How to Discuss Your App or Website Project with a Freelancer or Development Agency

Creating a website or app is a big decision for a lot of people, especially if you’ve not done it before.

There are other guides about how you should approach finding an agency or a freelancer to work for you, but here is my plain language version that highlights what I’d suggest should be important at the beginning.

I have worked for development agencies, and I am currently a freelancer. My motivation in this article is to try to help people have better initial conversations and therefore have all the tools at their fingertips to make the best decisions. When you enter into a discussion about potentially getting someone to create a website or app for you, it is a negotiation, only you’re negotiating with someone who has done it before. So, here’s my guide to hopefully steer you towards productive development discussions and a successful project.

1. Have an idea of what you want

Before discussing a project, it’s going to be beneficial to try to have answers to these questions.

• What is the idea for the app/website?
• What is the budget?
• Do any other websites/apps do something similar?
• Do you want it to look a certain way? Anything similar you’ve seen?
• What would be the perfect app/website? (list all the features)
• What would be the bare minimum app/website functionality?

It’s a pretty standard list of questions. The reason for the last question about what would be the bare minimum functionality is because you’ll probably want to launch (start earning money) as quickly and cheaply as possible. Having an idea of what a first version of the website/app could look like is a realistic first step, then you can add bells and whistles later. What is the core functionality? Which functionality can be added later?

If you are discussing a project with an agency or freelancer they may wish to split the project up into sections. The first part will be a duration of X and will cost Y, and it will give you enough of a project to launch and start to get customers. Then, the next stages will follow afterward, to add more functionality to the project. Knowing what the next stages will be might be useful for whoever you’re talking to. Maybe they can build the project in such a way to make it easier to go down a particular path if they know which direction you’re thinking you want to go in.

2. Have conversations with different people

Do not just approach one person. Listen to what different people have to say.

• Try to judge which people sound genuine and know what they are talking about.
• Can you work with these people? Do they listen to what you want, understand it, and respond to what you’ve said, or are they giving you scripted answers?
• Who is actually going to be doing the work? Are you talking to them, are they next door, or are they outsourcing to another part of the world?
• When you’re discussing the project can you understand everything they say? If not, it’s really important that you ask. When they explain what they mean, can you understand them now?
• Why have they suggested it be built a certain way?

If they are using a lot of jargon and what they are talking about isn’t clear you need to clarify.

If you asked questions related to something and the answers you received were equally baffling, or equally unclear, this person might not be a good fit for you. You want to work with someone who you can understand and makes perfect sense. If you ask for an alteration or addition, will that person know what you mean, or not? Or, will they just give you what they think you want?

If you cannot tell how truthful the answers are, or if you are a bad judge of character, write down the key points on paper and try to compare the actual content of the conversations you’ve had with different people at a later stage.

You may not understand all the names of programming languages or technologies but write it all down. If someone is saying they’d build the project with particular languages ask why. You may not have any knowledge of the language or the technology, but you should be able to understand their reasoning. Maybe, if you are not confident in which approach would be best, you can ask someone who might be more technical than you are.

Also, outsourcing can be fine. All I’d say is that you should make sure when you speak to whoever you speak to, that person can reliably pass on the words and meanings to whoever is writing the code. If there are language or timezone barriers between the person you are talking to and the developers that could potentially cause problems.

3. Be realistic

Have you heard of the Time-Money-Quality triangle?

The concept is you have an equilateral triangle. Time, money, and quality are the three sides and each has an equal length. Now, if you want to speed up the development of the project (reduce the time side), you’ll have to either reduce the quality or increase the money.

If you want something very fast, very cheap, and of the highest quality you may be out of luck.

In the context of an initial discussion about a possible website/app project, what is included in the quoted work? If one quote is a lot higher than another, is there a reason for that? How many people will be working on your project? Are the developers experienced?

Obviously, the more people you have working on something the more expensive it is likely to be. “More people” does not automatically mean faster. It’s important to understand exactly how your project will be worked on, and by whom.

Conclusion

This is all just my friendly advice from a freelancer who wants to make the world a little better. I believe that to get the most out of the development of the website/app you should go into the process with eyes wide open. If there is anything you’re not clear about you have to ask. You must ask, and you have to be able to understand the answer. Whoever you speak to will have had similar conversations many times before, so take your time and speak to a few different people and see who you trust the most, and who understands what you want, not what they want to make for you.

For more information, or if you have any questions, please send me a DM to start a conversation.