I can see valid points on both sides of the fence here. Yes, we work to make money and the faster we can get on with what we truly want to pursue, the better. That’s generally my feeling when it comes to working 16-18 hours days with the hope of working on other things I can’t afford to spend time on now.

It’s always unfortunate to see a company like Mint cash in their chips, but this seems to be a glass half-empty, half-full situation. Perhaps the Mint crew want to pursue more noble pursuits, philanthropic pursuits, or start their own companies that contribute to some other exciting industry like solar or other green tech ideas?

The primary criticism I have here is not your points- it is, of course, a worthwhile pursuit to try and innovate in a given field, but rather that you seem to assume these guys are done, that they are taking the money and running off to burn hard currency in their fireplaces.

I’d say at least acknowledge you have hope that the Mint team is going on to bigger and better things.

On the other side of the coin, your passion for overthrowing the old regime is inspiring, passionate, pragmatic and admirable, but keep in mind that the large barge companies out there that are currently in the “purchase and conquer” phase could also be suffering from a lack of direction, a leadership team not sure how to adjust to a new paradigm.

You can argue the large guys will buy their way to longevity, gobbling up the innovators, but the historical data rarely ever supports that. If you haven’t read “Good to Great” by Jim Collins, please do. Warm fuzzy feelings will soon replace your outrage. Honestly, I’m encouraged when I see this acquisition pattern take place. I’m not concerned about Intuit, Intuit will either innovate or die, not buy their way to results.

As for the Mint team? Guys, congrats on your acquisition. I’m excited to see what you do next, because the thing that Intuit did not get when they bought the Mint machine was the engine, clearly.

I was reminded of that a few minutes ago as I saw another of a series of tweets touting a recent Wordpress plugin that has the community abuzz. It has some new tools and features that are certainly useful if you are really trying to leverage your readers in some manner. The thing that amazed me about this was that not only are these tools just coming out, but that the very same functionality has existed for quite a long while in my CMS of choice, TYPOlight. I know the first thing that you’re thinking is “okay, so if you like TYPOlight so much, why aren’t you blogging on it?” The answer is that I was in a rush to create a blog, and I needed a good template, something that by virtue of market penetration I could easily procure for Wordpress (thanks, Woothemes!). However, when it comes to using Wordpress as a CMS, it can’t possibly compare to TYPOlight. When I see new plugins coming out, I immediately think about the fact that what they do is often achieved for free with TYPOlight and often, the breadth of features exceeds that which the plugins offer even under commercial license.

I also hear talk here and there about frameworks in relation to code, whether it be meta language, scripting, stylesheets, or php. The thing that amazes me is that TYPOlight has existed as part of an amazing PHP framework that is simply the best and easiest since it went live in 2006!, most reliable and secure I have ever dealt with. As a developer, nothing matches the ability to extend a package compared to TYPOlight. The design philosophies and the coding patterns are magnificent.

Both as an end user and as a developer, I can tell you with confidence that if TYPOlight was sitting at a poker table with Wordpress, it knows exactly who the sucker is, and it’s holding a monster hand. Either way you look at it, in the next year, TYPOlight is the tool that will storm the CMS market in the U.S. It already has abroad, its home country is Germany. I won’t bother to go into the feature set here, I will just say that if you want more information – and you will – you must go to www.typolight.org to learn more.

…do you have other recommendations for a mid sized company like my clients that would enable us to grow into the potential we have as a direct to consumer player? A tall order, I know, but love your thoughts.

While I am not a marketing expert, I do feel comfortable speaking from the standpoint of tools and usability. There needs to be a new emphasis on lowering the operational footprint of the tools we provide for clients. After all, the building that a store resides in shouldn’t require the level of attention that marketing, products and customers demand. As a developer, I believe that is the philosophy that we need to emphasize moving forward – the tool needs to be built with a clear emphasis on fitting into existing business processes as much as possible instead of carelessly redefining them, and in the process creating more work on the operational side. In addition, the tools themselves need to serve marketing directives better, which means adding features in that allow marketing departments to test, gather and abstract data into something that can be employed in marketing and operational directives.

