How do I start with my own IT outsourcing company?

Question

I am a Front-end Developer with over 7 years commercial experience and would like to develop my skills in my own business.

I was thinking about do my own outsourcing company in my country and finding programmers and QA testers to work. That's not easy because I do not know how to start. Can you tell me how is look process step by step? Of course, I am not asking about taxes etc. but how to find clients and workers. It is difficult because nobody knows my company, so I can not find clients. If I do not have clients, I can not to find workers.

Tell me please what should I do first - find client or programmer to work and propose him to client? How can I be competitive as a small company? How to talk to large companies when I am unknown on the market?

Answer 1

Find the clients first. When starting out and coming from a developer background, the hardest part is the finding of clients. Part of the problem is that most developers don't understand the vague nature of marketing: we act, and the results are not guaranteed and the results that happen, do not happen directly based on our actions. There is a reason why salespeople make so much money - it is a difficult job, and a good salesperson can bring in enough business to keep 5, 10, or even 20-50 developers busy.

How to be competitive? The best way is to specialize in a certain industry and build up the knowledge and a code base to serve that industry. Trying to be competitive just on price is a sure way to go broke.

Answer 2

By far the most important first step is find your first customer/client, which every book or blog on starting a business states that this is the most difficult part. Once you have that first customer, you can use that for referrals to other customers and show "evidence" of your expertise. What we have found that works is to ask family & friends who work at other companies if they can introduce you to someone in the IT department to see if they have any short-term needs for what you do, or if they know of anyone who would. Another option is to use your 1st level connections in LinkedIn to do an intro to their IT team for this. Hope this helps...