Outsource Software

If you have some experience in web site design and want to make good money you can try acting as IT-outsourcing partner. Learn more what you should know and how to start.

Why offshore web design and development

Offshore web site design and development help to keep prices at least 3-5 times less, for example, average hourly rate of web development services in USA is $35-75; in UK - $25-50, in Ukraine - $5-20.

How it works?

Typical plan:

• You find a client who needs a web site, ask his/her requirements for the project and send to your offshore partner company.
• The partner makes a proposal and gives you the project estimation basing on his hourly rate, for example, $10.
• You mark up the rate $10/hour as high as you wish (and can - taking into consideration competition in your region, level of demand for web design services, and other marketing factors), for example to $30/hour, and sends the proposal to the client. So if the web design project is estimated on 50 man-hours of work, you charge the customer $1500, from which $500 you pay to your offshore partner company, and $1000 is your profit.
• The partner company works on the project and delivers it to you along with copyright for the work.
• You deliver the site to the customer.

Result - you have a satisfied client and good profit from the marked up price.

How to start?

The first and most important step is to analyze market in your region and decide if it’s worth to start this business.

If you already have your own web design company it is easier for you because you already know situation in the market, gain certain reputation, have clients list, etc.

But don’t be afraid if you are new to web design business. Believe in yourself and work hard and finally you will be rewarded for all your efforts.

As in any type of business, starting the one in web design area, you must ask yourself general marketing questions:

1. Who will be your customers?
2. Why they will order the web design services exactly form you?
3. Where and how they will get to know about you?

Without having clear answers to these questions you shouldn’t try to start anything.

The second step is to find trustful and reliable partner – offshore web design company – that will work as “development center� for your business. This company must have good experience in web design and development area, good reputation, top level of customer care and communication. There are many resources in the Internet where you can find necessary information – search engines, web design directories, outsourcing portals.

For example, you can try searching in search engines for appropriate key phrases “offshore web design�, “offshore web site design�, “offshore web development� and analyze sites of your potential partners.

Also here are several sites where you can find lists of offshore web design companies sorted by country.

http://web-designers.bluegeckonetwork.com/

http://www.theoutsourceguide.com/

http://www.1234-find-web-designers.org/

How to choose the right offshore web design partner company?

There are 2 main factors that determine your choice – cost and quality of web design work.

Cost

Basing on the average web design prices in your local market and your competitive abilities you set prices that you will charge to your customers. There are several methods of web design price calculation, most used are flat price for fixed web site packages, and price based on man-hour rate. Most web design companies operate with both and choose one depending on each project type and requirements.

Then you decide which profit you want to have and narrow down your search choosing companies with appropriate price range.

Quality

Consider the company reputation, portfolio of previous works, testimonials of previous customers, level of communication. Pay attention to payment policy and method, conditions of ready projects delivery, warranties, post-development support and maintenance.

If all details are agreed you may start partnership. Sometimes the first project is quite simple to test abilities of both parties and if everything is going well the partnership will bring mutual benefits.

“Information technology workers and computer software engineers have
been especially heavily hit by offshore jobs outsourcing. During the past
five years (Jan 01 - Jan 06), the information sector of the US economy lost
645,000 jobs or 17.4% of its work force. Computer systems design and related lost
116,000 jobs or 8.7% of its work force. Clearly, jobs outsourcing is not
creating jobs in computer engineering and information technology. Indeed, jobs
outsourcing is not even creating jobs in related fields.”

By Paul Craig Roberts

In combining Open Source software and offshore development, high quality, cost effective software is more easily obtainable.  In fact, I suggest Open Source should always be a part of any outsourced software development, but that is a different topic.  The focus of this article is how Open Source provides a foundation of trust and confidence when using and/or providing offshore software development services.

When purchasing software development services, many people make the mistake of assuming that the only reason to choose one person/company over another are pure coding skills.  Simple as that right?  Wrong.  Developers also assume the person/company procuring software development cares deeply about Java vs. .Net vs. PHP vs. RoR.  Wrong.  Well, ok, maybe both of these points are not entirely wrong.  Yes, people do care about coding prowess and technology infrastructure, but I believe there are many other factors when making an outsourcing decision.

People who purchase software want to have confidence and trust in the people they choose to develop software.  Confidence and trust can be earned over time, but how does it start?  Well, of course, the software developer(s) needs to have good references, case studies, professionalism and applicable skill sets.  But, even after reviewing these factors, there might still be nagging doubts about trusting someone you have never met and the person or company was not a referral from one of your contacts. 

Open source software is the foundation for confidence and trust when choosing to outsource software development.  It is the catalyst to an acceptable answer to the “what is the worst that can happen” scenario.  In other words, even if you make the wrong choice in outsource software development partner, your code, your infrastructure will still be based on Open Source which can be parlayed to different developers much faster than completely original code.  In the worst case scenario, if the software being developed is not Open Source based, it will be much more difficult to replace the developers. 

“Open Source” can mean different things to different people.  In this article, my definition of Open Source is intended to mean complete products, tools, libraries, etc. with a vibrant community.  (Read Succeeding with Open Source for one reference on choosing Open Source software)  It does not simply mean the delivery of source code with the solution.  In particular, the Open Source product, tool and or library needs to have other established resources, so new developers time spent analyzing code and infrastructure can be reduced.  New developers to the project will spend much more time “getting up to speed” on architecture, if the software is not using community based Open Source software.

When implementing an outsource development strategy, choose developers that will use Open Source software in the overall solution.  Using Open Source in the solution provides a shorter path to confidence and trust in outsourced software developers.  Put another way, open source plays a positive part in the risk management of the decision to outsource.  By choosing offshore software development partners that deliver based on community established Open Source with appropriate license for your needs, quality and the most competitive cost can be obtained.

 

Interesting article on considering China for offshore software development:

“Few end users in North America or Europe are willing to consider China unless the China-based firm has a significant footprint in the States.”

via David Scott Lewis on SandHill.com