Web developer/coder or investor needed

Nipaco

Hi all,
This is my first post so I hope I'm not breaking those rules and posting correctly.
Ill keep this to the point.
Setting up new online web company with high potential. I need either an investor or someone with the web building skills of a coder.
There is no up front payment, but substantial profit share for help in getting this up and running. Thanks

jhegarty

This will not end well.

YouBuyLocal

You are about to get slated for being so presumptuous as to think your idea is worth the time and effort of a programmer, who fundamentally believes that he/she will be doing all of the work while you do all the 'easy business stuff'.

Just get a cheap office and bring in 3 or four interns. Tell them that depending upon what they achieve and how well you work together there is the possibility of earning in a stake in the company, a profit-share arrangement or a full-time job, depending on lots of variables and circumstances that you will have to work out wisely. Develop the site as much as possible and when you have it at a certain stage a developer may come in to baby-sit them in a profit-sharing arrangement to develop the sites more complex elements.

You'll get a decent response from http://www.gradireland.com and its free. You need a place to put them though so get an office.

Use open-sourced or free platforms if you can, there many open-sourced or platforms with dedicated communities that can really help your interns. The interns may develop over the period to be perfectly competent, especially because they will be learning as a team and you can then decide if they are worth giving an equity stake to or a share of the profits.

Good luck dude, and don't worry about some of the "advice" you are about to get

Nipaco

Genie Mac I wasn't expecting that. Youbuylocal, thankyou for your reply. My post maybe should have been more detailed. I have zero knowledge or experience in the web field and as such I need someone who does. A platform to me is at the train station and that's how bad I am. I am however very qualified for the industry concerned with the website. I don't presume that a programmer do all the hard work, believe me if I could do it confidently I'd be all over it. There is strong possibility for high returns on this and I will explain the idea only to serious parties in private, they can either say yes or no after that. I appreciate your help, and for the heads up :-)

Nipaco

Just checked out the gradireland site and perhaps that may be a solution for me. This is a start up with no funding yet and so cannot take on overheads this early. I think could start small scale with maybe templatemonster and such but even for this I would need guidance. Maybe a student just out of college would have the time to do it, or give me a few hrs a day for a week which would be paid.

DrivingTestTips: Brian

Nipaco wrote: »

Just checked out the gradireland site and perhaps that may be a solution for me. This is a start up with no funding yet and so cannot take on overheads this early. I think could start small scale with maybe templatemonster and such but even for this I would need guidance. Maybe a student just out of college would have the time to do it, or give me a few hrs a day for a week which would be paid.

There are so many ways of having a website I would say we need an idea of the business idea. Is it selling online, advertising, community, and so on.
Just give us some idea.

Nipaco

Sure. In the long run (1 year) it is quite a large job but if we find ourselves doing it all it means the money is there to take on staff, overheads and of course profit. We can get started by just doing a small section (ten or so pages). I could describe its functionality as kind of how Facebook or a dating site works, ie, profiles and ability to upload and run your own profile, with ecommerce. I can't think of a site that does what I'm after exactly but I'm sure it can be done. Does that help any ?

YouBuyLocal

8 months ago I was in the position you are in now, almost exactly. Now I am developing the platform with 3 interns on board and a technical advisor that is one of the top young tech-entrepreneurs in the country.

You will get a lot of scepticism here, over whether a non-tech-person can build a tech-business. But a massive amount of all web-businesses is understanding the market, and therefore it is in the interests of tech-people to partner with people who understand niche industries.

You need to find an open-minded ambitious tech-person. That is hard if you are not in the right circles. It was complete luck for me. If you are driven enough though, and you are objective and dispassionate about the business model, market need & revenue streams, then you'll get there.

I wouldn't go to GradIreland if you don't have an office and can't be perfectly 100% clear on what you want someone to build. Interns are not self-motivated by nature, they need support and direction, and are not usually willing to work on a team for something they don't understand. They mostly want to gain experience and move on to a well-paid corporate position.

You could, on the other hand, go to all of the colleges and talk to some lecturers about your idea. They might help you find a decent final year student. Don't worry about telling people your idea (not on a forum obviously) but one-to-one you can tell anybody, it will only hold you back to be cagey about it.

Again, Goodluck

Nipaco

That I can see is some great advice, thanks a lot. And it only encourages me to hear a story like yours. A "make it happen" mentality will always do well. Congrats

DrivingTestTips: Brian

YouBuyLocal wrote: »

Interns are not self-motivated by nature, they need support and direction, and are not usually willing to work on a team for something they don't understand. They mostly want to gain experience and move on to a well-paid corporate position.

