
Ask HN: Starting a Software Development Consultancy. Need Advice - motivatednoobie
Hey guys,<p>I’m starting a software development company. I have 4 people in my team currently all based remotely around North America.<p>We have experience with technologies like React, React Native, PHP, Laravel, Python, Flask, Django, Ruby, Sinatra, Angular.js, Vue.js, Node.js etc.<p>All of us have decided to form a company and try to get work as a company&#x2F;team. Currently, we have a lot of inbound work coming to us via LinkedIn but those are as jobs at existing firms. We&#x27;re looking to scale it up.<p>We would love to work on project to project basis and that’s why looking to build the software company.<p>Any advice on how we could market the company and find clients would be great and really appreciated.<p>Thank you so much in advance.
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davismwfl
The best way I found when I ran mine was to network. Trying to get jobs from
advertising and marketing is an expensive way to do it, and you will go
through a long and expensive learning curve. Best thing for consultancy is to
keep the queue full and to do that you need the networking going 24/7\. Use
existing clients that are happy with you to find the next client. Do this
while the client is happy with your work.

Some people I have talked to about running a consultancy think they will never
upset or disappoint a client, don't fall into that trap. You could do
everything right and still have a client pissed off cause their coffee was too
hot, shit happens. So after a few weeks, the client is happy with you and most
importantly you have delivered something to them, pick the right time and ask
for recommendations or introductions to other teams or companies. I found a
ton of work that way. Even when I would have the unavoidable client that was a
douchebag in the end, I usually got at least 1 reference that led to work. I
got better about client selection as we grew since we could be more picky, so
that also helps a lot, but in the early days you generally don't get to be as
picky as you'd like.

If you have specific questions let me know, I did it more than once, with two
successfully exited as product/consultancy companies. Others here have done
similar so hopefully you'll get other opinions too.

