
Tell HN: I will build you a working MVP for $2,345 - brandonhsiao
http://prototypefor2345.com
======
7Figures2Commas
As a simple rule, you can usually break MVP clients into two groups:

1\. Cash poor wantrapreneurs who expect the world but can't pay for it.

2\. Entrepreneurs with realistic expectations who are able and willing to pay
a fair rate for labor. The founder of Groove is a good example[1].

The person interested in a 3 week engagement that costs $2,345 is more likely
to fall into the first group.

You want to do everything you can to avoid the first group, even if you're
starting out and trying to build a portfolio. These clients are far less
likely to collaborate with you effectively and far more likely to be
unprofitable to serve. Additionally, because they don't have the capital
reasonably required to execute on their ideas, you'll probably never build
long-term relationships, which are very desirable for solos.

In terms of targeting the latter group, which would enable you to charge a lot
more, you're far more likely to be successful if you can demonstrate that you
have some product development chops. A lot of entrepreneurs need help
translating their knowledge and ideas into functional requirements; many of
them are not going to come to you with ready-to-implement wireframes, user
stories, specifications, etc. These entrepreneurs need a partner who is
capable of being involved in the tasks that come before implementation.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7604055](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7604055)

------
al2o3cr
My biggest concern with doing something like this would be that you'd burn all
your time negotiating - because clients are going to show up with a "3 months
to implement" idea, and you're may spend more (unpaid!) time stripping the
thing down to a reasonable MVP than actually coding.

"We'll agree beforehand on a list of features" has a lot of complexity hidden
inside; if a client shows up with an idea "be the next Google" and hands you a
list "1\. SEARCH TEH INTERNETZ", what will you do?

~~~
Turing_Machine
I know you were joking, but I once had a guy complain about just that. I
contributed a (very basic) search feature to some FOSS software and a user
complained because it "wasn't as good as Google".

My response was something like "If I could write a search engine as good as
Google in my spare time, I'd be living a lifestyle somewhat more luxurious
than the one I actually have."

~~~
bra-ket
you could have used Google API to index that site,
[https://developers.google.com/custom-
search/docs/api](https://developers.google.com/custom-search/docs/api)

~~~
Turing_Machine
Unfortunately a lot of the users had and have proprietary/sensitive content,
so opening it up to Google wasn't an option.

------
redindian75
I see a lot of people advising you to increase it. Don't. Its a perfect number
with a simple idea "MVP for $2345". It has in-built chance of
virality/wordofmouth for its USP - so you are getting free marketing dollars
inside that number.

If you charge 10K+ like others are suggesting, then you are competing with
10000 devs ready to do that work. If you charge 1K, you will lose money and
target the extreme low ballers, and no amount of free marketing can make it
sustainable. Your number of ~2.5K is a perfect balance.

    
    
      But set a few hard-rules before you agree on a project:
    
      - wireframes, mockups with annotations to avoid scope-creep
      - design will be bootstrap quality (otherwise design is never-ending)
      - is designed for demo purposes, it will break if 10,000 ppl access it.
    

Remember your clients are "idea mongers" who want to validate an idea, but
dont have the chops to do it themselves. So your clients will not be
businesses or startups - but plain old business folks with ideas. Stick with
it. If the demand is great, then outsource it or franchise it, but control
quality by keeping it within your strengths (py + web.py) since you missed "1"
here is a way to include it:

1 for $2345 :)

Great idea! Good Luck!

------
cwilson
This is a fantastic opportunity for someone to build a marketplace that
connects folks who need a quick MVP built with freelance developers. You could
go a step further and break it down by back-end, front-end, design only, or
all of the above (because maybe you already fill one of those roles yourself).

You can bake in the idea of a cash/equity split if the freelancer was
interested as well.

The idea would be to limit projects based on time, scope, or budget from the
get-go and stick to the MVP market niche.

Edit: Thinking about this idea more and reading more comments on this thread
gave me another idea. Many people have commented that it might be a good idea
to have your app fully wire-framed and thought out first. Need help with this
specific stage before getting into the development of the MVP? Just another
channel on the marketplace.

Idea Consulting -> Wire-frames -> MVP Development -> Design

All of course are optional and you could obviously swap Development and
Design.