I love this! lol

I think YouBuyLocal has given you great advice there.

I program my websites now because I had problems with a programmer, so make sure you understand as much as you can and have the hosting account in your name, Url in your name and know what CMS is used "ie, CRE_Loaded".

If you know the CMS and it is an open source CMS you could move to another programmer with ease.

Nipaco

Your dead right there. I'm actually 18 months trying to do this. The first programmer I had was just outta college but lacked the motivation. His share by the business plan was worth 36k tr 1 all going well and would rise substantially on growth. How much more motivation do you need ? Turned up late and hung over for most our meetings. I got another since but they spent nearly 2 hrs of a 3 hour meet arguing with me over the collie scheme. Now as I said I know more about space travel than web building but seems to me you need to have built a car before you paint it. I had a full story board done and he didn't even bother looking at it. I can tell he doesn't have the time nor the interest. I already own the domains .ie .com .co.uk and have cms ( I got the cms he told me to get). So now I have a business model which is a no brainer, willing to share a lifetime profit percentage and can't find anyone. My next step I think is to put up a notice in gmit or nuig to try and get someone.
Thanks for all the very helpful advice guys

DrivingTestTips: Brian

Nipaco wrote: »

Your dead right there. I'm actually 18 months trying to do this. The first programmer I had was just outta college but lacked the motivation. His share by the business plan was worth 36k tr 1 all going well and would rise substantially on growth. How much more motivation do you need ? Turned up late and hung over for most our meetings. I got another since but they spent nearly 2 hrs of a 3 hour meet arguing with me over the collie scheme. Now as I said I know more about space travel than web building but seems to me you need to have built a car before you paint it. I had a full story board done and he didn't even bother looking at it. I can tell he doesn't have the time nor the interest. I already own the domains .ie .com .co.uk and have cms ( I got the cms he told me to get). So now I have a business model which is a no brainer, willing to share a lifetime profit percentage and can't find anyone. My next step I think is to put up a notice in gmit or nuig to try and get someone.
Thanks for all the very helpful advice guys

What CMS is it?

Nipaco

Haven't a clue. He sent me a link and I got it. Or maybe that's the server, or maybe they're the same thing. I'm clueless with this so am completely at the mercy of a good programmer/ coder. All I know is that if it was a building I have the entire building not just the rooms.

BostonB

YouBuyLocal wrote: »

You are about to get slated for being so presumptuous as to think your idea is worth the time and effort of a programmer, who fundamentally believes that he/she will be doing all of the work while you do all the 'easy business stuff'.....

I think work now, get paid maybe, is always going to be hard sell.

R3al

It may be difficult for you to recruit a programmer on a 'do the work for free and we will share the profits later' basis without giving some indication of what you are looking for from the programmer, the amount of work involved, ongoing support required etc.

Nipaco

True. But there is no maybe. If I had the money now I'd pay up front and get a company to do it. Say the work on those first pages cost 2,500. The person will be paid that if the business goes to pot ( very unlikely ) but might not get it for six months. The business is not essentially a web company but rather a "tool" to satisfy a need in this industry. So it's kind of like pickapro in which monies come from professionals. To anyone can get this job done I would set up a contract.... Minimum is paid for work, up to making 50,000 per year after for just keeping it ticking over.

YouBuyLocal

BostonB wrote: »

I think work now, get paid maybe, is always going to be hard sell.

This is what I know:

1. There is no recession online

2. Many of the opportunities are in niche markets whereby efficient communications can solve a problem never solvable before

3. Programmers have little or no way of knowing that these problems exist, the same way a physicist would know little or nothing about cattle grazing

4. The people that do understand the markets and the potential revenue are not tech-savy. They may be excellent business people, and they know exactly what they need, but they won't have a clue how to develop it

5. Programmers can understand the business models if creative entrepreneurs are given an opportunity to discuss it

6. Programmers can make a lot more money developing web-businesses as partners than as employed staff

7. All entrepreneurs work now, get paid maybe, not just programmers, and in the businesses I am talking about there is often more work for originator of the idea off-line developing the business than there is programming involved

Here is a guy who knew little or nothing about web-development and exemplifies what I am talking about:
http://www.whohasit.ie

http://www.allaboutbusiness.ie/denlive/entrepreneurs/Terry_Reihill

http://www.anglocelt.ie/news/roundup/articles/2011/03/09/4003725-who-has-it-terry-does/

http://www.allaboutbusiness.ie/exclusive_videos/view/Who+Has+It

Nipaco

You've hit the nail totally. I couldn't have put my situation any better. I again recall a programmer saying to me if you go to a company they'll charge through the nose, or this whole thing could cost 50,000 to do (full site). He couldn't understand my answers. Truth is I don't care, if I make 100,000 I have no problem paying out 50,000. If I make a million I'll pay half a million. I'm not expecting anyone to work for free, and the won't be. However I would actually prefer a developer to have a personal interest in it, rather than it being just another job.
And therefore on the money side this is why I'm happy to pay hugely and not just a couple k for the job.
A bit of something is a whole lot better than a load of nothing.
Thanks a lot for the advice and I'll check those links out later today.

