Stop me if you've heard this one before. With any large-scale project, whether it be building a website or building a house, there's three things that everybody wants: 1. Make it Cheap! Nobody wants to spend a lot of money. This is the #1 request of clients who want website, but it holds true of just about everything. Why do people shop at Wal-Mart? Probably not because of the Quality! 2. Make it Quick! For most website projects, clients want the thing to be done "yesterday." Now, I'm going to give folks the benefit of the doubt here. I'm sure they realize that a website can't magically materialize out of nothing. Right? Please? Tell me they don't think this stuff is easy. Right? 3. Make it High Quality! Everybody wants their website to be the best. Everybody wants their project to be the best thing since sliced Spam (you can get it sliced?!). Better than FaceBook! Bigger than eBay! More profitable than [insert billion dollar company here]! Are you ready for some tough love? Are you ready for some common sense wisdom? No. You can't have all that. Now I'm not just being a jerk here. Let's break it down. I work on an hourly basis. While you are chatting with your friends on the phone, watching television, practicing your golf swing, or learning to knit, I am at my computer writing code. For you. Say, "Thank you." What I'm saying is that time is money. Even if I worked for pennies on the dollar, it still can take massive numbers of hours to create a website... or a house... or a baby. The faster a project is done, the lower the quality. The higher quality a project, the longer it takes. Here's your basic choices when selecting from your dream criteria: 1. Fast and Cheap = Your website will have fewer features (lower quality). I can get this done in a weekend and you won't be spending much money. It won't be the most innovative website, but sometimes good enough is good enough... less time developing a website is more time that you can start advertising your services and making money. You'd be surprised how much money you can make with a simple website. Go for a bigger site when you can afford it. 2. Fast and High Quality = This will cost you a lot of money. You are renting hours of my life as I work around the clock to finish your project, or for multiple workers if I hire additional help. We'll get it done fast. It'll be better than sliced Spam. Just be prepared to pay for the privilege. 3. Cheap and High Quality = This is the holy grail for most clients... until they realize what they're in for. This will take a long time to complete. Maybe the project is interesting to the web developer. Perhaps they will be learning how to create something they haven't done before. They certainly won't be making this task their highest priority (folks gotta eat, you know). They will be working on the site as they have time and as they learn how to accomplish the programming tasks. High quality, indeed, but at what price? Didn't cost you much out of pocket... who cares if it launches some time in 2009? Just realize that nobody is a miracle worker (well, besides myself). Ready for the fortune cookie breakdown?

• You will get what you paid for.
• Something done right takes longer than something done wrong
• Your lucky numbers are 12, 87, and 62

Cheers!