~~~
cardine
You should pay Brandon $2,345 to build a working MVP for that idea ;)

~~~
cwilson
Hah, I'd just do it myself, but I was going to suggest he build his own MVP to
scale his own service!

------
smnrchrds
Chris Granger does (did?) offer a similar service[1]. I think his price
(5000$) is more sustainable for a developer, but I'm not sure how the market
is for this kind of work.

Chris, if you are reading this, please share your experience with us.

[1] [http://iwbyp.chris-granger.com/](http://iwbyp.chris-granger.com/)

~~~
ibdknox
I got/get lots of offers, but in general the projects were pretty
uninteresting (so many clones), people didn't really know what they want, and
I found that what people really needed was someone to think through their
ideas with them, not a prototype.

At that point in time 5k was reasonable. The price would go up quite a bit if
I were doing it now though. But I doubt I'd do it again - the work didn't end
up being as exciting as I thought it would be.

What I would consider doing in the future is the "idea consulting" I
discovered most people ended up needing. I have a knack for pulling things
apart and putting them back together in interesting ways :)

------
subpixel
Perhaps consider taking a page out of the pinboard.in playbook:

customer #1: $2000

customer #2: $2100

customer #3: $2200

And so on until customers stop signing up. Then you start over.

------
elwell
> I'll get half the site working, demo it to you, give you all the code thus
> far, and you'll pay me $1,172.50.

You should ask for 1/4 up-front, before you write any code.

~~~
brandonhsiao
As someone who isn't used to taking upfront payments, my question is, are
people actually willing to do that?

~~~
elwell
Yes, definitely. I just did that for two projects in the past week; but it was
1/2 up-front. Albeit, they were close referrals. YMMV if it's potential
customers who don't know you.

~~~
jack_jennings
Was just going to post the same thing.

I've never had anyone walk away from a project after asking for 50% upfront at
projects this scale.

------
PhrosTT
You should post this reddit.com/r/startups or /entrepreneur

This is like the one venue for most people CAN build out their ideas.

------
zavulon
Back when I was running a web development company, I toyed with this idea a
few times, but couldn't find a way to do it and not lose money. Hope your
experience is different. Good luck!

~~~
brandonhsiao
Interesting, what happened that made you lose money? Were you pouring more
time into the projects than you were getting paid for?

~~~
zavulon
I didn't actually go ahead and implement it - I just couldn't make the math
work. In my opinion, there are too many unknowns with this model - you're
quoting the price of a project without knowing all features, talking about
design iterations, supported browsers, and a million other things. And if you
substantially increase the price after getting the requirements, clients won't
like that, because the most important number for them is the first number you
tell them - in this case, $2,345.

I could go on, but I don't want to discourage you. You should try it, just be
careful not to lose money. Also, if you're in the western world, make it
$10,000 or $20,000, that's a more realistic number :)

~~~
hayksaakian
think about it like fiverr

There are a lot of unknowns, the only known is that it costs 5$, that's all
some people need to know.

------
joshlegs
This is a ridiculously low number. I'd say you really need to double it or so.
Good luck! Looks like you've got some pretty cool past projects under your
belt.

------
lifeisstillgood
I love the idea - but I wonder why the price? it does seem really low. At 19
bucks and hour pro rata, you are not storing up cash to get through the hours
when you are not earning, like marketing, talking to clients, understanding
what they want.

It did get me thinking though - really good luck.

~~~
brandonhsiao
3 weeks is just to buy me some runway. I was hoping to work on multiple
projects in parallel.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
Unless the projects are carbon copies (in which case automate) this will never
work. The context switching will kill any productivity. You can work in
parallel by threes - one in sales funnel, one in development and one in
maintenance mode. And that will be tough.

------
robinhoode
I like the idea, but:

$2,345 / (40 * 3) = $19.5416666667/hr

I guess if you're just starting, that's decent money, but I don't think I
could run with the same idea myself. I'd probably need to add a 1 to the front
of your number.

