Real Answers to Real Questions.

Several people have asked how I would respond to some of the questions I raised in last week’s post called, “Are you ready for this person?”

Last week, I posed 10 questions that are representative of the type people would ask me when I was pitching EE-based design/development services over the last few years. The questions were intended to be just a little less than perfect in order to reflect that the person asking them may not have a very good understanding of EE or my company.

I nearly always will try to adjust my answers to meet the needs of the audience. In the “real world,” I might give two very different answers to the same question depending on what I assessed the needs are for the particular audience I’m addressing. Both answers will be truthful, but each will take a different tack.

The answers presented here are examples of my responses, and are not in any way intended to be a guide for selling your services. But they may help you craft or refine your own answers, and if they do, great.

Every time I hear someone like Les Camacho, Greg Storey or Mitchell Kimbrough pitch EE, I wish I had a recorder in my pocket so I could play back what they said and study it. All three of those guys have pitching EE down to a fine art. And there’s more of you out there I’ve yet to meet.

Many of us in this business work alone, so we just don’t get to see or hear how others position EE with their clients. So when someone like Michael Boyink, who’s been working with EE for a long time, let’s us peek into his sales bag, it’s a great opportunity for all of us to compare answers. See Mike’s Answers

Here are my answers to the 10 questions from last week.

Q1: Why do they charge for it, isn’t it open-source?

A1: Very good question. (Actually, it’s two questions.) EllisLab charges for the software for a number of reasons, but the reason I don’t mind paying for its professional license is because of the professional support it offers through its technical support forums.

Lots of software companies have an online community, but when you buy an EE license, you have access to paid support staff that participates in the technical support forums. Also, in the rare case that the support team can’t resolve my issue, they will typically escalate the issue to a person on the software development team. The paid support is not only covered with the price of the license, it’s staffed with experts who use the software every day.

Just as importantly, EllisLab doesn’t encrypt or otherwise obscure the code in its software, so anyone with a copy can see everything that’s going on “under the hood,” and this encourages all sorts of software functionality additions from the community, just like the free open-source CMS solutions. 

Q2: What happens to it three years from now when we’ve moved all our resources into it and you’re out of business?

A2: When you visit the expressionengine.com website, look for a link to the Pro Network. You’ll find over 70 full-time development firms from all over the world who specialize in ExpressionEngine-based websites. You’ll also find a job board where you can post your needs in front of a community of over 50,000 novice and semi-pro developers and designers who use ExpressionEngine.

Also, EE is based on PHP/MySQL, and there are thousands of people familiar with these tools around the world.

Q3: We just pre-paid for two years of hosting and got a really great deal at a huge well-known hosting provider. Are you saying that your software wonÅft work there?

A3: A common occurrence in the world of websites and hosting is this: You get a nasty-gram from your hosting company that the software your website runs on is somehow faulty, so the company is shutting down your site until you get it fixed. You contact your software company and it tells you that the software is fine, but that your hosting company doesn’t have a clue and needs to have its head examined. The software vendor is blaming the host, the host is blaming the software. . . . hmm . . . you’re stuck in the middle with a website off line. What if you could find a CMS software company and host provider that are engaged in a mutually beneficial partnership?

EngineHosting has a business relationship with EllisLab. If EngineHosting thinks there might be an issue with ExpressionEngine, or vice-versa, it will all be taken care of behind the scenes, and you won’t have to deal with being stuck in the middle.

A3: Alternate Answer: Imagine I loaned you my car for a cross-country trip with one stipulation: you must not adjust any of the settings in the car or make any repairs or upgrades to it during the trip. You can’t adjust the seat, the mirrors or the radio. You can’t add oil, change out a filter, or put air in the tires even if they start going flat. You would look at me like I was nuts, yet this is what it’s like for an experienced developer when the client picks an unknown hosting environment for a site.

Every host provider has different equipment, different rules, different default settings on its servers and different ways of providing support and of doing maintenance on its gear. Just because it says Brand-X on the hood, doesn’t mean this car is ready for a cross-country trip. When was the last time the brakes were checked, the oil changed, the filters changed?

