[thelist] What do clients look for? [Was: My company got ripped off]

Ken Schaefer ken at adOpenStatic.com
Sun Jan 18 22:54:28 CST 2004


I would guess that there are lots of reasons why Vendor A, who charges
$10,000 might be chosen over Vendor B who charges $1,000.

Part of this might involve the presentation and reputation of the Vendor A.
Vendor A may have resources, processes and experience that Vendor B does not
have. Whilst Vendor B might be confidant that they can supply the product
cheaper/quicker/better, the purchaser (who is ultimately risking their
money), might not share that confidence.

I imagine this would explain why vendors like McKinsey, or
PriceWaterhouseCoopers, or IBM Global Services, or
Dell/Compaq/other-big-brand exist, are profitable, yet charge an
arm-and-a-leg for services/products that others may be able to supply
cheaper.

In the case in question, it appears that the purchaser wasn't even aware of
Vendor B - purchasers only have a finite amount of time to work out who they
should be asking for quotes.

Personally, I feel that if the original poster had felt strongly about this,
and felt that they could do the job better, they should put together a
proposal, sell it to management, and see if something could be done in
future. It may take some time to get some traction on the issue, but a well
argued and supported proposal, couched in business language, backed by the
type of things that managers look at (figures, evidence etc), is usually
enough to convince most managers that I've met and had to deal with.

Cheers
Ken

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From: "chris" <lists at semioticpixels.com>
Subject: [thelist] What do clients look for? [Was: My company got ripped
off]


I agree... It's maddening to scrap around on little $2k websites and come
across NEW 10 -100k websites that are very poorly done.  It's a testament to
the fact that clients respond less to the quality of our work and more to
other factors... Social proximity to their community network, personality,
etc.  What do other folks think?  Do your clients know or care or recognize
quality work?

-chris



-----Original Message-----
From: thelist-bounces at lists.evolt.org
[mailto:thelist-bounces at lists.evolt.org] On Behalf Of Brian Cummiskey
Sent: Friday, January 16, 2004 7:01 AM
To: thelist at lists.evolt.org
Subject: [thelist] My company got ripped off


Brian's rant of the day.

<rant>
My company paid some professional firm to re-do our website.  I work in the
networking department there, so the web stuff never even crossed my path
(its just a hobby of mine).  Word around the office is that they paid
$10,000 for it.

It's pathetic.

It sucks.

It is soooooo unprofessional.

The javascript date at the top links to a free script site source site...
They couldn't even code their own or at the very least, figure out how to
remove the copyright link.

There's proprietory GoLive tags everywhere.

Horrid use of a flash.

CLICK HERE links, instead of linking text that means something.

Half the people in the pictures are no longer with the company.... for over
a year now.

I could go on all day.  See for your self.

http://www.americancustomercare.com

Now, it gets worse....

The woman who did the site didn't know what FTP was, when our network team
gave her ftp info to put it on our server.  HOW CAN you be a webdesigner,
and not know what FTP is?  HOW?

I hate golive.  I hate frontpage.  I hate dreamweaver.

They have taken life out of the internet.

</rant>

How is it, that we struggle to make 1-2k on a full corprate website
free-lancing...  and yet, firms like this score 10k on a RE-DESIGN?  And
half-ass it at that.

I just wanted to share...  Had to get it off my chest.

Please feel free to bash away at how horrid the site looks and is coded...
Or how I should've never posted this to the list and you are going to
forward it to my boss...  Lol  (please don't =)  )

I can only imagine how bad it falls apart on a mac or other odd browsers
too....




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