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Perhaps the most exciting phase of a business is right at the beginning. You’ve uncovered your great idea, you’ve done the initial research, and you’ve started talking to potential customers. You know what you want to build.

Now what?

For many non-technical founders, the building phase can feel like a brick wall. You don’t know how to code, and you may not even really know how to explain to a developer what you need.

With this limited knowledge, new entrepreneurs start looking for a “technical cofounder” or perhaps just a freelance developer to do the initial work.

Both of those choices have benefits, but they also come with lots of downsides. Another option to consider is a development shop (like, say, DevDigital). Perhaps we’re a little biased, but here are 4 big reasons a dev shop might be the best option for you.

Finding good programmers is hard.

It’s amazing how non-technical founders think that developers grow on trees. A typical line of thinking is, “Oh, I have this great idea. Every developer within a 50 mile radius would LOVE to build this!”

The first problem with this is assumption is that there are far fewer developers in that 50 mile radius than you realize. Unless you’re in Silicon Valley, there’s a shortage of developers in almost every city in the country.

The second problem is that because there are so few developers, most of them have more work than they can handle already. And, they’re very discerning about what they give their time to, even for money. Trust us. You need them much, much more than they need you.

Keeping them is even harder.

On the off chance that you actually found a developer to work on your project either for equity or pay, you’ll soon find it could be hard to keep them around.

Remember how in demand they are? There will always be another project and another company willing to make their life better than it is now in exchange for work. Even if you keep the same developer through an initial build, chances are high that they will find other opportunities at some point in the life of your business.

Continuity between developers is impossible.

What happens when the first developer leaves? Chaos.

Oh, plenty of companies deal with this, and several survive the transition. But it’s not easy to hand off the code of one developer to the brain of another, and you can experience quite a few hiccups during the process. If this happens early in the life of your company, you could be looking at a huge blow.

Even great developers can only do so much alone.

But, okay, say you’ve found a great developer, and they’re in for the long haul. Even the most talented full stack developer will only have so much capacity. They’ll be stronger in certain areas and weaker in others, and unless you’re very lucky, you might find their weaknesses are the exact thing you didn’t know you needed.

Most apps and websites are built by teams for a reason. Everyone brings something different to the table, and the business is stronger for it.

How Dev Shops Solve These Problems

Dev shops like DevDigital solve all of these problems.

We have a large team of experienced developers, and we can build anything from apps to websites. You don’t have to go on a wild goose chase, and you don’t have to worry about things like employee benefits. We’ve got it covered.

Turnover is inevitable, no matter the business. But because our developers work in teams, if one leaves, the rest of the team is able to keep the project going.

We’ve also been at this awhile. We know what to expect during development, and our project managers are experts at communicating with the development team to make sure you get exactly what you envision. You’ll find that we think people are the most important part of business, which makes the whole building process smoother.

Give us a call. We’d love to chat about your big idea.