~~~
brandonhsiao
To be honest, I said 3 weeks just to be safe (the old rule of doubling what
you think you need). The plan was also to work on multiple projects in
parallel.

You're right though, I am just starting off, and already feel a bit guilty
asking for anything north of $5k.

~~~
elwell
Don't feel guilty. If you're price is too high you simply won't get leads.
Better 3 high-paying customers than 10 low-paying customers: less support
time.

~~~
iambateman
That is a fact.

------
soleimc
This is super inspiring and really makes me want to try a similar experiment.
I've been wondering how I can make income while doing month long stays in
different countries throughout the world, and this seems like it would be
about perfect. New country, new project, enough income just to get by. Keeping
the price low is not necessarily a mistake. It will allow you to pick from a
much large range of products and if you can live for two months on $2000, why
not just keep it low. The world doesn't necessarily always have to be profit-
maximizing.

P.S. I checked out your essay about the first person view. I think you should
watch this video from the BBC. It describes how this first person view that
you describe is not actually making the decisions for your body, an MRI
machine can predict what decision you will 6-7 seconds before you become
conscious of making a particular decision. This doesn't necessarily answer
your question, but the video shifts the question from why am I making
decisions to why does brain make me think I'm making decisions.

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6S9OidmNZM#t=303](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6S9OidmNZM#t=303)

------
elwell
The original idea: [http://iwbyp.chris-granger.com/](http://iwbyp.chris-
granger.com/)

~~~
brandonhsiao
Hehe, you got me. That actually is where I first got the idea.

~~~
elwell
Yeah, I wasn't being critical. It's a fun/great idea. Seems like a fast way to
broaden your portfolio; both intellectually and on paper.

------
meetamit
How can you commit to a fixed amount to execute on an idea that requires an
unknown number of iterations, re-evaluation of initial assumptions, and
customer feedback? Maybe this is possible IF your customer is a sensible
designer who can iterate in parallel with you and has a realistic sense of
what an MVP is and isn't. If your customer is just some schmuck with 2.5 grand
to throw around and no product experience, you'll likely find yourself
fighting time consuming battles of scope and deliverables. And how can you
juggle multiple projects like that simultaneously, when there's unavoidable
friction that comes with the context switching? And, how fulfilled will you
feel when your day-to-day is filled building things that are bug-laden and
just minimally good enough? What kind of portfolio will that generate for you?

~~~
brandonhsiao
I sit down with each person and agree on a specific list of features they want
before I get started. I say explicitly on the site that the $2,345 is only for
one iteration.

~~~
meetamit
I think the definition of what constitutes a single iteration is subject to
personal values and tendencies. E.g. I myself have a hard time calling a task
"done" when it simply meets a rough guideline that was specified in text ahead
of time. For me, it has to be better than just satisfactory. And that's before
adding the customer's expectations into the mix. Hence, I would be a horrible
candidate to try this. But I have met devs who are the other way around, and
you may well be like that. I do think it's bold of you to give this a shot.

------
nchuhoai
I'm very intruiged by this idea, because I'm in a somewhat similar situation.
I'm a fullstack developer all the way and love building products, but I
haven't quite figured out a way yet how to make an income from that. Good luck
and I would love to hear hot it's going.

------
brandonhsiao
Thanks for all the helpful advice! Totally didn't expect so much feedback.

Question for the more experienced people here: if I changed it to "$2,345 per
week, and it'll take 1-3 weeks" instead of "$2,345 for up to 3 weeks," would I
lose anyone I shouldn't be losing?

~~~
antocv
I would suggest $7890 for 3 weeks. Thats still low-balling somebody with your
skills, thats about $65 per hour, man.

A better idea is to go with $12345 for 4 weeks.

------
147
How would you market this (aside from posting on HN)? I want to do the exact
same thing but charge more. Trying to freelance and I'm just unable to find
clients.

------
ritchiea
Question for you or Python users in general:

Why web.py over flask or django?

