Process

Our development projects go through four phases:

1. Initial Consultation – we will provide an initial no-charge/no-obligation consultation to understand the current status and strategic goals of your project, and further explain our capabilities, pricing structure, and high-level recommendations for your specific project. We are a small, focused firm and always look for a good match with our clients rather than attempt to sign every project that crosses our path.
2. Requirements Analysis – as a contractor building a house needs to have architectural blueprints before they can say how much time and money it will take to build that house, it is necessary for a developer to understand the details of a software system in order to provide an accurate time and cost estimate. Some clients come to us prepared with a complete set of wireframe mockups specifying the desired user experience, but most do not. For that majority we will have one or more meetings with the key stakeholders of your project to understand their needs and expectations, and how those relate to the company’s strategic goals. The result of this phase is a comprehensive plan for your project that identifies the types of users of the system, the tasks that they will accomplish with the system, and how those use cases map to individual screens or external integration points within the system.
3. Development and Deployment – armed with the blueprints and lightweight project management tools like Pivotal Tracker, we will commence construction of your system following an agile development process in which prioritized sets of use cases are implemented and deployed to a live server daily. You have the opportunity to review progress and provide feedback at every step along the way, and we approach all projects with an emphasis on security and performance from the beginning.
4. Handoff or Ongoing Maintenance – for those clients who will maintain an internal technical staff, we will provide comprehensive technical documentation and training covering architecture and integration, detailed design, operational administration, and other areas as needed to ensure a successful handoff and immediate productivity. For other clients who need an ongoing technology partner, we are available on an ongoing basis to provide support and implement enhancements to the system.

Costs

Costs for development projects varies by the scope of work and type of resources required.  Sample costs based on previous projects are provided as a rough guideline:

Simple Web Application (3-5 primary interaction flows, limited external integration (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, ad server)): $15,000-30,000

Complex Web Application (10+ interaction flows, custom Ajax widgets, extensive third-party web service and data feed integration): $100,000-300,000

Simple Mobile Application (3-5 forms with remote backend): $10,000-20,000

Complex Mobile Application (cross-platform, extensive hardware integration, vector graphics): $50,000-100,000

Basic Corporate/Blog/Brochureware site: $3,000-5,000

General Assessment of Existing Codebase: $1,000-5,000

Security Audit of Existing Codebase: $5,000-25,000

In addition to these developments costs, most projects will incur expenses of around $50 to register a domain name and purchase an SSL certificate, and around $50/month for server hosting during the development and beta testing phases. Once an application is released to the public and scaled to handle the increase in traffic, server hosting costs typically increase to $200-2000/month depending on the amount of traffic and level of redundancy desired.

The development cost samples above do not include graphic design services, which as a focused development firm we do not perform. We often refer clients to design partners for these services.