Let’s take a concrete example.

A media company came to us the other day. They have a blueprint for a couple of phases of website development (which is more realistic than most customers are) and wanted a quote. We had a conference call to discuss it. Rather than starting with the blueprint, I started by asking about their business and why they’re creating a website.

It turns out that they’re main goal is to sell subscriptions. They’re building a great prospect base but, for a variety of operational reasons, it’s not big enough to start marketing to it yet. It needs to be about four times as large as it is. The blueprint, even phase one, assumed that they were ready to pull the trigger on advertising relatively soon, even though it’s taken them about six months to get where they are.

As a quick aside, from just reading their blueprints, I’m betting that in their mind, the main challenge was getting the mechanics in place to sell subscriptions. The mechanics of that are relatively easy. My own experience is that developing the marketing base or interest level in a product or service is much more difficult than the mechanics. But they’re better at that than I am so they were probably designing based on their unknowns.

So, given that it’s taken six months to get where they are and they have to quadruple that, my recommendation was to first tackle the problem of building their prospect base. Rather than building the whole site, add a little to what they already have and see if that propels growth. When that growth reaches a certain point, then they should start developing the specialized content and the subscription infrastructure. One of the big benefits of this is that they only spend a little bit now and get to see what happens.

Next: General lessons from the example.

Let’s generalize that example.

There are a few simple guidelines to keep in mind when thinking about managing risk in a website design, development or maintenance project.

First, think in terms of incremental improvement. Rather than going for what you currently understand as the desired end result all at once, put first things first. What’s your most important business goal now? What’s the second most important goal? How much of the first do you need before the second starts to matter?

Second, when you’re talking to a developer, talk in terms of these business goals rather than specific features. The developer should then be able to present a list of possible ways to help you meet those goals and should be able to give you rough cost estimates. Notice that I say “rough”. These could vary wildly between developers, depending both on what they have in mind and their experience level. And the final price could be higher or lower depending on the direction you give them during development.

Third, don’t contract for the whole project at once. Contract for a little at a time. When that’s done, if you like it, contract for a little more. This “Incremental Funding Method” ensures that you have something usable at the end and that you have the ability to adjust course midway through development. In software, they call this “agile development”.

Fourth, always keep in mind that website design and development, like software design, is interactive. Your developer will ask about your needs and opinion and offer ideas. Together, you’ll probably come up with a way to meet your business needs that’s better than either of you could have come up with on your own.

Always think about risk.

I’ll close with one important idea. The foundation of managing risk is as simple as always thinking about it. What risks does your project face? Is it that it will cost more than you’d like to spend? Is it that the features won’t meet your needs? Is it that your solution to a particular business problem won’t be innovative? Ask yourself these questions early and often, and you’ll end up with a better result.

So Ramit Sethi over at IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com fessed up to not having any secret paths to wealth. His audience gives a mixed response, mostly that the method he teaches (save, invest, repeat; use credit wisely) is boring. Oh, and that he’s too young.  It brought to mind my own thoughts from an earlier article, Passive Income Generation on the Web: The Complete List of Effortless Ways to Make Money Using the Internet.

Anyway, what I think most people want is the panacea.  But what most people need is to simply work.  Hard.  Probably harder than they are.  I know that the times in my life where I’ve been–how shall I say–financially challenged, I’ve also been less willing to put in the time, to do the research, to try something that might fail, to work a few extra hours, etc. etc. etc.  I wanted the quick fix.  And while some people are lucky enough to find one, most people aren’t.  For most people, the search for the panacea is a disaster waiting to happen.

John and I were at An Event Apart (earlier entry) today. Some nuggets from the presentations:

If a person goes to your website and does one thing, what should that be? (Jeff Zeldman)

[Full] justification is, 9 times out of 10, a bad idea. Why does it work in print and not on the web? A lot of reason. One big one: no fine grained control over line breaks. (Jason Santa Maria)

No one wants to read Harry Potter online. (JZ) (In other words, keep your content brief.)

All copy is a brand opportunity. (JZ)

New copy is the least expensive site update. (JZ)