3 replies to this topic

[dzdrazil]

I've been signed on for a start up company two of my friends are planning with an established professional in the field. It's really a division of his established company, but one that deals largely with e-commerce.

Because I am seasoned in coding but don't have a large portfolio of contracted work, and their relatively smaller budget, I need some help in understanding what I should propose as my budget for my contract.

Here's the project:
There needs to be a website established with both a friendly CMS as well as e-commerce via paypal (I've chosen drupal for this). I will be responsible for getting the base-line website up and running, along with the appropriate database and tables for maintaining customer records. The product they sell is a consulting service.

In addition, the interface for their consulting service is a Flash (built in flex) or Java applet which is essentially a representation of their established data model, which I am being provided with via an Excel book. I've already done a demo of the layout for this interface, with which they were very pleased.

Basically, I'll by July 1- 16, I will have:
A drupal- based e-commerce website and database. The potential clients will review a limited- access version of the actual product, and upon confirmed payment, will have an account that can access the entire model.

I'd love to simply do this by the hour, as all of my other applications work has been with my previous employer. However, I get the strong feeling that their boss would rather hire me as contracted labor with an established budget.

So, how would you establish your budget? I subtly asked what kind of budget they had in mind/ what they had available, but the coy response was "you set it, we pay you assuming its not too much"

Major brownie points to anyone willing to help this newbie to contracting out!

[WingedPanther]

Start by defining more clearly what you will produce and how long each piece will take to develop. That, combined with your hourly rate, will let you quote the price and provide a time-line. It also lets you effectively negotiate features, design, etc and discuss the impact of changes to your envisioned design on the contract price.

[NatalieM]

I've read somewhere that you should work out the time you think it will take you, then multiply that by 2, then apply your hourly rate. It might be pushing it a bit but basically, the idea is that things always take longer than planned so make sure you do add some contigency hours when you work out your price.

[WingedPanther]

It depends on how good you are at estimating. I tend to have very accurate estimates, so multiplying by 2 would not be appropriate. I may pad 10% extra if I'm not comfortable with the spec.