Tuesday, February 15, 2005

Partnering with Customers

Development is a costly game. Something that allot of small businesses cannot easily afford. Yet these same small businesses are usually the ones that can benefit most from a system that reduces running costs. What is the solution for this?

Something that I am starting to offer some of my smaller clients. Reduced development costs, for a share in the profits. A partnership if you like.

This on the surface seems to have a few extra advantages.
First of all, if a project really hits the mark, the potential return is greater than the lost income of the initial development. This is good, gut it is also a risk. A risk of lost income if the system fails.

However there is another advantage to an arrangement like this. Clients (business partners) end up being allot more trusting. They tend to allow the developers to make more technical decisions, simply because they also have a stake in the risk.

Is this something that is becoming common in the industry?
Is this a way for an independent software developer to secure a more stable income?

Hit me on the comments, Let me know your thoughts

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You do have the added risk of the client being potentialy intreventionist and either blocking or trying to control any technical desicions that they either dont understand or dont see any benefit.

That could be a good thing in the end but it may make for a bumpy road.

Anonymous said...

I had a friend of mine who did this, and I think he found it extremely lucrative since projects became passive earners for him without any effort on his part. One problem is finding a way to quantify the gains so your customer can pay you.