1 hour between Monday and Thursday to do your weekly coaching call
No prior technical knowledge or experience is required. When you sign up, you will immediately be able to access some basic HTML, CSS, and Javascript training exercises. These ensure that everyone starts the course with the same basic skills.
Our coursework is designed for all levels. Complete beginners will benefit from helpful how-to video demonstrations, while more experienced students can delve into our advanced modules. You will receive coaching that is personalised to your experience and skill level, to ensure everyone launches with top tier skills.
Course Structure
- Sign up for your preferred start date (view available dates here)
- Get immediate access to the pre-coursework tasks, which teach you basic web development skills (perfect for beginners to web dev)
- A week before your course starts, you will be invited to join our group chat on Slack
- On course kick off day, meet your group virtually on our kickoff Zoom call (this will be recorded if you can't make it)
- Your coursework is released every Saturday morning (in your time zone)
- This is followed by a weekly group call which runs through the tasks for the week and what to expect for the week.
- Work through the weeks tasks in your free time during the week. All tasks and lessons are hosted on the website, so you can log in and work any time.
- Book a mid-week 1:1 or mini-group huddle on a time and date that suits you.
- This call allows you to talk directly with our tech coaches, and get help with your coursework
- If you run into issues between your calls, drop a message in our tech support channel for 24/7 support from our coaches
- On Friday at 6pm (in your time zone), submit your coursework to our dedicated email inbox
- Receive personalised video feedback on your work from our tech coaches
- Work on your website for 9 weeks
- On Launch Day, get your site and your social media launched to over 80k followers on Instagram
- After Launch Day, you receive a month of weekly group calls and Slack support to help you get your first paid client
- Receive templates for pitching, invoicing and emailing clients - as well as call scripts and marketing help
What Will You Learn?
Our Freelancer Bootcamp teaches you the skills to become a kick ass, highly skilled, highly paid, freelance web developer. We take you from 'what the heck is HTML' to launching your first website and working with clients. The course has 10 modules, and over 130 lessons which teach you everything you need to create and launch your first high-spec website.
Our lessons cover:
- Web design basics - The architecture of a self-hosted website
- WordPress - In-depth training on how to use WordPress.org
- Design - how to create a great colour palette and look for your website
- UX - design a website that users love!
- Functionality - learn how to add a booking calendar, shop, membership area and online courses to your websites
- Business Setup - learn how to set up and register your business
- Freelancer Basics - how to communicate well with your clients
- Finding Clients - how to find your dream client and wow them with an incredible pitch
- Pricing your projects - learn the market rate for your skills, and how to price your projects fairly
- Advanced Freelancer Skills - our 'Freelancer Formula' will teach you how to land dream, high paying clients and build long lasting relationships with them
- Freelancer Marketing Skills - learn how to market yourself on social media, to draw in new clients and establish yourself in the market
You will leave our comprehensive and in-depth course with the skills, knowledge, and confidence to begin working with high-paying clients from day one.

Frequently Asked Questions
We have multiple start dates available in 2023, click here to find the one that fits best with your schedule.
You will need a laptop or desktop computer running Windows, MacOS or Linux. A tablet, phone or netbook will not enable you to complete all the tasks on the course.
On the course you will build your own personal portfolio or client website. There are costs associated with building a site which are not covered in the course fee - as these are variable costs depending on what you build. The costs should be billed to your client if you are building a client website, you can advise your client of this before they agree.
- Domain cost: You will need to buy a domain name. These cost anything from €0.99 per year, the cost really just depends on how in-demand the domain name is. To estimate this cost, go to godaddy.com and search for some domain names you are considering for your site (stephwebdesign.com etc).
- Hosting cost: Websites need to be hosted, and there is an annual fee for this. We recommend two options of hosting in the coursework, which we have vetted. These are Hostinger which is €29 per year, and Siteground which is €79 per year.
- Theme: You may opt to buy a theme on the course. This cost is optional, and you will be given free and paid options to choose from which we have checked and vetted. If you buy a theme, the cost is between 29 and €60. This is a lifetime cost, not an annual cost.
If you are working with a client, you can let them know in advance that they would need to pay for these costs. You may also choose to charge your client for completing their website on the course. If so, the normal amount would be €500 on the course - payable when the website is delivered at the end of the course.
I am very please to say that both the Freelancer and Entrepreneur courses are now accredited by the CPD Certification service. You can view the membership details and certification details in the gallery at the top of the page.
When you complete the course, you will be sent a certificate of completion directly from CPD with your name & optionally your company name in it. If you will be using your web design skills to work for your company, it's possible that your company will pay in full or part for your place on the course.
You have two options for the website you will create on the course.
- You can create a personal website, to advertise your freelance development skills to potential clients. If you have other skills & experience you can market these on the website too.
- You can create a website for a client. Some previous students posted on their social media looking for clients, and others created websites for their partner or family members businesses.
If you create a website for yourself, you will be able to use that as a way to market yourself. If you create a website for a client, you will gain experience of working with a client which will be very helpful.
- The course will teach you how to build self-hosted WordPress websites from scratch.
- It will teach you how to find clients, pitch for work, gather client requirements, and set your pricing.
- You will be given a basic introduction to four key web development languages: HTML, CSS, JavaScript & PHP and how these can be used to customise your website.
When your 3 month course is finished, you will be invited to join the SMLTB Graduate community, to support you in your freelancing career. Graduates receive:
- 6 Months post-course access to all coursework (free)
- Lifetime access to our tech support Slack channel, where you can ask questions to the tech coaches (free)
- Lifetime access to our 'doc review' inbox, where you can send websites, proposals, pitches, and any client communication for review from tech coaches (free)
- Quarterly developer calls to keep you updated with latest trends and what's happening in the world of tech & design (free)
- Continued access to your Slack group chat with your intake and the coaches (free)
- You can pay €5.99 to retain access to the coursework, with all updates (we update the coursework a lot as things change and new tools are introduced)
- A graduate code to get 50% off all non-coached courses and online training on the site
- A graduate booking calendar, where you can book paid (£55 per hour) tech calls with coaches anytime for dedicate technical coaching or support
You will always have the opportunity to reach out to your coaches for advice, support, and tech support!
We teach students all over the world, and our course is structured to work with any timezone. Group calls take place at 9am Irish / Uk time, but these are recorded if any students can't make them. A recording is sent to the Slack group chat after the call ends. For weekly 1:1 calls, our coaches are based over 2 timezones, so we pretty much have most hours between Mon - Thursday available for you to book. Your coursework is hosted online, so you can study anytime!
If you want to learn how to build great websites, but not jump straight into freelancing, then that's totally fine! The final 4 weeks of freelancer coaching are optional, and you can finish the course when the tech phase is over. You will still receive your CPD cert, all graduate community access, and support.
You will be sent recordings to the freelancer coaching calls, if you do ever decide to start freelancing!
We get it, tech can be intimidating! But it's also a fantastic career path for someone who wants freedom and travel in their life. We would suggest trying our free coding challenges to see if you enjoy tech, or book in a 20 minute chat with one of our coaches to chat about the course and see if it's a good fit.
If you can't finish the course with your group, for any reason, then you will be offered alternative options for finishing. You can continue to access the coursework, and choose an alternative launch date when you are ready. You will remain in the SMLTB tech support Slack groups, and receive online coaching from our coaches. You will receive all call recordings from your intake, to watch when you return to the coursework.