Hot answers tagged webdev
13
Last time I worked on a project that used an outside design agency, the results were quite good. The one-time costs were high, but not out of line with a fully-loaded employee. To this day (about 4 years later) the site continues to grow using the same basic design.
Some tips:
If I needed design help on a low-budget project, I'd probably outsource to a ...
12
Jeff, I don't mean to be ill mannered, but you're clearly not a technology guy. "Cheap" and "scale easily" don't go together in the same sentence.
There is no way to answer your question. You're not providing a level of detail even nearly close enough to make a solid architecture choice. And even if you did, the most important factor are the people ...
10
1) Do you have written specifications for what he/she will be building?
2) Do you have a written schedule for the building of this web site?
3) Do you have a written set of project deliveries, each of which is supposed to be complete by a specified date?
4) Do you have a written budget for this project?
5) Has the developer agreed to 1 - 4 (above)?
Treating ...
9
So if you apply your idea throughout your company, will you choose to under pay or over pay your taxes? Will you pay too much or too little for office space?
Are you seriously saying you will interview potential employees, come up with a salary and then make it lower or higher? Here's what will happen:
If the pay is lower than normal- you will miss out on ...
8
The small company I work for does almost no marketing directly to the clients that we service. The method we use is to form partnerships with other agencies that are bringing in clients and offer them a service they do not already provide. So if you do the back-end programming really well maybe consider reaching out to design only agencies and offer your ...
8
In my opinion, a startup might consider these points:
Ease of workflow: How quickly can a dev build things with the tools. If using MS Foundation then you have chosen a complete workflow. Why should you break that? Jira will not integrate so well as TF, even when it is nice. If using something else like Java, there is no such workflow and you can chose ...
7
I don't have a site to point you to, but I do have some advice. If a lot of your tasks are small then consider doing them yourself. The overhead of managing small tasks is high when you compare the amount of time it takes to do the work. You have to issue the instructions, manage the progress, check the work etc and it all takes time. Arguably more time than ...
7
this is Nicole from Rent a Coder.
As many have suggested (thank you all), our service is appropriate for hiring workers for this type of work. I'd like to point out a few differences between our service and services like Elance, oDesk, and Guru however, since those differences could influence the success of an outsourced project.
Selection of workers:
The ...
7
Yes, it is possible. If it is difficult depends on the work others have done. IF it is code and follows the "Clean Code" principles aswell as using standard frameworks then it should easy to take over the code.
If the previous programmers did not respect general coding conventions or use exotic frameworks, it might become difficult.
Personally I would ...
5
Do you plan on making actual business of it? Then I'd say – probably not.
The CPM of Google AdSense, and the likes, are usually about 10-25 cents CPM. For bloggers and other low-cost online sites that should cover the basic costs, and even make some money if you're big. To make actual money on a site, you need more than that.
Andrew Chen have written well ...
5
Show prices, but make sure there is a good spread in the prices, so you don't pin yourself down as "cheap" or "high-end".
On the low end you can have standard, non-negotiable packages.
On the high end I guess you do custom projects? If some of your existing customers would permit this, then perhaps write up a case study on some of the larger projects you ...
5
I think hiring locally is always beneficial for several reasons. The biggest being that you can easily consult with the designer on changes in person. Secondly and probably just as important is that if they end up working out really well then you have a local contact who you already have worked with whom you may be able to hire PT or FT when the time ...
5
Earlz gives some nice pointers. I would also add a few question on time constraints:
does the project need to be live at a specific date? It could be a conference and you'd have to factor in time for Call for Papers and attendees registration
how much testing does the client want/can spare? I mean, would you have him/her testing after each iteration of the ...
5
How did you get your current clients? Can you repeat that process? Is it scalable, at least in the short term?
Why do clients choose you over other companies that provide an equivalent service?
What do you do better than other companies?
Are you selling to local companies nearby that you can have a personal relationship with, or are you trying to sell ...
5
If clients comparison shop, they are eventually going to ask, how can you charge so little? You may not have as much over-head as everyone else, but sometimes clients like to pay for those extras: a large team of developers and support staff, strong references, partnerships, certifications, etc. Some may only be able to afford someone on a part-time basis ...
5
I've worked on projects where there was an existing codebase - and sometimes I had to start over from scratch, but usually not. If possible, I prefer to use the existing codebase unless there is a really good reason not to.
A competent programmer, or team of programmers, should be able to inherit code and build on it. This should be the preferred approach, ...
4
I've personally used Elance, oDesk, and Rent-A-coder and local resources. I've had the best results with Rent-A-Coder believe it or not. The design of the site may be Web 1997, but it works.
A few tips for using the online services:
Have a clear-cut design document. Eliminate English slang words
Define your acceptance criteria
Specify if it's ok to use ...
4
I think you should definitely outsource vs. hire someone. Unless that person is going to be busy every day, then you have the great potential of having a headcount that's costly and wastes money. It sounds like the design won't be changing much so outsource it.
I disagree about hiring locally. I've been on both sides (agency and client) involved with web ...
4
This almost belongs on Stack Overflow. But I would ask for more details on what they want the website to do, static or dynamic, and if they have any constraints on platform/technologies (for instance, must run on Windows Server 2008 and use SQL Server). If they are not sure on the platforms or technologies make sure to tell them that they will need to pay ...
4
It's unlikely that you'll be able to find a good local developer for less than $12/hour. In addition to have a compelling product, you'll also want a designer who thinks through the user's experience on the site. You can do a lot of the design work upfront by using a tool such as Balsamiq Mockups to create simple mockups of your website that you can test ...
4
I disagree with bkparikh in some parts of his answer. Think of it like this, when one graduated from a college/university, what are they trying to do? Get a job. What are people with less skills or less experience need? More jobs! The problem with freelancing online on websites such as Elance and Odesk is that, you are not getting awesome developers who are ...
4
Technically I would be wary - if that portal is your product, thnen outsourcing means you dont know what you do (i.e. you keep all the product knowledge outside of the company). This would be different if the portal would be a side service (extranet for a consulting company or something).
Also, you seem to hae a problem with your people.
•Depth of ...
3
You should study the marvellous world of business models (the best reference so far: http://www.businessmodelgeneration.com/) and, if you feel overwhelmed and/or lazy, contact an expert.
The easy way is to try different business models in a short period of time and research which is better for your web page.
3
Web work is collaborative and a personal expression of your business. Often this is best done on a local basis with face to face interaction.
On the other side of the coin, not staying local opens an enormous pool of designers to you. This can be good (lots of choice) and bad (how do you choose?).
3
Are you asking for replacement cost, or are you asking to value it as a business? I know little about Drupal and without going through the site, I would guess that if it is fully functional its replacement cost would be a few thousand dollars ($3K - $5K) at best. It's probably worth more as a business, but you would want to have customers on the platform ...
3
I have outsourced about 30 projects via Rent-a-Coder and Guru 28 of them being successful, and have had the most success with Rent-a-Coder. Their outsourcing process is just more thought through. On Guru, the rating mechanism is flawed because one can see the rating of the other party before you rate yourself. This leads to everyone rating 5 out of 5 because ...
3
"We hate Facebook and Twitter"
I don't think you are in the position to hate some of the most effective marketing tools. Social Media sites aren't just that anymore, they are tools... if you really wanna make something out of your bussiness make an effort and embrace them.
3
I am not 100% sure of the question but will guess it is one of two things:
you want to create a simple form that captures reviews - if so use something like http://www.wufoo.com that will handle the form capture and send you the results via email or downloadable file that you can import into your database.
you want a form that captures your data that looks ...
Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible
