Got a good idea but no funds to develop it...

Ok so I just had what I think is a great idea for a website but it could cost a few thousand to build and market properly and I dont have this sort of cash. What can I do to get my project off the ground?

It's a tricky one cos it could theoretically be copied quite easily and quickly so I would need to make sure my site was no. 1

What would you suggest?

 

my site too has cost me a good 6 digit $ amount and ten thousands of hrs of work
hence i started small
page by page and earned the investment-$ before i spent it
until it was done several years of intense work later

hence

good ideas - really good ones - always are affordable - just a matter of steps, efforts and time

start small with the funds you have IN YOUR POCKET now these days
a site is cheap and even a cheap shared hosting will do the first years
and work your way UP step by step with the funds you earn from ANYm truly good idea
as you progress and succeed adsense may further assist you if your idea is as good as you think and visitors come in increasing numbers year after year

 

Thanks for the advice but it's not really a site I could build one page at a time. It requires a lot of programming knowledge and would only be ready once the entire site was complete.

Not to mention that there would likely be lots of imitation websites out there if I were to build it slowly.

 

My suggestion is if you truly don't have the budget to get it off the ground quickly, code it yourself in house without telling a soul. Then when you're done, create a marketing buzz and launch it.

Plus one thing to consider is the possibility of your hired (or contracted) programmers to leak code and information about your idea, despite signing NDA. It happens. Or after they are done working for you, they'd just take their code and apply it to a competing site with a new layout.

Sadly these type of things happen all the time.

Good luck.

 

coding yourself is one option if you are already an experienced coder
to learn coding to a professional level just for oyur project may take years and by the time you have the project it may be totally outdated or already realized by many other sites. Ideas flow into many minds at same time if ideas really need to be realized - and many getting same inspiration -. one evewntually has the power to finish the job
thus learning from scratch might be a poor choice for a project that needs to be done NOW.

hiring a coder - keep in mind that top qualified experienced freelance coders easily make 20-40 us$ and more ... per hr
hence it would coset you a true fortune

however

the Open Source world is huge
have a look at all linux projects, tools and OS software and see if you can assemble what you need out of th ehuge pool of OS software and packages

 

Well I ran into this same issue, but I am working around it.

I have developed my product for a year. around 30hrs of work for a year to get it to the stage it is at now. Finally, it is all ready to go, minus a few tweeks. then again, my knowledge saved me (if i had to hire a company to write it for me, at my billing rate) more money than i could ever sink into this kind of thing. DBA's, developers, project management isn't cheap. those $150/hr conuslants add up!

if you think it is that good of an idea, and you are willing to risk it, then you should be prepared to risk a certain amount of personal debt to get it doing. it isn't the best solution, but if you don't, your idea may go no where and make you nothing. if it does, you may make a small fortune. if you do and you lose money, hey what is a few thousand in the long run.

best of luck.

 

Thanks for the replies everyone.

After thinking up this site I went about researching it and I actually found a post on a freelancer website where someone was requesting a site like the one I had planned. The quotes he/she was getting where for $6k-8k and I think they were going ahead with it so I am no longer sure if I should do this or not.

 

if you're not going to do it, at least share the brilliant idea...

 

sharing the idea or giving the idea to those who can realize it NOW is an excellent idea - finally it's christmas time - giving time, at least on this part of the globe christmas time ahs started already many weeks ago - and giving excellent ideas worthless to you may be just the gift someone else may love
and who knows what in return comes back to you
may be another idea you can do right away without debts, withotu further preparation ...

hence one option may be either share your full and detailed idea HERE in DP forum - as a gift in return for the many valuable resources, help and tips received from DP ... or post it on your own website with proper title and SEO

 

Well I will share the idea as I dont now intend to pursue it.

Feel free to criticise it as you wish

I assume you have all heard of an auction where the lowest unique bid wins? Well right now us regular joes cannot sell our own items in such a way it's only dedicated websites who do this.

Why? Wouldn't it be just as possible for say me to sell an LCD TV using this same method.

Now obviously you would wonder why I wouldn't just sell it on Ebay? Well I could and I could use a buy it now to achieve a price I would be willing to sell at.

But by using a lowest unique bid auction I could potentially sell at a higher price just by selling more "tickets".

For the buyer, they do not feel agrieved at me making more since they could potentially get the item for much less than they would otherwise do.

I think that people are far less tight with their money when they only have to shell out small amounts. Take a look at the lottery for example, or those phone in programs where you could win a lot but the call cost you 1.50 or more.

Obviously the owner of the site would take a percentage of the sale price and a listing fee in a similar way to ebay.

One issue I potentially see is legal as I am not sure whether this would fall under gambling acts or something similar.

Another is that auctions have no set end date (i suppose you could make them have if you wished) they just keep going until all the "tickets" are sold.

The site would have a feedback system like Ebay's and sponsored listings etc...

I think a site like this could create quite a buzz with lots of good publicity opportunities like "Mr X paid just £2.26 for his Ipod" for example.

What do you think?

I know it is in quite a rough format right now cos like I said it was just an idea