In the context of e-commerce, the problem lies in the fact that otherwise decent core e-commerce packages, make it cost prohibitive to make any sort of change to the system, and it doesn’t need to be like that. If designed right, the actual code framework should be able to handle most or all of the customization needs a client has. That way, if something does need to change, less time can be spent customizing and therefore reducing TCO (total cost of ownership) of the tool set.

Generally speaking I see the rising stars in direct to consumer as having expertise with and providing non-invasive, adaptable, (robust, portable) open source tools as well as being experts at converting raw data into real marketing and operational strategies for their clients. These are lofty goals to be sure, but it is time for us, the techies to listen to the marketers and to the users to create tools that work with and serve the clients better.

What do you think?

Oh, and if you, Gary Vaynerchuk read this post and decided you hated it for whatever reason (and took the time to tell me) I would drink that up like grocery-store Egg Nog in July. If I am completely wrong in everything I do today and you notice, I’d consider myself lucky because I’m learning something from a guy who already learned it before me and is willing to share. I’m all over your content now, I actually can’t stop finding more. So, thanks for that. I owe you.

Read This Or Else…

Before we get onto the main course, let me say that this post is an experiment. Instead of me sharing with you some knowledge that I’ve learned and think is worthy of writing about, this post is solely meant ot engage you, the reader in conversation. So, if you are reading, be prepared to throw your two cents in!

Do What You Love

When all is said and done, you are not going to have any success getting ahead doing something that you aren’t completely fascinated (and subsequently rewarded) by on a daily basis. I’m not even 100% sure that I know what that is yet. It could be innovating web applications. Despite the fact that the tools (hardware and software) still get in the way of how I think and produce solutions, I still love discovering the solution. That one split second when the light bulb goes on is for me the most special feeling I get when doing what I do.

I’m a LAMP developer, but I’m not a great one from the technical standpoint. There are plenty of guys out there faster than I, know more language and syntax than I, guys who can just immerse in the code and pump it out line after line. That’s just not me. My value doesn’t lie in my speed or technical points though. It is in my ability to solve the problem. If you give me the parameters and the resources to craft the solution, I will do the rest. That is what I have come to love when I’m working.

Enough about me, what about you? What does the most simple concept boil down to for you?

We all know how this story should end, but we keep saying “not yet, you’re not ready to move on. Sure, it’s been almost 8 years since the two met, but we don’t think it would be smart to shut IE6 out of your life. You really need to support IE6. It’s the right thing to do.”

What terrible friends we are. If we really cared, we’d be doing something to help. Instead, we’re feeding into the dysfunction that is the IE6 browsing experience. We cater to it, spend extra time dealing with bugs and dropping in CSS hacks to satisfy a still-somehow-significant portion of site visitors.

I just have question for all of us to consider – if we don’t put our foot down and say “No, I don’t have the time to cater to IE6 in my projects”, then will we ever truly move on? Shouldn’t we gently guide IE6 users to a better browser? How bad could it be? Keep in mind people are getting update notices all the time, so upgrading is painless. Here we are, experiencing technology revisions faster than ever in history, and then we have a single version of a single browser, a veritable square wheel on the information superhighway making life miserable for the collective web development community.

Do the numbers matter?

On average, IE 6 accounts for as low as 5% up to 15% or more of the visitors to websites that I have analytics hooked up to. I don’t disagree that a figure like 1 in 10 or higher is a statistically significant number when looking at website visitor metrics. That could represent a hefty portion of your revenue, for example, if you are in e-commerce. How about at least taking a closer look at what the quality or potential ROI is on a given IE6 user? It may become apparent that the potential loss of revenue is inconsequential or at worst only a small temporary issue. The truth is, we could sit here and split hairs all day long about the economics of supporting IE6 (which I’m sure would back me up, but feel free to out-number me on that one), or we can acknowledge that the time has past, and enough is enough.

How do we make it happen?

I personally think the solution is pretty simple, but it requires a tactful approach. If we can present users with a non-annoying suggestion to upgrade to a more recent browser with a link for their convenience, I’d be willing to bet they wouldn’t be too adverse to the idea.

As I was researching for this article, I took the time to Google this very subject and found an interesting initiative started in Norway that has spread to many other countries to do this very thing. Here is a link to an article in Wired (Feb. 2009): Norwegian Websites Declare War On IE6 – Pretty inspiring from a country whose full wartime mobilization number is less than the number of loyal Microsoft employees armed with unlimited free energy drinks and potentially-lethal optical mouse lasers.

I think it’s time to stop building to satisfy IE6. Instead, on any given page, detect browser version and present IE6 users with a smartly-worded choice of new browser. I think IE6 users will thank us. If we are the ones suffering at the hands of IE6, why don’t we take action instead of just complaining about something we can actually fix – simply by choosing not to do it?

The difference between bridging and hybridization

By definition, Bridging occurs when two applications with separate code bases and two separate database schema share a link that allows them to exchange data and synchronize to each other either in real time or via scheduled processes such as a CRON job. The major drawback is that you are dealing with two packages, two code bases, and two database schema. Double the updates, (potentially) double the server overhead, and double the fun headaches.

In contrast, a hybrid app is one that is tightly integrated. It should share the same code base/framework and it definitely shares a common database schema. In fact, I would hesitate to call a hybrid solution “hybrid” if you were dealing with more than one code base or framework. In fact, why don’t we just put our foot down on this right now. If it doesn’t share a framework or code base (and someone is actually trying to make it coexist in the same package), there will be hell to pay and souls to eat. No, that’s not a threat, it’s a promise.

What will it look like? How will it work?

All jokes aside, the next logical step is to visualize a truly hybridized e-commerce & CMS system. Here are a few thoughts on what you might get.

• One code base for both tools
• One database for both tools
• One back end interface for both tools (and any modules that comprise the back end functionality).
• All E-commerce tools/assets manageable within the context of the CMS, implemented in a normal CMS fashion
  

E-commerce tools should not monopolize a page’s functionality

There is a reason that I italicized the sentence fragment above:

…within the context of the CMS, implemented in a normal CMS fashion

A CMS controls the structure and content of a site. So to shall it (as I’m wielding my stone tablets here) control the implementation of the e-commerce tools. This is really a big departure from the traditional way of thinking about how to structure an e-commerce site, and therein lies the problem. A traditional e-commerce site has little or very limited CMS functionality, and usually it is added as an afterthought. For example- in a traditional e-commerce application, there is a single page dedicated to all product listing functionality. Essentially, this page becomes a dedicated controller but will be wrapped in a template with some static or near-static content. You may have some includes which get dropped in left, right, header and footer, but essentially if you want to take things further and place a listing somewhere else (perhaps within another page), you are out of luck. The same goes for any other piece of the e-commerce tool set. The checkout is defined by the code in the page, rather than being one component in the page.

To solve this issue, you need a CMS that emphasizes modular design and allows you to manage where tools go in the front end, not as pages but as components on pages, and it also should seamlessly fit into the existing templating architecture. I know, it sounds like a lot. I’m awful demanding, aren’t I?

There are always naysayers…

I’m hoping that this article stimulates a hearty debate. I’m sure e-commerce purists will find fault in my assessment of what should be when it comes to bringing these tools together, for example, that in some way we may be sacrificing some sort of feature set or overcomplicating things for the end user admin. Just remember, I don’t like hearing myself type as much as I like hearing you type!

Okay, let’s say the client is a perfect client in the sense that they never challenge the limit of what the quote ecompasses in terms of project scope. How often have any of you had a client who doesn’t challenge those boundaries in passive-aggressive ways if not directly? I’m going to guess the answer is “rarely”. Feel free to correct me on that assumption.

So, we all are trying to build strong working relationships with these clients, but whether they know it or not, they always have a bigger picture in mind no matter how clearly defined the project’s tasks are. At some point, its just not worth it to spell it out due to time constraints anyway, right?

So, if that is the challenge, how do we try to mitigate the risk of overruns while keeping a client happy? Here are a few improved uses of your quoting time to ensure you get a fair price and minimize the risk of going over on the quote.

Tip 1: Ask more questions, ask relevant questions, and ask follow-up questions

The golden rule should be “assume nothing and ask everything” when in the discovery process. Don’t just find out what the tool is for, ask how they execute in real life. This will give you a much better understanding of the operational side that you are most likely being paid to automate to a certain extent. If you can’t visualize yourself doing a given task then ask more questions until you feel like you could go in and do the task or process yourself with minimal guidance. Sure, you may be committing more time at this stage than usual, but you are reducing the potential for massive time drainers later that come when you have to change something already built.

Tip 2: Put the cost in context – justify your price with a cost analysis

The more information about the current cost of doing whatever it is you are going to assist them with, the better off you are. If you present them with a $5000 quote out of context, the first question they will have is “why so much?” But if you find out that the only alternative is a 3rd-party system that charges a setup fee and a monthly fee, you can show them savings over time instead of the initial investment. What is even better is that when you come back with a slightly lower quote, you can mention the savings you are giving them when compared to the other option they are considering. If they are not aware of an alternative, be bold – find that alternative, figure out a 3-year cost for them, and then you can show them how they will save money by working with you instead.

Tip 3: Present the draft quote to the potential client and eliminate the uncertainties as much as possible

When I started freelancing, in my eagerness to get started on a project I would hand off a quote as a final quote and then say something like “we can tackle the unknowns as they come”, which is amazingly reckless and of course, I was sinking my own ship. I had no defense when the client would remember an 11th-hour feature that needed to be there, and to keep them happy, I would just throw it in. After a while I realized I needed to slow down, and approach the situation from in a much more careful, thorough manner. That isn’t to say I don’t still have quotes where I underestimate, but it happens a lot less than it used to.

Tip 4: If you can, build in a financial safety net

If you think you can squeak in a percentage of the total quote as a financial safety net, you should. Although I would recommend a 10% buffer, anything helps. You also reduce headaches for your client by not needing to get additional funds approved for the little stuff.

Of course, there are many other ways to refine your quoting process, but my personal experience has shown that emphasizing these four things has helped smooth out the process, keep the client satisfied, and keep the value of the project from becoming an issue. If you have other tips or techniques, I’d love to hear about them. Thanks for reading!

Tip 1: Take stock of your current client base

You probably already feel you have a pretty good handle on your clients, but what about in a general sense? Who is giving you work, who stopped, who is demanding the most of your time, who doesn’t pay on time well? Asking some broader questions and then evaluating your client base along that line of questioning will help you determine who could be hurting – rather than helping your business stay healthy.

Tip 2: Stop Relying on “that one, or those two or three key clients”

Think of clients as being legs. The more legs you have, the more chance there is your business will stand, even when you lose one. I’ve seen friends lose their business because that all-important huge client went out of business or else simply cut costs by stopping all work with them. The trick here is to find a way to gain more clients while staying profitable and not over-extending you and/or your staff. In another post I’ll cover some of the ways to tackle this particular problem, lowering your overhead on projects by choosing the right tools and reusing what you can from previous projects.

Tip 3: Invest some time in figuring out how to streamline your project development and operational processes

You might have a pretty great position with your business, perhaps you’ve narrowed down your strengths and weaknesses and have already started shifting towards a more streamlined business model, or perhaps you are capitalizing on the hottest new trend or opportunity out there, but at the end of the day, those extra 1 or 2 hours you spend sorting through emails, figuring out problems, talking on the phone with clients (and not billing the time), etc. might be costing you money better spent on other internal endeavors.

We all do this to a certain extent, it is the nature of the business we’re in. Most of what we do is provide service and as a result, there are many intangible factors that can add time to our daily workload but don’t actually generate real revenue. As a result, we’re essentially paying out our valuable time when we could be using it more effectively. The key is to be aware of these facts and to commit some time to finding solutions.

So, what solutions have you found? What steps have you taken to shore up your business so that you can gain when others struggle?

Writing that all important, barely read first blog post is likely to give a writer a headache. It may be the most difficult post to write in your blogging career. For me this is no exception.

