Ask HN: Finding data science and analysis contract work

What type of consulting do you do? Are you familiar with any specific industry vertical? How do you get clients for your consulting business? Acquiring contract work in data science is no different that selling in your business. It is same as selling any other consulting services.

In my experience, it is very difficult to get data science and analysis work (except in tech/web analytics) unless you understand a specific industry segment. I have been able to get data analysis contract work by focusing on a specific industry niche.

Identify a niche, do data analysis in that niche on your own, share your findings with the people working in your niche, participate on forums in your niche. Stay patient, keep diving in data analysis for your niche, and leads will come to you. Clients need to know you exist, you know their business, and you have unique/interesting insights that can help them in their business.

Become a data-backed industry specialist instead of just a generic data scientist/analyst. Kaggle, Elance and oDesk are not worth spending time on for data analysis work unless you see a project in your targeted niche.

This is a medium-term investment of time, but my advice is to network. In my experience, personal connections are the best way to find the kind of work you want consistently. Show up to user groups, recruiting events, conferences, seminars. Work with recruiters to get started if you need to, but be sure to make connections with every client with whom you come into contact (posting on HN counts as networking too, I think).

Email me. I could def. hire you for a few small jobs - michael at realpython dot com.