When you let your developer choose your host, he or she already know the hosts he/she is used to working with, how the gear there is set up, how the support system works and how often this host changes the oil. This saves you and your developer time, money and headaches.

Q4. My nephew is a professional web designer and he uses Xippty, and Xippty is free and is used by a lot of people, and he says that your software is kind of difficult to use and he doesn’t know anyone who uses it.

A4. Could you put me in touch with your nephew? I would like to take him on a guided tour of ExpressionEngine, and learn more about Xippty from him as I’ve never heard of it.

There was, at one time, something like one new CMS software package released every 12 hours somewhere in the world. It’s not uncommon at all for full-time developers to come across some software he or she is unfamiliar with and to find it a bit challenging at first. Most of you have been using telephones for years, but how many times have you been challenged by new cell phone? Have someone coach you and it’s easier, but try to figure out the instructions on your own, and you might have to think pretty hard.

How about you hook me up with your nephew so I can give him a guided tour of EE, and show him what we’re doing with it? And then, let’s see if he still feels the same way about it.

Q5: How long have you been in business anyway?

A5: Since age 11. I had a double paper route delivering the evening paper. My career shifted to the web in. . . . . brag, brag, brag. . . .  since then we’ve built. . .  brag, brag, brag. . . . and by this time next year I hope to have your site prominently listed in our online portfolio.

Q6: The other CMS we’re looking at is only $100 per seat. Look, we can’t afford $250 a year for every person in our office, do we look like that kind of operation to you?

A6: ExpressionEngine isn’t sold by the seat, you get the whole bus for $250.00, and you can have as many people on your bus as you like.

A6: Alternate answer (this was specific to our subscription package offered by my firm): Your license and all renewals are covered through the Advantage Program. We purchase enough licenses that we get a volume discount from EllisLab. As long as you stay with us, we’ll roll the cost of all licensing into your monthly retainer, and there’s no limit on how many people can use the software.

Q7: It will work just like MS Word right?

A7: Your skills using MS Word will help you learn to publish in ExpressionEngine. We will configure EE to meet the needs of your website and your publishers. When we’re done, we will have made EE as easy to use as possible, yet like anything new there will be some things for you to learn.

We can train anyone to publish to his or her EE website in one to three hours, depending on how many features have been built into the site. Most people master 95 percent of the skills in the first hour. Our youngest publisher is 78 and she publishes a daily blog in EE. If you can shop online, you can publish with EE.

Q8: Has your firm ever worked with a company our size before?

A8: There are three key roles or people in any organization (and within your company) to which we need direct access in order to begin and maintain a successful web project. These include 1) the primary decision maker for this project, 2) the person who will be doing most of the hands-on work on the project, and 3) the person who will make sure our firm is paid on time. As long as your organization maintains those three relationships with us, then we can keep your project moving foreword.

Also, we’ve done work for: {name_drop_here}.

Q9: Look, I don’t have a lot of time. This is going to be easy to use right?

A9: You will need to budget a little focused time in the beginning to get familiar with the software and the configuration of EE we’ll be setting up for you. How easy it is for you depends a lot on your current level of computer skills. If things like shopping online and preparing letters in Word are easy for you, then this will be too. Expect a bit of a mind shift though if you’re brand new to CMS publishing. Letting go of a mindset based on a sheet of typing paper can be a little challenging at first, but it’s also very rewarding once you do.

Q10: I don’t like the idea of someone else having our data. Why can’t we keep the data for the website on our computers?

A10: Desktop computers just aren’t a good safe place for your web data, just like your desk isn’t a safe place for the company’s money.

Banks are designed as a safe place to keep money, and have a lot of security in place that most businesses just can’t afford. The same is true for data centers where your new website will be hosted. Data centers are very much like banks in that they are specially constructed buildings specifically designed for keeping computers safe, cool and clean.
I hear your concerns about your data security, and would like to forward some information on just a few of the security systems and features we will be implementing with your new site to protect your data.