How to choose a contractor for outsourced development

Competition in the market forces businesses to implement and develop modern technical solutions: websites, mobile applications, CRM and other IT platforms. But regardless of the type of project, to release a cool product, you will need qualified UI/UX designers, developers, project managers and QA engineers. How to select a competent outsourced contractor is discussed in this article.

Let’s start with the fact that in IT there are three main models of interaction with specialists:

• In-house development. You form your own staff of developers from scratch and deal with HR issues. This only makes sense when launching large projects with large budgets, plus you must have a sufficient technical base and experience managing a team of IT specialists to properly organize work processes.
• Outstaffing. This option assumes that you rent the necessary specialists from an IT company. As in in-house development, you will manage the team yourself, set deadlines, distribute tasks and monitor their implementation, so you can’t do without a technical base here either.

The main difference is speed. You don’t need to deal with payroll, employment registration and other bureaucracy – you simply hire a specialist for a certain time, and the very next day you involve him in completing tasks.

• Outsourcing. This is the most effective way to get a high-quality software solution if you have an idea, but no technical base. In fact, outsourcing is the creation of a custom product. In this model, you entrust the development to an IT company, minimally participate in the team’s actions, and pay for the result.

Typically, outsourcing is chosen by enterprises that have nothing to do with the development of digital solutions, have a limited budget and want to quickly launch a high-quality product. The main thing when working according to this model is to choose a reliable contractor who can take on technical issues and ensure competent implementation of the project at all stages.

To begin effective communication with a contractor, you do not need to have a specific technical task. A clear idea and understanding of the business logic of the planned product will be quite sufficient. At a minimum, we recommend answering three questions:

• Who is your target audience?
• What problems should the new product solve?
• Do you have competitors, and how are you different from them?

It will be a good plus if you already have a rough understanding of the stages of developing software solutions. This way you will be able to get involved in the process faster and be better oriented in what and when is required of you.

If you don’t have enough knowledge, don’t worry. A personal project manager will work with you, with whom you can discuss all the nuances in detail. The PM oversees the project implementation process at all stages and will become the link between you and the technical team. His responsibilities also include monitoring the budget, timing, development management and receiving results.

In our company, all communication with the client goes through the project manager. You will contact him regularly throughout the development process. At the design stage, calls will be the most frequent, since at this moment all the business logic is built into the product, and during the design and development period – less often, about 1-2 times a week. With this approach, you will be able to constantly monitor intermediate results and will clearly understand what kind of work is currently being performed. Thus, the final version of the product will become an expected and predictable result for you, and not a “pig in a poke.”

The market for digital product developers is simply huge and has hundreds of players, and these are only officially registered companies. And there are also freelance teams that are simply too numerous to count. But where can you get a guarantee that this particular contractor will be able to implement your product efficiently, without bugs, and will definitely bring it to release? In order not to be disappointed, you need to approach the choice of team very carefully. There are three questions that can help you in this matter.

1. How does a potential contractor position itself in the market?

At the initial selection stage, you need to analyze general data about the companies that you are considering as potential contractors. Find out as much information as possible about them to form your own, unbiased opinion. Study the portfolio, look at reviews, ask how many years the company has been in the market and how many specialists work in it.

All this will help you get a general idea of the company and understand whether it is suitable for solving your problems. But perhaps the most important thing to learn about a potential contractor is what kind of clients they work with. From this point of view, outsourcers can be divided into three general categories:

• Well-known companies. They have been working for an average of 10 years, have an impeccable reputation and occupy leading positions in IT ratings.

Their main clients are market leaders in various areas, so most of the popular solutions on the market are their development. As a rule, such contractors are not interested in small projects, so it is advisable to contact them if your task is large enough, long-term and requires large resources.

• Medium and large companies. Such companies have been on the market for quite a long time. Their clients sometimes include well-known brands, but there are also small projects. Such outsourcers are the main part of the market. They have sufficient expertise to implement complex applications and, at the same time, offer reasonable prices.
• Small teams. In most cases, these are young studios that entered the market several years ago. They take on the development of almost all projects, since it is important for them to develop a portfolio and their own expertise. Often customers are mistakenly biased towards young companies, although in practice experienced developers may work there.

