

Are my friends and family crazy? - darbor

Hello,
My name is Rob and I can&#x27;t believe I&#x27;m writing this. 
Here goes. 
I have been on the sidelines reading Hacker News for 3 years now and too scared to ask any questions because I am just a regular Joe with no technical background....NONE!
The Story;
I have an idea for a online marketplace website. The user base I am catering to is huge.
Hint:
My users are a lot like me.
We barely understand how a computer works.
We can barely type.
We don&#x27;t Tweet.
We do not have books with Faces on it.
We do not use Pinterest, Instagram, Snapchat or any other social platforms. I know, how can we function on this planet without any of these things in our lives. 
My users are smart, work hard and this country could not survive without them. They are the forgotten ones with all this high tech hoopla.
I know the trendy word nowadays is it &quot;disruptive&quot;? The answer is yes.  
I have presented my idea to friends and family and the general reaction is usually ..... holy crap! They joke with me and say the market is in the Godzillions. Are you hiring? Hahaha!<p>I am a family guy and I&#x27;m concerned. 
I&#x27;m sure most of you all have heard or read about  the poor guy who pissed off his kids college fund on a pipe dream but I can&#x27;t and won&#x27;t let that happen to me. That&#x27;s why I need your help.<p>So, my question to you is;
How do I find the right person or company to help me build this thing?<p>For me it&#x27;s all about trust.<p>Thank you for not laughing at me too hard and helping me chase &quot;the dream&quot;. I look forward to your advise.<p>Thank you! 
Rob
======
mindcrime
_I 'm sure most of you all have heard or read about the poor guy who pissed
off his kids college fund on a pipe dream but I can't and won't let that
happen to me_

Good, don't do that. Web-based applications can be developed fairly
inexpensively, especially if you were willing to learn to code yourself.
Otherwise, try to spend other people's money (but with the caveat about being
careful about how much equity you give up if you get this thing going and
start raising money).

Another thing you have to consider... if you want this built, you have three
realistic options:

1\. Learn to code, and do it yourself, at least through the initial stages.

2\. Subcontract the work to somebody on a pure "work for hire" basis

3\. Bring in a co-founder who receives a share of the equity in exchange for
building the site.

In many ways, (3) above is the most attractive, but in this case, you face an
interesting conundrum... you have an idea, but a potential co-founder is going
to ask what else you can bring to the table? If you aren't going to code, what
are you going to do? If _all_ you have is the idea, and the other person(s)
have to do all the work, they are (rightly, IMO) going to want the lion's
share of the equity. You, as the originator of the idea, may not be so
comfortable with such an arrangement.

Given that, unless you have some money you are comfortable spending on option
(2), I seriously recommend considering (1). It wouldn't be the first time a
non-technical person learned to code and built their own prototype and then
used _that_ to work their way forward... once you have a prototype, you're in
strong shape to seek a co-founder or outside investment.

All of that said, if you want to subcontract the work out to somebody, feel
free to shoot me an email. I might be able to help you find somebody.

~~~
darbor
Thank you for your reply. Option 1. I have a full time job, I am limited in
time to learn how to code. Option 2. I looked into websites like Elance and
Odesk and not really sure who to trust based on some bad reviews. Option 3. I
believe can build the website with funds I have. I prefer not to have a
partner at this time. Been there before and I usually run circles around them.
You did not mention hiring a web developer / company?

~~~
logn
Option 2 is hard. It means you're in the role of engineering manager. Most
people on oDesk/elance are individual engineers and the consulting shops on
there are generally just loose associations of friends or crappy outsourcing
firms.

I'd suggest finding a small, local consulting shop and asking them to build it
for you as a work-for-hire giving you full copyright ownership. Full-time
consulting orgs will have no interest in stealing your idea as it's their
lifeblood to build out other people's ideas. Meet with the owners, see their
offices, evaluate their past work, get a free consultation, and only pay what
you can afford.

Finding a co-founder is also hard. I think it's the same success rate of
starting a rock band. And I think it's more likely to have a bitter end where
you're trying to divide a baby.

~~~
darbor
I agree. Your suggeston of finding a "local" consulting shop is probably the
direction I will take. Thank you for your input! .

------
mudil
Look, Rob, I agree with the most important statement in business: Ideas are
easy. It’s the execution of ideas that's difficult. And nobody is going to do
the execution for you. Sorry, but I think there will be no partner. You'll
have to do everything: from running the server and hiring developers on Odesk,
to marketing and social. People that have partners have done something before,
and they have partners because these partners know that they are getting in
bed with someone who has been tested before. Ideas are cheap, hence you will
get no partners for now. Keep working on your idea, start implementing it, and
then, and only then, you'll find the right person or company to help you build
this thing.

