

Show HN: My consultancy built a project management tool made for client work - bdunn
http://www.projectorpm.com

======
aculver
Full disclosure: I'm a developer at We Are Titans, but my involvement in
Projector has been limited to being one of the first users. :)

My favorite use-case for Projector so far was putting together a recent
project proposal:

On my side, I: * broke down the project into stories and estimated those
stories in _hours_ , not points. * also added the regular template of tasks
that take place to get a project off the ground, launched, and the known time
required for those. * entered the hourly rate. * invited the prospective
client to the project.

The client sees: * The sticker price. * How his request translates into work.
* How larger features are broken down into smaller features that account for
the cost of a feature. * He sees which features and areas of the project
account for the most money. * He saw a line item for 'back and forth' design
with a bunch of hours attached to it, which communicates: Nice design can be
done on the cheap if you avoid the back and forth. Use us as a saw and not as
a flash light. Measure twice, cut once.

This client accepted the proposal and the project management software is
already configured for the project and ready for us to get started.

Like thedelchop (one of my co-workers) mentioned, the nice thing about
Projector for a team like ours is that features and budgets are in the same
place. I'm used to managing projects in Pivotal Tracker and my billing in
Harvest. Clients are used to seeing progress daily in Pivotal Tracker and a
sticker price on paper every couple of weeks. Now we all see it in one place,
every day.

------
endersshadow
Just so you're aware, I've used a PM tool called Projector before, but it's
not you guys: <http://www.projectorpsa.com/project_management.html>

It also does time tracking and whatnot for a consulting firm. You may run into
some TM issues with the name.

~~~
bdunn
Unfortunately, my attorney brought this up to me the other day. We'll more
than likely ultimately need to rebrand - probably sooner than later.

Thanks for the heads up :-)

------
typicalrunt
_Do I need a credit card to sign up?

Nope. All you need to sign up is an account name, email address, password and
the name of your first project. When your tiral expires, we'll calculate your
plan based on the number of developer accounts you've setup. You can always
remove developers (ask them first!) in order to downgrade your account._

Just a couple things here to note.

The first is a spelling mistake. "tiral" should be "trial".

The second is the usage of the word "Nope". Although the gist of the pricing
page looks to be informal, "nope" is an incredibly informal word, especially
when "No" is sufficient enough in this context.

~~~
bdunn
We just pushed the new marketing site yesterday. Good thinking - making those
edits now, thanks!

~~~
typicalrunt
No worries. It can be difficult to catch spelling mistakes in things that you
write or read over many times.

Pro-tip: When I don't have the luxury of a spell-checker, I read the paragraph
backwards, one word at a time, and I find that it helps to catch most of the
common errors.

When you read text normally, your brain reads ahead[1] and skims (or omits) a
lot of errors out of your field of view so you miss a lot of easy typos.
Reading backwards mixes up your brain just enough that it stops "helping" you
read.

[1] <http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/matt.davis/Cmabrigde/>

------
jhill7
Full disclosure, bdunn's firm built my app (@aeir_talk), and take it from me,
they make great products. I am so excited to see them putting their own
products out. Especially one that is meeting a critical need for its users.

~~~
aculver
Thanks for the kind words, Joe. :)

------
thedelchop
I've been using this tool for a while, and I really think it captures the
needs and concerns of a consultancy (Are we going to make our time/budget) in
a way that tools like Pivotal Tracker just can't match.

------
TamDenholm
Is it just me or is the #features div broken, having a 620px width but makes
more sense to be 880px. Or am i missing something?

~~~
TamDenholm
Also, perhaps update the expected date of the videos. Otherwise it looks cool,
i've signed up and am going to give it a go.