YouBuyLocal

Nipaco wrote: »

You've hit the nail totally. I couldn't have put my situation any better. I again recall a programmer saying to me if you go to a company they'll charge through the nose, or this whole thing could cost 50,000 to do (full site). He couldn't understand my answers. Truth is I don't care, if I make 100,000 I have no problem paying out 50,000. If I make a million I'll pay half a million. I'm not expecting anyone to work for free, and the won't be. However I would actually prefer a developer to have a personal interest in it, rather than it being just another job.
And therefore on the money side this is why I'm happy to pay hugely and not just a couple k for the job.
A bit of something is a whole lot better than a load of nothing.
Thanks a lot for the advice and I'll check those links out later today.

No problem. You will also get a lot of people saying "well maybe if you can't find a programmer or investment it is time to give up!?" That is nonsense, people don't want to take chances, and they look for excuses for not investigating something they don't understand immediately. It is their loss though. You will get there, you only need one.

Coincidentally, I think this would be a good time to go around the colleges as a lot of final year and masters students will be finishing up now and looking for an opportunity. You may be able to get away with paying them a basic wage, 200 per week + an equity stake/profit share deal.

Nipaco

I'll get it to happen one way or other. What is the qualification in a student the I need. Is it a programmer or coder etc... It's all very confusing to me when the tech speak comes in. For example I showed a site I looked to the first guy I had and he said was in joomla and started laughing cos it was wrong. I'd be happy to pay a wage of 200 plus equity if I could be sure I had the right person.

YouBuyLocal

I know what you mean.

A good idea would be to download prezi.com. There is a 30 day free trial and its relatively cheap after that. Use it to go through every single link on the site. Go through the site in minute detail, exactly how you want it developed, every piece of functionality (what it does), every feature. You don't need to know anything about software to do that, you should have a very good visual image of how the site should function and where the data comes from, what crowd-sourcing elements you'll have. Crowd-sourced is when the information on your site comes from users and it is not totally managed by you, you want as little manual moderation as possible, let users help to moderate if possible.

I am using Elgg (http://www.elgg.org) to develop my site. This is a powerful open-sourced platform. A lot of developers won't understand what the point of using this is, but force your hand on this. This platform will likely give you less problems and will look far more professional than if a coder developed it from scratch. Some of the features already developed as plug-ins are very cool, and would take weeks for a programmers to figure out how to develop them.

I have no idea what language you need the site developed in, you will have to leave that to the programmers. Elgg is written in php.

Talk to some lecturers, you never know, you might find some of them helpful.

I would also suggest that you lay down exactly how much work is required off-line to develop the business, so they know that it is a team effort and are not frustrated by the idea that they are doing all of the work for only half the profits.

EIREHotspur

Nipaco wrote: »

Sure. In the long run (1 year) it is quite a large job but if we find ourselves doing it all it means the money is there to take on staff, overheads and of course profit. We can get started by just doing a small section (ten or so pages). I could describe its functionality as kind of how Facebook or a dating site works, ie, profiles and ability to upload and run your own profile, with ecommerce. I can't think of a site that does what I'm after exactly but I'm sure it can be done. Does that help any ?

You say you need a website where people can:
- create a profile and log on and provide a service?
- similar to pickapro
- have e-commerce as in people paying money via website for service?

Nipaco

Something along those lines yes

Cianos

OP,
People have very good reason to be skeptical as you are admitting yourself that you know very little about websites, ecommerce and by the sounds of it, the internet in general.

Just because a niche is recognised, and there's an idea there to build a website that would solve some peoples problems, doesn't necessarily mean that the website will take off. There are a lot of variables and not having a good insight and feel for how the internet 'works' could send you down a long path before you find that out the hard way.

In saying all this, trivial matters such as finding someone good to build the thing should not get in the way of making it happen IF it has real potential.

If you want to PM me more info I'd be happy to give you my thoughts on it.

