Make sure you are not a keen programmer.
Whatever you do – the customer’s needs must come first.
You should clearly see the problem that other people are experiencing find a solution to that problem – that solution will be your product (software development for startups).
Keep asking yourself these questions throughout the life of the company. Otherwise, all areas will suffer, from marketing and sales to production.
Decide whether you will set up an outsourcing or a product company. The first type accepts applications from customers, and specialists create online shops, landing pages, applications, or services according to the terms of reference. The latter sells ready-made IT solutions: CRM systems, smartphone applications, PC programs
Take care to protect
Product rights. You need to think about protecting your product as well. For example, your company writes software. It is essential to state who owns the rights to the created product. For this purpose, an employment contract must be signed with all the employees stating “that all proprietary rights to the intellectual property belong to the company in exchange for a salary.” There have been cases where several software experts have come back to companies and businesses they had previously worked for in demand for software royalties.
Information leakage. In addition to protecting the product, information should also be protected. On the one hand, physical media: laptops, phones, hard drives, everything must be encrypted. On the other hand, you need an NDA (confidentiality agreement). It’s not just another document that multiplies bureaucracy. With the right approach, it is a real tool that prevents facts from being disclosed.
The first and most crucial step on the road to success is starting. We will not mention the garages where Apple and HP started, nor will we describe a photo of Amazon’s first office with a computer, a chair, and a handwritten banner with the company’s name on it.
To summarise the above, there is nothing difficult – you just need to take the right steps in a balanced way, don’t be afraid to step out of your comfort zone, and stand up boldly for your position.
Calculate your business model and determine your costs for an office, a co-working space, or a rented flat and determine an effective sales pitch. Choose a cooperation model with your developers: freelancing or hiring on staff? If freelance, you work with them when there are requests. If full-time, you load the work and pay the salary regardless of whether the customer pays you or you develop your own products.
To start an IT company, sales channels are important. Most of the time, the first thing that happens is hot sales. When there is already a specific need: you are known trusted, you draw up all the documents, assemble a team, and take on the project for development. This is ideal for a good start for a company. From day one, the start of work on the project, you should already be looking for the next one if there is a desire to continue the business and develop. There should be a cash reserve for salaries, rent, and taxes when the project ends or stops.
By choosing one of the top technologies, you guarantee yourself that there will be demand for it for at least the next five years. And even if tomorrow the technology will leave the top for some reason, there are still hundreds of thousands of projects written on it that need to be maintained and developed.
Interesting fact: Java was first released 25 years ago, but it is still among the top 3 languages. This is because a huge number of enterprise projects were written in it at the dawn of global digitalization (Shopify web development services).
As you can see, there’s nothing super-complicated about starting your own IT business. You just need at least one hired developer (possibly in your person), a little persistence and time, and then you’ll really get your niche in IT.
Now for the hard part: what do you do next? According to statistics, the “survival rate” of start-ups is around 3% in 3 years.
90% of IT companies have difficulties with sales at different stages. Rapid growth comes from the first projects – the first 1-3 years. Then there is bound to be a plateau and a lack of knowledge of how and where to move forward. To maintain the pace of the company’s development, consult with experienced colleagues on how to improve, what to modernize and how to manage the team, the collective, and the company.