In my previous post within this community, I narrated an incident about how our decision to build WordPress websites for $70/₹4999 led to threats from competitors. It was a healthy topic to discuss among WordPress community.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/Wordpress/comments/1bg56la/started\_a\_wordpress\_business\_got\_threatened\_in/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web3x&utm\_name=web3xcss&utm\_term=1&utm\_content=share\_button](https://www.reddit.com/r/Wordpress/comments/1bg56la/started_a_wordpress_business_got_threatened_in/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button) (I guess it spooked someone, as the moderators have now removed it.)It gained mixed reactions from this sub-reddit. I believe it became important to provide more context to the situation, our business model and how we’re able to cut down prices using best of technology.
I am not directly involved in building the site nor taking profit from it rather currently is fully focused on building a product startup. But some of my trusted colleagues from my previous web development venture which transitioned into the product focused startup, expressed a desire to stay with me accounting to our positive work environment.
However this presented a dilemma as their leader, expect one guy- none of them came from a CS technical background. They are super passionate about tech and I pride myself training them in WordPress development during my previous gig period but lack the necessary skills for the technical requirements of our new deep tech startup so businesses wise it’s not justifiable keeping them onboard at the new venture.
To address this, established a separate org tailored to their skill sets. Pals are assigned individual clients, and they retain full profits from those clients. It’s more like a community under whose banner they can work comfortably adhering to a set of rules I have framed.
Now, Here’s how we manage to offer such low prices (our business model) :-
1. **Location:** Incredible India. It’s not exorbitantly costly to live like in West. The Purchasing Power Parity difference is huge while living standards have improved a lot in last decade at par with cities like New York with even better connectivity and infrastructure facilities for way lower cost. (not here for a debate, New India have both side – developed & under-developed. But surely a huge jump in last one decade).
2. **Target Clients:** The “community” exclusively target small businesses, mom-and-pop stores, and SMEs that require basic static websites (e.g., Home, About Us, Portfolio, Contact Us pages). This streamlined focus minimizes overheads and need zero oversight from my side.
3. **Themes:** Instead of custom-built themes, they leverage a library of themes developed during my previous gig or whose (unlimited use) licenses I own. This reduces development time and costs.
4. **Work Process:** I had implemented an automated system. Starting it collects client data required through google forms. Its auto-passed onto an OpenAI ChatGPT wrapper I build to curate content and drop the data in particular developers emails, who can then easily incorporate the data into our pre-build website themes, significantly reducing build time to just 6-8 hours.
5. **Cost Optimization:** Negotiated a deal with a cloud company, for NVMe SSD storage and cPanel + Softaculous. Then shared this server space across thousand’s of people and passing on savings to clients. Also got the server guys to throw in auto-scaling features for potential traffic increases, for free. Again, this is possible because we focus only on a specific clientele who is looking just for an online static site and drive less traffic.
7. **Limited Custom Work:** The community pals is restricted from taking complex custom projects and gotta just stick to static low scale projects that can use our theme libraries alone. In future, I hope/wish them taking larger custom projects for higher price ceilings and to enable that – its mandatory for them to finish at least 4 skill development learnings every month.
8. **Client Support:** While static sites typically requires minimal support post-launch, one strict rule inside the community is to provide assistance whenever needed irrespective of whose client it is.
This approach enables “community” to offer affordable services while maintaining profitability and client satisfaction within target market. I wish the “community” we created would be able to sustain and thrive itself. Currently this is just a trial run and if they’re successful happy to add more people to the community and even increase the scope.
Also tail-end: my previous post (unlike one-or-two commented) was never intended to market our service, My only thought was to narrate an incident, else will not be literally discussing our business model here now! and am **happy to see if this model works out for anyone else too**.
Now to be transparent couple of people did contact requesting for developing their sites and I have forwarded their requests to our community members.