

Non-tech Cofounders – Don’t Hire an Agency - camwest
http://blog.kera.io/post/33365312918/non-tech-cofounders-dont-hire-an-agency

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ovi256
I used to work in a web agency in France. By chance, all my projects were
e-commerce startups that outsourced their development and ops to us. One may
argue that dev was not a core competency for them, but I personally doubt it.
Even with our best effort, we were not as invested as an in-house tech co-
founder would have been, not by far.

Of course, other reasons prevailed, and anyone who knows French business
pecularities would see some more reasons for this state of affairs. For one,
most French startups, especially e-commerce, are founded by business school
graduates, ex managemant consultants, basically the MBA crowd. They mostly
don't want to have a tech co-founder, as tech work is seen as low-status. Some
of their failure modes are directly related to this. So is their focus on b2b
partnerships and bizdev even for e-commerce.

There are, of course, French startups run by tech people, and I know plenty
who do well and run circles around direct competitors that fit the above
patterns.

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maxcameron
I think you proved the point. The startups that focus on technical leadership
run circles around those that don't.

Why do you think that's the case? Faster iteration?

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ovi256
I don't have enough information to say, but faster iteration is a solid bet.
Plus better visibility into technical feasibility and cost, which leads to
doing technical daring things as soon as they become possible. This becomes an
unfair advantage fast for the tech startups, as the MBA crowd gets their tech
bearings mostly from monthly magazines which are years beyond the state of the
art. This means they only do tech things once they are common practice, so
they'll never have a tech advantage.

As an engineer, I'm biased, of course, but this looks to me like: tech
founders have to learn some biz, marketing and management skills, which is
feasible, to be able to judge business opportunities and execute on them. The
MBA crowd already knows how to do this, but they need to learn tech skills, in
order to judge tech opportunities and execute on them, which is harder for
them.

Edited for spelling.

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CookWithMe
I'm technical, I build stuff myself, so take my opinion with a pinch of salt.

If you have built a non-technical throw-away prototype (paper, wireframe,
...), at some point you may find your testing is limited. IMO, a technical
THROW-AWAY prototype is ok to be outsourced, because it'll take all the short
cuts it can, and when you are done testing you want to change at least 50% of
it anyway, so throwing away and starting from scratch is the right answer.

That said, I don't know if there are any agencies that do this. But you could
probably find a freelancer that enjoys this type of work. You definitely need
a tech co-founder when you build the real thing, though.

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maxcameron
You make a great point. But I'm trying to think about why you'd be building a
throw-away prototype. Either you'd want to prove a technical challenge, or
you'd want to make sure you're building something that a customer wants to
buy. I can't really see the logic in outsourcing the first use-case, I mean
that's the core tech of your startup, and I don't know many agencies out there
that specialize in that type of heavy lifting.

But from the cust-dev perspective, where do you see lightweight prototypes
(powerpoint, paper, wireframes, omnigraffle, etc) falling short?

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jfdimark
Hey, good post! I'm in total agreement.

I am starting a company and was in the same situation as all non-technical
founders: hire an agency, give away half the company to a tech co-founder, or
learn how to build it myself.

I went with the third option. Not only is it extremely gratifying to build it
with your own hands, but it means I can make quick decisions and changes on
the fly, the only cost is my time, and the vision and execution are 100%
aligned!

~~~
maxcameron
Hey man,

Wow, I really admire your determination to learn how to build it yourself. I
can only imagine the amount of time you're devoting to it. You're in an
interesting position because as a solo founder you're responsible for so many
aspects of the business.

How do you balance working on the product versus acquiring customers vs
operations?

Kudos either way!

~~~
jfdimark
Well, sleep is optional of course!

Otherwise it's just a case of being efficient with time and prioritising
tasks, because everything works in lock-step i.e. have idea, get feedback,
refine; create mockups, get feedback, refine; build mvp, get feedback, refine
etc. so I take each step at a time.

Having said that, I will be looking for a more accomplished developer to join
me as a co-founder imminently because the range of tasks and the timeframe do
make it impossible to do everything myself.

Best of luck with Kera by the way, it looks like a great idea.

~~~
maxcameron
Hey, thanks for the kind words - I appreciate it. I think you're going to have
a 10x better chance of finding a great technical cofounder because you took
the time to prove the concept and build your technical skills. Not only will
you have something in production (not just an idea or a lean canvas) but
you'll have so much empathy for your cofounder. You'll appreciate what they go
through in a way non technical cofounders can't do (or take a long time to
learn).

What's your startup?

~~~
jfdimark
I hope you're right!

