I think he's curious about the origin of the name.
San usually meaning "without" and degree often meaning "Diploma from a higher education institute" it is a rather interesting chose of company name. Not something people typically advertise so explicitly if that is indeed what it means.
Not the author here and I don't particular appreciate advertisement landing pages on HN which this is. But as someone who routinely charges $50k for similar projects, I'm curious...
The pricing in the software consulting industry is a bit opaque. Very few companies do what this one does and advertise their price up front. Which I respect.
So my question is, is this sort of pricing common? Am I over charging? Are they under charging? Are we both over or under charging? [1]
[1] I know there are a LOT of factors and there is no way someone could say for sure without due diligence but I guess you can take a guess.
Hey @throwaway2016a, responding to some of your comments:
1) Not sure why you'd have complaints with this site versus, say, any business on HN that attempts to make money being advertised. I originally put "Show HN: " in the title, but it was changed by a moderator. Was mostly looking for feedback.
2) Re pricing: I'd say in order to assume you are over/under pricing, I'd have to know what you are building. Are you building simple 5 page static sites? Probably overcharging, depending on the complexity. Are you building a complicated clustercuss of interconnected API calls hooked up to a background processor that munges the data and distributes it through multiple channels?... it gets complicated.
The reason I made 20kprototype.com is because I see a lot of people who have ideas, a decent amount of money, but no way to get from A to B. If they go to an agency, the overhead alone will cost them near $100k. If they go to a developer, the dev will say "Okay. Do you have a designer? Who's doing [insert whatever they don't want to do here]?" Then who manages those people?... This idea is: I'll take it from 0 - working so you can prove the idea or show investors. All the work goes into the functionality.
Typically said posts are under Show HN. So the fact you put it there originally was right, I think the mod was wrong in that case. If it said Show HN I would have objected as much.
But I think the other part is because the only piece novel here is the price. There are a lot of services that do what you (and I) do. Unless there is something I missed.
Again, that second part is mostly moot because I don't think I would have cared if it was "Show HN"
Re #2:
Typically in that range I give the client an API, a single front-end (mobile or webapp) and all the database and design that goes with it.
I do really appreciate you trying to cut the crap and focus on shipping functionality. I also like how some things that people could call a negative you turn into a positive (like cutting edge tech and lack of fancy sales decks). I'm not calling it a negative mind you.
I do have one question, and feel free to not answer if it is prying too much. What do you pay the developers? How many of these a year does it take to pay their salary?
In the interest of transparency: our staff is all US based. Here it is $75k - $150k USD and if we have them on 3 to 5 projects a year we've paid for them.
Again don't answer if you don't want to. I can hide behind anonymity which lets me be a little bit more transparent.
Thanks! I'm not sure I've conveyed this accurately enough on the landing page: we don't route $20k to a bunch of developers that we find dirt cheap; a single seasoned developer takes the project from start to finish and they get all the money. Now, how much money they make is based on how quickly they can finish the project. This is where the vetting becomes crucial. If someone calls me up and goes "I want to make the next Facebook!", I explain to them this is beyond the scope of a $20k prototype and guide them to other agencies that can help. Worst case scenario, they gain a little knowledge about their project.
The price/time ratio is the key to making this work. I've done a ton of prototypes that are near that sweet spot. Some will take longer than expected, some will fly out in a few days.
The biggest obstacle I see right now is finding the right platform for targeting the demo-graph I'm going for: people who have ideas, money and not a lot of connections to tech.
14 comments
[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 25.0 ms ] threadSan usually meaning "without" and degree often meaning "Diploma from a higher education institute" it is a rather interesting chose of company name. Not something people typically advertise so explicitly if that is indeed what it means.
The pricing in the software consulting industry is a bit opaque. Very few companies do what this one does and advertise their price up front. Which I respect.
So my question is, is this sort of pricing common? Am I over charging? Are they under charging? Are we both over or under charging? [1]
[1] I know there are a LOT of factors and there is no way someone could say for sure without due diligence but I guess you can take a guess.
1) Not sure why you'd have complaints with this site versus, say, any business on HN that attempts to make money being advertised. I originally put "Show HN: " in the title, but it was changed by a moderator. Was mostly looking for feedback.
2) Re pricing: I'd say in order to assume you are over/under pricing, I'd have to know what you are building. Are you building simple 5 page static sites? Probably overcharging, depending on the complexity. Are you building a complicated clustercuss of interconnected API calls hooked up to a background processor that munges the data and distributes it through multiple channels?... it gets complicated.
The reason I made 20kprototype.com is because I see a lot of people who have ideas, a decent amount of money, but no way to get from A to B. If they go to an agency, the overhead alone will cost them near $100k. If they go to a developer, the dev will say "Okay. Do you have a designer? Who's doing [insert whatever they don't want to do here]?" Then who manages those people?... This idea is: I'll take it from 0 - working so you can prove the idea or show investors. All the work goes into the functionality.
Hope that answers your questions!
Re #1:
Typically said posts are under Show HN. So the fact you put it there originally was right, I think the mod was wrong in that case. If it said Show HN I would have objected as much.
But I think the other part is because the only piece novel here is the price. There are a lot of services that do what you (and I) do. Unless there is something I missed.
Again, that second part is mostly moot because I don't think I would have cared if it was "Show HN"
Re #2:
Typically in that range I give the client an API, a single front-end (mobile or webapp) and all the database and design that goes with it.
I do really appreciate you trying to cut the crap and focus on shipping functionality. I also like how some things that people could call a negative you turn into a positive (like cutting edge tech and lack of fancy sales decks). I'm not calling it a negative mind you.
I do have one question, and feel free to not answer if it is prying too much. What do you pay the developers? How many of these a year does it take to pay their salary?
In the interest of transparency: our staff is all US based. Here it is $75k - $150k USD and if we have them on 3 to 5 projects a year we've paid for them.
Again don't answer if you don't want to. I can hide behind anonymity which lets me be a little bit more transparent.
Anyway, good luck to you!
The price/time ratio is the key to making this work. I've done a ton of prototypes that are near that sweet spot. Some will take longer than expected, some will fly out in a few days.
The biggest obstacle I see right now is finding the right platform for targeting the demo-graph I'm going for: people who have ideas, money and not a lot of connections to tech.