Do you have to be a 'hacker' to do a startup?

[ericseidelman]

I have a killer idea for a start-up. I truly believe it has potential to make millions in either revenue or acquisition. The problem is... I don't have a programming bone in my body. So, at this point I'm on a path to locate someone who wants to partner with me in this venture.

From your experiences, is this possible? Should I just say screw it and give up (if you say yes to this, I'll just ignore you).

What is some advice you could offer a non-hacker in starting a very technical start-up?

Thanks in advance.

[RiderOfGiraffes]

You need - as a matter of urgency - to find a programmer you trust enough not to screw you, and simply sketch your idea to them. They can then give you a ROM (rough order of magnitude) estimate of the work/complexity/trickiness involved. It won't be accurate, but at least you'll have an idea of the size of the task.

They might be able to wire-frame a static, non-functioning web site to give you an idea, and that might only take an hour. You need data, and you need someone to bounce the idea off.

And soon, while you have the enthusiasm.

I also note that you haven't told us your skills, haven't told us what you can do other than just having an idea, and haven't put contact details in your profile. It might sound harsh, but that tells me you're not really serious.

[ericseidelman]

didn't see a place to put my contact info... I'll find that and do it now.

I've been in online marketing for years. Currently working at a large ad agency as a Sr. Search Media planner. 9-5 is not the way I want to go for the next 25+ years.

I am serious, and have reached out to a few programmers I know to start discussing the idea. I just don't "speak" programmer so I'm not sure the best place to start.

[RiderOfGiraffes]

  > didn't see a place to put my contact info...
  > I'll find that and do it now.

Well, you've filled in your profile, but there're still no contact details.

  > I've been in online marketing for years.

Do you have any work you can point us at to show what you've done and what you're capable of? If not, can you create something to show off your skills?

  > I am serious, and have reached out to a few 
  > programmers I know to start discussing the idea.
  > I just don't "speak" programmer ...

That's why you need to find a programmer type that you can trust, buy them a beverage and shoot the breeze, including talking about your idea.

If you're really good with words you should be able to find some way to tell us the problem you're solving without saying exactly what your idea is. Tell us the pain you're taking away - that will sell the idea and make real hacker types want to get involved.

Just my $0.02.

[lotharbot]

The "email" line in your profile won't display, ever. It's basically only there in case you lose your password.

If you want people to be able to contact you, you have to put some sort of contact info in the "about" section of your profile.

[gyardley]

It's possible but very difficult to find a competent developer to partner with for equity. Especially if you haven't already established a good working relationship with developers through previous jobs. There's so many people in your situation lurking around tech meetups that it's become a bit of a stereotype. Try your best, but it's not easy.

Assuming you won't be able to find a developer to work for equity, you can make a certain amount of progress by hiring contractors. This is hard to get right, especially if you don't know anything about programming or at least writing a detailed specification. Unless you've got a large budget, in which case you should just skip looking for a founder and hire a pro to work as an employee, I'd recommend going the oDesk route, relying on the technical tests to initially evaluate candidates, and hiring multiple people simultaneously to do the same very small trivial task at first - until you determine which ones are good ones. There are some hidden gems out there, but you will waste a lot of time and money on garbage contractors until you find them. This is inevitable.

Your goal is, through your pocketbook and brute force, to get the product far enough along that it begins to generate decent revenue on its own (in which case you use it to hire), looks impressive enough to attract a little bit of angel investment (in which case you use it to hire), or looks impressive enough to persuade a developer to join you as co-founder. (Whether you hire or get a co-founder, the developer will then rewrite all the code your crap contractors put together.)

As inspiration, you may want to look at the recent Mixergy interview with Jason Jacobs, CEO of Runkeeper. I met Jason once, and he's an impressive example of a driven but non-technical founder who's managed to make a lot of progress. But be warned that you'll be doing a lot of pounding your head against the wall and the risk of failure is high.

[RiderOfGiraffes]

I hadn't heard of oDesk - thanks for the reference:

http://www.odesk.com/

I might point a few people I know at that.

[lifexkills]

It sounds like you already know the answer, considering you said you'd ignore anyone who says you should give up. :)

Of course you should forge ahead with it. Your best bet is to probably to go with your gut. Look for a programmer to partner with and in the meantime, maybe grab a few books on programming so you could help (even if its with menial stuff).

Good luck!

[charliepark]

You say you don't have a programming bone in your body. That might be true, but I'd suggest you at least try to learn some programming basics. Best route for that that I can recommend would be the Ruby on Rails Tutorial book (http://railstutorial.org/book).

[ericseidelman]

does it make sense to find a cheap outsourced (money is tight) programmer to help start on some of the very basic features?

[hector_ka]

You want to make sure that the code is not crappy.It is possible to find some very good developers that are cheap, but again is not the norm.It depends what kind of programmer you need (I presume web). Then go with PHP those are the cheapest ones.