[louisadekoya]

Thanks for the thoughtful post. Wow - that much huh? It really feels like a fairly basic app to me but I guess that shows how much I know. I did have someone build me a comparably complex app for me for $600 last year though - but no facebook integration with that one.

Yes, it had occurred to me that storage could be an issue with this one.

By the way, do you know any good resources for finding good but affordable copywriters?

Still keen to read others' thoughts.

[ScottWhigham]

Well, the idea comes to my mind that, if it could be done for $600 (or even $6000), then it's a side project that any developer, anywhere could do in a month of spare time if they had the idea. You can't patent/trademark an idea either so, if you can build it for cheap, someone can copy it for cheap as well.

Looking at your specs, I don't necessarily agree that you'll need $25k minimum. It seems pretty simple to me too; $1k-$3k for the right person seems right to me to get you your beta then another $1k for bug squashing and $x/mth for maintenance.

What I don't get is that (a) you aren't the developer, (b) you aren't wanting to write copy, and (c) it doesn't seem like something that needs a salesperson making calls, so what's your role? Rhetorical question really.

[jwilliams]

Yeah, $25k may seem high, and probably varies a lot on location. $25k is what I would recommend if someone was in the early stages of a business case.

$600 is really only a day or two's work for a professional developer. Depending on where you're at, you could spend double that just nutting out the exact requirements.

That said, as my first line was trying to allude to - it's horses for courses. You can go a lot cheaper, or a lot more expensive depending on what you're after.

If you have the right contacts, and you want something whipped up, $1-2k might be more than enough.

[zacharye]

You're using one now. I'm in the midst of launching a site myself (outsourced as I'm in a situation much like yours) but I have 9 years worth of copywriting/marcom/biz dev background. Feel free to shoot me an email and I'd be happy to chat.