~~~
darbor
Thank you. Point well taken.

------
slugslog
learning coding or outsourcing the dev work both seem like non-starters to me.
It's not just about getting some prototype built and walking away with it to
the market. Any first attempt will be half baked at best. How do you iterate
after? how do even measure if whatever you built is even working? what is
reasonable traction to be had?

taking a step back though, before plunging headlong into this journey, I would
seriously consider all the steps between thinking about the prototype and the
'godzillions' to be had. Just like with almost every other startup, the
initial reaction to your prototype/MVC is going to be that the market doesn't
care (shocker!)..maybe you get lucky and get some traction. The data you get
will be clear as mud. Would you persist and continue with iterations to
uncover the real market fit?

also, it doesn't matter if you are tech savvy yourself. are you at least
completely comfortable working with a strong tech person without letting them
completely run the show? If you are unsure, I would recommend going to a few
local tech conferences/meetups and get to know the people. Maybe you'll come
away with an arrangement where someone talented is willing to work part time
on your time for some equity.

take your time finding the right partnership arrangement; don't worry too much
about the fact that you have this brilliant idea someone else will beat you to
it.

------
macarthy12
Ideas are easy. It’s the execution of ideas that really separates the sheep
from the goats. — Sue Grafton, author

~~~
darbor
That's why I'm here. Thanks!

------
idoh
Hey Rob, distribution is key. Facebook, Pinterest & Instagram are some of the
most engaging and sticky platforms out there. If your target market does not
even use those, then what chance do you have of that market finding and using
what you are planning on building?

~~~
darbor
The user base (market)that I will be catering to uses websites like Google and
Craiglist and other pay for ads type classified websites (even though
Craiglist is free). Just because we do not use the websites I mentioned does
not mean we do not use the internet. This market has 1000 times more buying
power then the teenagers using Facebook and the like. I think that a lot of
businesses think like sheep and just do what ever everybody else is doing and
forget to think outside the box. Thank you for your reply!!!

------
dynabros
Why not hire a cheap overseas developer to create v1? It will cost you a grand
or two, but will allow you to test your idea for little capital. You can
always rebuild v2 with a reputable dev shop or freelance team.

~~~
darbor
I believe I have the funds to produce a quality product in V1. I would like to
work with someone fairly local for some hand holding. Thanks!

~~~
dynabros
I may have an idea for you. Shoot me an email, it's in my profile.

------
sharemywin
with marketplaces the website is the easy part. getting both sides of the
transaction to the party is the hard part. how do people sell in this market
now? why would they switch to you? how are you going to reach them? take ebay
they spend millions on advertising on google. and everyone know who they are.

~~~
darbor
I plan on building a brand / culture that appeals to my user base allowing
them to "connect" with the website. I believe that I understand how the user
base thinks, their likes and wants. Also, there are basically five large "pay
for listings" type websites on the market now. They will switch to my site
because all listings will be free and focused wholly on their market.

------
X4
I don't know what your idea is, but most people have objections that are
simply not realistic. You cannot create a social network and hope to become a
billionaire without knowing what people want/need or at least hitting a
tangent. You maybe thinking of Zuckerberg, he hustled hard to get there,
really. People simplify what he did, because they don't want to believe that
success is either luck, vitamin C (connections) or hard work.

I'm soon available and want to work on some projects for fun anyway. Let's
chat on [https://vline.com/](https://vline.com/) about the idea and vision, if
you want.. I'll do it, if I believe in the idea, otherwise you can create a
profile of what type of developer you need and what needs to be done and post
it here or on some job board. (post your email or other contact info on your
profile so that people can reach you)

Look, what people here are telling is almost completely true. You've heard
that ideas are cheap and execution is hard or that ideas are pipedreams and
don't mean anything without "proper execution". The essence of this is true,
but there is a part to that picture that is missing. Insider knowledge and
making the product so that it's effective and efficient at what it needs to do
is what ideas can't offer. That is what you shouldn't share, except with those
who you need to share it with.

Nobody will steal your ideas and become a billionaire with it without putting
a lot of effort into it. And if they do that, it doesn't mean that they will
be any successful by a long shot. That's because there is only so much that
can be winners, the rest is doomed to work or to become "the losers" in this
race. Someone needs to believe as much as you do into the idea to make it.

