[AccessD] The Business Side Of Databases

Christopher Hawkins clh at christopherhawkins.com
Tue Jun 26 19:54:59 CDT 2007


That sounds both smart AND dangerous.

Smart, because you're securing a guaranteed income and being on-site gives you a lot of opportunities to up-sell.  Dangerous, for numerous reasons.  What if Client A has an emergency on a day when you're at Client B?  How are you ever going to grow your business beyond yourself if you're doing what amounts to staff augmentation?  And doesn't doing the work on-site remove much of the mystique/respect that you normally get as a hired expert?

It could work brilliantly or it could turn out to be a PITA.  I suppose all you can do is give it a try and see!

-C-

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From: "Kath Pelletti" <kp at sdsonline.net>
Sent: Monday, June 25, 2007 5:05 PM
To: "Access Developers discussion and problem solving" <accessd at databaseadvisors.com>
Subject: Re: [AccessD] The Business Side Of Databases 

It is tricky.......They *need* you to stay in business for the next set of changes that will inevitably come but how do you afford to stay in business if you have a quiet period? I have 3 or 4 main clients at any one time who provide most of my income and then other small stuff.

A friend of mine (contract programmer) suggested to me the other day that I consider selling a day to each of my main clients. It wouldn't have to be a whole day but it might be, or it could be one day a fortnight .......so they agree to pay 1 days salary for the entire year. It's a pretty ambitious idea but he feels that the clients would see it as an opportunity to keep their system more dynamic / you could offer to be on-site for all/many of their 'days' and they would have a secure agreement. It feels like a big ask but I'm going to sound it out to one client (also a friend) and get some feedback. Then I'd have the security of the pay check whilst working for myself......ain't that the holy grail?

Kath
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Christopher Hawkins 
To: accessd at databaseadvisors.com 
Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 1:34 AM
Subject: Re: [AccessD] The Business Side Of Databases

I'm another one who needs to do a better job of selling ongoing business, Kath. It seems like a chicken-and-the-egg type of problem though - once you write (or re-write) a complete system, if you've done your job correctly the client probably won't *need* any maintenance. So what do you sell? It's tricky.

-C-

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