So, here are three first blog posts from some blogs that I read on a regular basis.

Adii Rockstar: “Launched!“

I just recently discovered Adii’s blog and quickly became a regular. Adii not only is well known for his accomplishments via WooThemes but also via Radiiate, his design trinity with partners FRESH01 and Foxinni. What I like about Adii’s first post is that it assumes nothing of what the blog would become in such a short span of time, and that Adii would go from student to successful entrepreneur in less than two years. Of course, I know Adii would be quick to point the finger at the people he works with on a daily basis and his family, but a hearty “Well done!” is in order for Adii and crew.

Adii has this to say about his first post:

I think the phrase “It kinda makes me feel famous and important…” probably accurately describes how I felt when I first started blogging. I started out with a real plan or strategy, but knew way back then that blogging would play a big role in my “career”. As it’s ended up, I co-founded a very successful company (WooThemes), which specializes in selling WordPress – a blogging platform – templates. But hey… That’s why they say hindsight is an exact science!

Six Revisions: “Six Things You Need for Your Web Project to Succeed”

Strangely enough, Jacob’s first post occurred a year and a couple days after Adii’s first post (February 2nd, 2008) and his blog Six Revisions has also enjoyed a meteoric rise to the top of the heap. Jacob has delivered quality posts consistently over the last 14 months and has seen his subscriber base grow to almost 23,000 (via RSS) in that short period of time. It seems to me based upon his first post that he had a very clear idea of what it was all about right from the get-go. Having a clear sense of purpose for your weblog will definitely start you off right and keep your content focused, which means happy readers. A huge “congrats!” to Jacob Gube on his wild success as well.

Jacob has this to say about his first post and the creation of Six Revisions:

I started Six Revisions in one day. I wanted to write and publish something to cap off the day with a solid accomplishment, not only to set up a website, but also to have an article published.

I began on one Sunday morning by coming up with a name, getting a web host, and setting up a WordPress installation. I had one published article even before the DNS records have fully propagated for “sixrevisions.com”!

I wrote the first article because of a project I worked on that failed to launch: design and ideas where all there, and we even had a working WordPress site with a custom theme that I designed and developed. The issue was a lack of passion and commitment for the subject (tech gadgets).

For the third blog, I’m going to be a bit cheeky and feature this blog, and this very post. Sure, its not technically a look back yet, but it will be tomorrow! Also, if I can ever get away with lumping my little blog in with the likes of Adii Rockstar and Six Revisions, then I’ll feel like I’ve really accomplished something!

A little about me is in order, I suppose. Here it is.

• I’ve been blogging on and off since June 2000, back when Blogger was just 10-months old.
• I’ve always been an eager and sometimes early adopter when it comes to the web and social media, I love watching the Internet grow and evolve, and I feel I’m a part of it.
• I’m a huge fan of Jim Collins’s work, especially his book entitled Good to Great – Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t. This book is worth its weight in gold, time infinity. So there. Go and buy, read slowly, rinse, repeat, and show off your new business smarts.
• I’m a web developer, although I like to say “Web Solutions Architect” because it’s so much more than just developing for the web. I’m more of a problem solver with LAMP in hand. I’ll be the first to admit I’m not the best developer, but I strive to be the best problem solver I can be within the context of what I do.
• I’m a TYPOlight developer/expert, I have been solely developing for and almost exclusively using the TYPOlight framework since Spring of 2007. Yes, I know this blog is a Wordpress blog. Two reasons for that – first, because it is built specifically for blogging and second, it’s still the quickest to set up and theme.
• I recently got back into Twitter when I discovered console apps like Twhirl and TweetDeck. I’m a TweetDeck guy now. By the way, my Twitter account has a PR 6 with around 100 users and less than 250 tweets, which is quite perplexing. Does anyone care to hazard a guess as to how I might have garnered such a generous PageRank?
• Here we’ll be passionately discussing web, social media and business. Strap on your brains!

I’m looking forward to many exciting discussions with everyone. Thanks for reading.

- Fred