At this stage, you should choose a contractor based on the features and size of your project. Assess the budget, planned functionality, its complexity and decide who is definitely not right for you. This will help eliminate most of the options, so you will approach the next criterion with a certain pool of main contenders.

2. What projects does the outsourcer do – unique or standard?

When ordering a digital product, potential contractors may offer you two implementation options – a standard solution or custom development. And here it is important to understand the difference.

Standard solution. Typical applications are usually called applications assembled from ready-made modules. Their functionality is standard, the design is not unique, and the page loading speed is far from ideal. Nevertheless, this is a good option for small businesses that have limited resources and, in principle, unique functionality that is not particularly needed. You can customize a ready-made template to your needs in just a couple of weeks, and it costs relatively little.

However, over time, the capabilities of a standard solution will most likely not be enough for you, so in the future you will still have to attract developers to release updates and optimize the product.

Individual solutions. This option is suitable for companies that want to implement new business logic or automate internal processes, and for this they need complex and unique functionality. In this case, all software elements are created from scratch, and accordingly you will need larger investments and time.

However, in return you will receive the most efficient and productive digital product, fully customized to your needs.

3. On what principle does the contractor build the work?

A whole team of developers is involved in software development, so the final result largely depends on what methodology the contractor uses. In short, work can be transparent or not transparent. Some customers would like to outsource the project and not participate in the processes at all, and in the end only receive the result and pay money. But there is nothing good about this – it is an opaque model in which everything is complex and incomprehensible. In this case, you are at great risk, because the contractor may “invent” non-existent problems and request additional funds to solve them, delay development, or create a product that does not meet the company’s needs at all.

Therefore, to protect yourself from these risks, it is better to choose companies that operate transparently. Thanks to constant interaction with the contractor team, you will always understand in which direction the development is moving, what processes are taking place, whether there are problems and what options for solving them. In other words, development will proceed smoothly, understandably and as expected, which is why your chances of getting a good result increase significantly.

In our company, work is organized according to the Scrum methodology. All interaction within the team and with the customer occurs in short sprint iterations. Thanks to this, you can see new functionality created every two weeks, make edits, comments and adjustments. Thus, the finished product will fully comply with the business logic and needs of your company.

Let’s consider a few more important points that should be considered when choosing an outsourcing team:

• Experience with similar projects. Before choosing a contractor, look at what projects he specializes in. For example, one team may have great experience in developing AI-based solutions, while another is focused on the food tech segment, and so on. Take into account the specific expertise of the outsourcer and select one who already has development experience in your field, and therefore knows all the nuances and pitfalls.
• Real reviews. See what his clients say about the outsourcer. This will give you a complete picture of the potential contractor’s reputation and approach. But you need to keep in mind that text reviews, especially without indicating the customer company, can easily be faked. Therefore, pay more attention to video comments and reviews that can be verified.
• Clarifying questions. Do not confuse inquisitiveness and involvement with unprofessionalism. On the contrary, the more questions the contractor asks, the better.

This means that he immediately thinks about how best to implement the project and what functionality you will need. But if in response to a request you simply receive a price and terms, you should be wary.

• Availability of post-release support. In order for a digital product to be constantly in demand on the market, it needs to be continuously developed, even after release. Therefore, it will be very helpful if the contractor can provide further technical support for the software. It is much worse if, after development is completed, you are left alone with the product.
• Speed of communication. Pay attention to how quickly the outsourcer responds to your request. This will allow you to understand how your further interaction will proceed. If there is no response within 1-2 days, then, most likely, nothing will change after making an advance payment, and it will regularly “disappear” and delay the deadline. It is better to refuse such an outsourcer immediately. Ideally, you should receive a same-day consultation offer.

If you have an idea for developing a cool digital product, you clearly know what you want and have created a certain budget for development – you can start looking for an outsourced team. You should approach this issue carefully and carefully, ask more about the experience of the potential contractor and trust exclusively the facts. This way you can find the optimal team and increase the chances of developing a successful project.

AVADA MEDIA has been developing innovative digital products for more than 10 years. Our specialization is the creation of custom applications, with a focus on competent UI/UX design and functionality. For each project, we select the optimal development team with experience in the required field and appropriate qualifications. If you would like to discuss the implementation of a project with us — fill out the form below and we will contact you as soon as possible.