Do you have a great idea for a website? Or an app? Do you think if you just found the right developer to take your "big idea" and make it a reality then all of a sudden you'll be a budding tech entrepreneur - I'm writing you to tell you this plainly and briefly. You're probably wrong.


Underestimating Costs

On a small mom-and-pop level, some people want a website from scratch with e-commerce and think a good programmer should do it all for $800, or you can just make a Wix page to handle online orders. WRONG.

You might expect a software development company to make you really cool native apps for Apple and Android for $4000. WRONG.

Prices can vary, and smart, staged approaches can get you pretty far on little money. But usually, you need to ask a pro to give you what the price parameters really are for tech.


Building Is Only Half The Battle

My main point is this: If you make the great website or pony up the necessary $ for a good development team to build you the best site ever in your industry. Now the money is going to roll in, right? WRONG (sorry for all of the harsh "WRONG" answers in caps).

If you build it, they will not necessarily come. The problem is, nobody will know you are there. I'm tempted to say that building a great technology is half the battle; but in my experience in a few startups has me thinking that building a great technology is about 10-20% of the cost of a tech business. Without serious advertising and marketing dollars behind it and a dedicated and motivated marketing team, it's all a waste of money and effort.


If You've Got An Idea

We don't want to pour water on your idea and say in a blanket fashion that it's gonna fail. That's terrible, that's being a killjoy and it's not even accurate. Plenty of non tech people have great ideas that take off. We should never assume that "if it was worth doing, somebody would have already done it". Civilization would never ever advance if we all thought that way.

The best way to avoid these false assumptions, in my opinion, is to flesh out your plans with an actual business plan before you even start with a phone call or an email to a software developer.

We have a great business plan template document that asks all of the right questions up front. It may get you to realize that yes, company X is already doing this and cornered the market. You might realize this would take a massive $ investment that you can't swing. Or you might see after the due diligence of completing a business plan - you might say "holy crap - this seems like it could work" and you're on your way.