~~~
brandonhsiao
I considered both when I first got started. Django was just too hard for me.
When I read code using a framework I've never seen before, usually I can still
kind of tell what it does. It might be my own stupidity, but when I read
Django code I have no clue what it does.

I did consider Flask, which is much more similar to web.py, but eventually
chose web.py because I was a fan of Aaron Swartz' work at the time.

~~~
joshlegs
I know one of the main developers on Flask. He's an exceptional fellow and
extremely talented. I havent used the framework before but I hear it's highly
recommendable in general.

------
cmapes
This is ballsy but cool. Being a full stack business guy, full stack
developer, and someone who had done years of freelance in the past, I'd be
afraid of the scope creep and complexity issues that are going to rear their
head. But more power to you for choosing to try to tackle them, I hope you end
up on top.

------
ddebernardy
I dunno... It seems to me that there's a lot more to creating a minimum
_viable_ product than simply building a python web app for X amount of money
-- especially without knowing the specs in advance.

Good means to advertize your site on HN, though. ;-)

------
imjk
I have a feeling you'll be inundated, but I'll be reaching out to you shortly.

------
jack_jennings
Maybe you can roll the numbers up a digit for each successive job…

Having done "MVP" work before, I wouldn't undervalue your work like this for
to long or you'll be facing burnout quickly.

~~~
brandonhsiao
Hm, I'm hearing that a lot. Is $2,345 really that little? I've been living
near the poverty line by choice, and $2,345 lasts me about two months.

In either case, I guess it would turn off half the visitors if I just changed
the price right now.

~~~
lobotryas
Yes, it's too little. Remember patio11's advice: you are not charging what the
work or time is worth it TO YOU, you are charging what your output is worth it
TO YOUR CUSTOMER :)

Also, having a starting price in the 10k+ range will help weed out bad apple
customers. Trust us when we say that you want fewer high quality customers
than a lot of pain-in-the-neck customers. Finally, charge 1/4th upfront like
another poster said so you don't get screwed.

~~~
goatherders
Having a starting price in the $10k range also weeds him out. In my market
(Austin), if I have $10k for a prototype (even half that) I can throw a cat
and hit a Ruby guy, a Python guy, a PHP guy, etc. The price as he has it is
low enough that people with "an idea" might take the plunge to get a prototype
going.

If I were to have one suggestion it would be for his site to spell out some
parameters about what a prototype is so there are no later arguments.

------
sparkzilla
I'd be interested in this type of arrangement for a node.js dev who could do
some Bitcoin work.

------
hayksaakian
Hey, I remember you from robot game.

Wish you the best with this new venture.

~~~
brandonhsiao
Thanks :) Is anyone still playing that?

~~~
hayksaakian
136 weekly active robots

[http://robotgame.net/stats](http://robotgame.net/stats)

------
pconner
The link 404'd for me

EDIT: Working now

------
antocv
Your fee is too low. It turns out to around 35 000usd per year. Before taxes.

Thats probably lower than a cleaning man is selling his time for.

Oh well, I guess you get what you pay for. No offense, but seriously.

~~~
brandonhsiao
Hm, I _was_ considering going from "$2,345 for 3 weeks" to "$2,345 per week,
up to 3 weeks." But the fee right now isn't as low as it seems; I was planning
on taking projects in parallel.

------
techaddict009
Good Idea. But your own website looks little lame. Hope you update it soon.

~~~
gk1
"Cobbler's children have no shoes."[0]

Busy consultants and developers rarely have the time to work on their own
site.

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoemaking#In_popular_culture](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoemaking#In_popular_culture)

~~~
greenyoda
But if your business is developing web sites, your own web site is a strong
signal to your potential customers about the quality of work that you do.