Nipaco

I hear what your saying. Like I said I'm a year and a half down the road and im aware of how likely it is for me to trip up.
I've been involved in the industry concerned with this site sine school days (20 yrs), so what I don't know about it isn't worth knowing. I have read some posts on other threads where people have asked for advice or who to go to for help. There where about 8 different people proposed, only 3 of whom I'd approve of with 2 others not even having the suitable qualification. So I'm looking at this as if it were me starting in my industry, I can see how easy it is to fall or make a mistake, but I also believe that this will work and im not going to back of. There is a way to get it done, I just need to find it.
There is limited risk in that I will know within 3 months if it is successful and so if it's a long road we'll be driving a Ferrari down it.
It's a worldwide opportunity so I don't think I would call it niche, it's specific more so.
There are two reasons why I think it will be successful. If a guy came to me and asked me to sign up I'd be all over it. It would really solve many problems for my personal business and create more revenue, exposure and open up more profit streams. The second reason is that there is no other site doing this. There are sites doing one or more aspects, but that's next to useless for my business.

BostonB

YouBuyLocal wrote: »

This is what I know:

1. There is no recession online...

I think you are missing my point. In terms of getting a developer, you need to look at it from their point of view. So your offer has to be better, then one they can get elsewhere, and additionally if there is no income upfront then you need to find someone who doesn't need the income immediately.

Finally in my experience, its not unusual for a developer to get a pitch from a startup. I've gone to interviews, for jobs or contracts, though agencies, only to find its a startup doing a pitch, completely unrelated to the job/contract advertised. My point about this, is you have to stand out, from these type of offers. Because Developers become to immune to it after a while. TBH it can be hard getting developers even when you are offering a decent salary!

I guess my point is, perhaps you need to look at this from the POV of the business of Developers. Rather than POV of your business.

Nipaco

That's a very good point. And I guess with a lot more people thinking of themselves as being entrepreneurs etc there is more bull around than quality. This is a problem as it must be very difficult to spot the genuine article.
All I can say is that getting this going means a lot to me and so I don't see it in terms of hrs work or how long it takes. Whether it's two weeks of non stop slog or 6 months it's all the same to me. And so the monetary reward isn't reflective of the amount of work. For example for all I know this could be started in a weekend.
Whoever gets it going would continue making money for the life of the company. So maybe for that two weeks work the guy gets ten grand in two months. And from then on has nothing to do but advise the staff and maybe take forty to fifty thousand a year for it.
I know I'd be up for an opportunity like that.
You don't need to take it on blindly, have a look at the business and you can make up your own mind. I will only do this in person and with suitably able people with the time and motivation to get it done

EIREHotspur

I understand your need to be vague in order not to give away the game as regards your idea.

It makes it very difficult for anyone to know what skills your seeking in order to build your website.

If you say it would be like Facebook, that has a lot of big features.
Would your users have to be able to show certain users on a friends list for example or would they be seen by anyone visiting the website like pickapro.

Do you want users to be able to:
- Register on your website themselves or over email like pickapro
- You update their pages/They update their page

Do you need a mobile version of the website, do you need adverts, audio, videos?

Use a few for examples to give a better idea.
Pickapro isn't a very good website.......bad design, but easy enough to impliment I think.

Nipaco

I agree regarding pickapro, it's just an example. The total site will have all of what you mentioned in the finish. But right now can do with post or pm ability and ecommerce

nuttlys

Nipaco wrote: »

There is limited risk in that I will know within 3 months if it is successful and so if it's a long road we'll be driving a Ferrari down it.
It's a worldwide opportunity so I don't think I would call it niche, it's specific more so.
There are two reasons why I think it will be successful. If a guy came to me and asked me to sign up I'd be all over it. It would really solve many problems for my personal business and create more revenue, exposure and open up more profit streams. The second reason is that there is no other site doing this. There are sites doing one or more aspects, but that's next to useless for my business.

If your idea is as great as you say, and I don't mean that in a sarcastic manner, then you should hand in a business plan and see if EI will give you funding for equity, then you could just pay for a development company to do it.
http://www.enterprise-ireland.com/en/funding-supports/Company/HPSU-Funding/

Nipaco

I have considered that and it's certainly something I will take up as I believe you can already be going a year to 18 months to still qualify. I admit I'm also skeptical about pitching to strangers as I then have no control. my plan was going grand (ish) with the taking on of the first programmer, get the market key ( there is one ) and then it's tied up. I could then pitch to EI. I believe it's something that some government departments might see benefit from. It certainly wont break any employment records, few interns maybe as suggested earlier. So I'd like to have some more work done.
Thanks a lot for the input