Dealing with the freetards?

[jakebarnes]

They want a full formal quote, but the only specifications they've given are "I need 12 new e-commerce sites. Please provide a formal quote. Thanks". I keep replying to them and politely asking for more information and even listing various jobs which they may or may not require completed, but they seem to answering the first option as "yes" or "no" but never answering the rest of them ... totally infuriating! I'm onto the 12th email reply right now ... might be the last, as this is getting ridiculous ... and time consuming!

One of the frustrating things about clients is that the less experienced they are, the less they are able to judge what any project should cost. I have, for years, had clients approach me and say something like "I'd like to build something like Facebook, but with a lot more features. My budget is $5,000".

I thought I could solve this problem by writing a comprehensive essay that lists all the different types of websites that I work on, and what their costs are:

http://www.teamlalala.com/blog/2008/...websites-cost/

But this did not work. Nowadays I routinely send potential clients to that essay, but if they are inexperienced, the essay doesn't help them much. They do not know enough to figure out which category they belong in. I've had to get used to the fact that a lot of clients will read that essay and then tell me "My project is in category #3" when in fact their project is category #8 or #9.

The misunderstanding that I describe in #8 still happens all the time:

8.) An information resource that, to succeed, must be the best: $500,000 to $5,000,000. One fellow came to us and said “I have $20,000. I’d like to build America’s largest database of foreclosed properties.” We replied: “This is obviously a great idea and, if you can pull it off, the site will surely be a great success. But you should really go out and raise $1 million to get started. You’ll need a team of programmers working constantly to get data into your database, you’ll need a lawyer to work out multiple deals with your sources of information, and you’ll need national marketing. You’ll probably need $2 or $3 million over the first two years, but you probably should not even start unless you can raise $1 million.” The other possibility is to start small and build a database of foreclosed properties for a single metropolitan area. If the site is successful, it should be easy to raise the money to go national.

The strange thing is, even after clients read the essay, they still say stuff like "I'd like to build a site like Facebook, but with more features. My budget is $5,000."

Of course, the Facebook craze is fading away. The new thing seems to be business services that imitate Basecamp. I've had several clients come to me with Basecamp-like business service websites, but they have budgets of under $10,000. I tell them they need $50,000 to do a good job of it.

[jakebarnes]

LOL. Yeah, that feels familiar :)

The funniest ones I get are actually from fellow web developers who sent me suggestions that we go into business and share revenues as they can handle some of the complex HTML/CSS/PHP while I handle the business side of things ... which sounds great, except I ask them for some sort of portfolio .... ROTFLMAO they tend to look something like this ... http://www.angelfire.com/super/badwebs/.

Yes, I can relate. I've noticed, the faster someone is to offer me equity in their new venture, the less experienced (or more crazy) they are.

Since the recession started, the number of equity startups that get pitched to me have slowed down. But I think back in 2007, I was getting offered equity in a startup about once a month. Some of these offers were out of the blue, from totally random people.

[andrea_r]

"I'd like to build something like Facebook, but with a lot more features. My budget is $5,000".

I get this, but their budget is significantly less. We just have to set up MU with buddypress & tweak a few plugins, right? (that was sarcasm...)

Got a contact to do revenue sharing right before Christmas. I think I'll pass. ;)

In the office, Ron & I pass the best one back & forth a lot: "But $50 is a lot to invest in a website"

[wpmuguru]

Have I ticked off a lot of people with this method? Yeah, it happens. But, you can't be everyone's friend.

Agreed, you will tick some people off. There are some who expect a lot for free. In the last month or so I had someone leave a comment telling me what I "had to do if you want people to use your ...". I haven't answered the comment.

* Avoid these people like the plague -- "If you answer this one question, I'll join your club."

We get the ones where people say they'll make a donation if we help them. To date, none of the people who have said that made a donation. We do get donations, most come from people that we've helped & most are complete (and nice) surprises.

[Len]

Just from lending a hand in the .ORG forums I get all kinds of email asking for help. I can imagine how irritating it must get when you make your living from a WordPress related service/product.

[Ryan]

If they're donating money for something in return, then it's not a donation, they're just trying to contract you. I've occasionally just changed the words from "payment" to "donation" and told them I need the "donation" up front and given them the exact "donation amount" required to get their job done. I don't recall if any of them paid or not. I suspect a few have, but I haven't kept track of it.

[Ryan]

Just from lending a hand in the .ORG forums I get all kinds of email asking for help. I can imagine how irritating it must get when you make your living from a WordPress related service/product.

I used to post very heavily on SitePoint.com and was actually making a reasonable amount of money form it at one point as the other forum posters often paid me to do work for them.

For whatever reason, WordPress'ers don't seem to have the same attitude towards paying for services that other parts of the web development community do.

[jakebarnes]

Mostly aimed at those of you who develop plugins and themes for free, WP Questions is starting a fundraiser to donate 25% of the money we get from questions related to your plugin or theme:

http://blog.wpquestions.com/2009/12/...in-developers/

You do not need to do anything for the money. We are also starting an affiliate program where you get 100% of the money in exchange for linking to us.

[davecoveney]

Blimey - this old thread came back to life didn't it? And even Matt's stepped in.

For the record, I don't believe in Freetard meaning supporters of Open Source, I mean it in the concept of those who seek out free above and beyond all other measures. These are often the people who download cracked software, expect free support for anything (including whinging about the problems with their cracked software!) no matter how little effort they've put in and so on.

It looks like it's a very real problem for people.

The WP Questions proposal is an interesting one, and I'm going to look at it at least.

[Ryan]

It's great to see someone building something like WP Questions. I certainly wouldn't use it myself as I already have my own paid support system in place, but for those who don't, this could be a good alternative to keep their plugin users happy.