My startup is Xavy (xavy.com), it's a video discovery & distribution platform
for connecting professionals and conference organisers.

Idea is to provide free/very cheap access to world-class conference content
(of which millions of hours exist!) and help generate leads for upcoming
events through utilising that content - all in one place, organiser-neutral,
searchable/filterable by type of content.

(I have a conferences background, so I know the space).

Sign up on the landing page and I'll ping you once the MVP is up and running,
which I'm aiming to be Monday morning.

Cheers!

~~~
maxcameron
Hey there,

Sounds cool - I'll check it out. I'm not a conference organizer so I don't
know if I'm your target customer. We actually spun Kera out of Big Bang
Technology. I guess it's time to update my HN profile!

Max

~~~
jfdimark
Ah, that explains it!

No need to be a conference organizer to test out the alpha, it would just be
good to get independent feedback on the look and feel, functionality etc.

Have a great weekend!

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psweber
I just went through this from the agency side, and I totally agree with the
author. I think just the list of people that were brought on the project prove
the point.

All these people were involved: Account director, Project Manager, Business
Analyst, Marketing Specialists (3 of them for some reason), Copy writer,
Content Strategist, User Experience, Art Director, Technical Manager, Front
end developer, Back End developer

The agency burned through enough money to hire 4-5 employees for a year. We
had a few meetings with the client and 8 people from the agency. The math
there is pretty painful for the client. 8 people for an hour (at $165+ each
per hour) means that each meeting costs well over $1k.

Hire a freelancer (like meeeeeee) or get full time employees. Agencies best
serve large companies that can't (or don't want to) maintain design and
development teams in house.

~~~
maxcameron
Thanks for the kind words. Wow, that sounds like a huge meeting. I can only
imagine.

Did they ship early and often? Or did they hold back and try to get it
"perfect"? And also, is that startup still alive today?

~~~
psweber
Standard agency waterfall process. Definitely shooting for "perfect". The
product just launched. It was funded by the client's extremely wealthy family
and the upkeep fees should be tiny compared to the upfront cost they paid to
the agency, so it should be able to stay afloat for a little while.

The real problem is the weak product idea. The agency wasn't in a position to
tell the client their idea was bad because they wanted the money.

~~~
maxcameron
I hear you. The really sad part is that shipping your mvp is really "just the
beginning," whereas a lot of agencies and clients assume that the job is done.

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dasil003
Very good points in this article. But the problem is that if you are a non-
technical founder without connections you are extremely unlikely to convince
anyone very good to join your startup. It's probably better to hire a
_technical_ (not design-focused!!) agency and pay a premium as you will get
much better and more maintainable code than if you hire a junior-level or just
plan mediocre software dev off the street. The trick is identifying the right
agency.

~~~
maxcameron
I don't know if I agree, only because while it isn't easy to find a technical
cofounder, it's not impossible.

If it were easy, then everyone would do it. But if you work hard, attend lots
of meetups, have a strong vision and are actively trying to push the business
forward, it can't be impossible.

~~~
dasil003
Well let me put it this way. As a non-technical founder, your chances of
identifying a great agency _and_ that agency being willing to work for you are
one or two orders of magnitude greater than your ability to identify a great
developer _and_ convincing him to be your co-founder.

Of course if you have an inherently interesting idea, a Jobsian charisma, or
an uncanny nose for talent, then that can shift things in your favor. But I
can say with some authority that the number of new entrepreneurs these days
far outweighs the number of talented developers who are entertaining new
startup job offers.

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mgkimsal
In a situation right now where I'm working with 2 co-founders (I'm not one
myself, just on the sidelines) and they're bringing in an agency. The agency
has offered to work for free, because they see a lot of potential in the
project. I still think it's a bit of a mistake, even taking the money aspect
out of it. The 'find/iterate' mentality from the article is the primary reason
why.

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maxcameron
Hey there,

Is the agency really working for free? Or are they taking equity in the
project?

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mgkimsal
Should have indicated that - I don't know the details of the deal, but I do
believe there's a 'x hours for y% equity', but it _may be_ 'x hours now for
delayed profit sharing'.

~~~
maxcameron
Interesting. I think a value-based approach would leave the founders better
off than an equity deal.

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yo-mf
I agree for the most part. The motivations and ethos of startups and agencies
/ dev shops / et al. are not aligned. Thus you have a huge potential for
failure, which I have experienced first hand as an entrepreneur and seen
repeated numerous times as an investor.

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maxcameron
Heya,

Pretty cool that you got to see the consequences of that approach from both
sides of the table.

