I've been writing / editing technical blogs for the past decade, and I found that the key thing is to be engaging.
Most technical blog posts are boring. They look like documentation.
My best technical blog posts were the ones where I added personal stories about how I used the library/framework I was referring to.
The best advice from OP is to hire an editor. Especially for non-native English speakers (like me). A good editor can transform "good" technical content into exceptional content.
With a limited company generating £100k/year in revenue, I’m curious how much a contractor would earn after salary tax? (assuming no admin/accounting costs)
In my understanding, it's not that it's illegal to hire a person as a contractor, it's just that it can be re-qualified by a judge as an employee, if some working conditions are met.
For example in France, which is known for its labor code that protects employees much better than other countries, here are some conditions that can lead to this:
- Proven relationship of subordination
- The contractor is only working for your company
- Poorly written contract (specifically, obligation of means vs obligation of results)
There are many other studies like these every year in France, for many different positions in tech.
Here is a TLDR.
A junior dev (0-2 years of experience):
- Paris: 35-45k€
- Big cities: 35-40k€
- Outside of big cities: 32-38k€
A confirmed dev (3-5 years of experience):
- Paris: 45-60k€
- Big cities: 40-46k€
- Outside of big cities: 38-45k€
Senior (5 years+):
- Paris: 55k+€
- Big cities: 45-55k€
- Outside big cities: 45-50k€
Note that these salaries are "brut", meaning there are 23% of various taxes (income tax not included), unemployment taxes, social security, retirement etc.
On top of that, France as one of the highest income tax rate in the world.
I think it really depends on what kind of software business you want to create.
For example, being a solo founder running a profitable bootstrapped SaaS business requires different skills than a venture-backed B2C social mobile app!
If you want the former, I suggest you read interviews and follow companies on IndieHacker: https://www.indiehackers.com/
You'll find lots of resources and case studies of people that made the switch from developer to founder.
I quit my software developer job two years ago to build a SaaS API business with a co-founder. We're at $4500 MRR and we are documenting almost everything we do: https://www.indiehackers.com/product/scrapingninja
About business books, Traction[1] is a must-have in my opinion as a developer. You'll learn a lot about marketing, which is often the problem most developers face when launching their first company.
I also love "Start small stay small, A developer’s guide to launching a startup with no outside funding" by Rob Walling.
If you need solid advice in terms of code & technology choice/architecture to launch a startup, you should read Hello Startup.[3]
With these three books, you'll have a solid understanding of what to build, how to build, and how to market your software.
It's not just about the content, but the typography, the style, illustrations...
I don't know why but I'm more and more sensitive with the general reading experience.
I know the results are biased given it's a sample from OP inbox but I'm surprised not so see https://postmarkapp.com/ here. I thought they were pretty popular.