| As a software consultant with decade worth of experience, I've seen non-technical founders getting ripped off and getting substandard product. It's generally because, while they do have a clear vision of what they want, they do not have the ability to gauge the skill set of the agency/freelancer they are dealing with. In one case, despite paying full, my client didn't have access to the code and the agency became hostile when they started to feel the client slipping away. We had to send legal notice to get access to the code. Here are some tips: 1. Check for their LinkedIn profile and actually do attempt to talk with their clients. Do your research well, cold email should work. 2. See how old their clients are and if they are still in business. Substandard product reduces the probability of the project to succeed. 3. Involving external consultants to help you evaluate the Agency/Freelancer suited for your business. They would provide unbiased opinion which would help a lot. 4. Always go slow, it might even make sense to comission 5-10% of the project and see how they perform. It reduces your overall ridk. 5. Check their GitHub account for open source projects to gauge on technical competency. 6. If you can't afford an architect, I'd still recommend getting few hour worth of their time to sense how the project is progressing technically. They would assist like a consulting CTO. There are scammers everywhere, the onus is on us to be diligent. Shameless plug: I run an agency, email in my profile. Do send me an email if you need any help. |