A signed scope of work is the difference between a project that finishes on budget and one that grows a week at a time. Here’s the short version of how we scope.
Jason Long
Jason Long
Founder & CEO
Jason Long is the founder and CEO of JHMG. He is a serial problem solver and entrepreneur with 25 years of experience in business building. Jason's ventures range from agriculture to healthcare with a focus on web-based technology. He has extensive experience in software development and have operated as a developer, UX designer, graphic designer, project manager, director, executive coach, and CEO. At JHMG, he operates not only as the leader of the organization, but also as a SaaS Consultant helping businesses start, build, grow, scale, and exit their SaaS businesses.
Jason is also an experienced world traveler who regularly visits destinations worldwide, and is passionate about community growth, social issues, fitness, and family.
Founder & CEO
Jason Long is the founder and CEO of JHMG. He is a serial problem solver and entrepreneur with 25 years of experience in business building. Jason's ventures range from agriculture to healthcare with a focus on web-based technology. He has extensive experience in software development and have operated as a developer, UX designer, graphic designer, project manager, director, executive coach, and CEO. At JHMG, he operates not only as the leader of the organization, but also as a SaaS Consultant helping businesses start, build, grow, scale, and exit their SaaS businesses.
Jason is also an experienced world traveler who regularly visits destinations worldwide, and is passionate about community growth, social issues, fitness, and family.
Author’s Posts:
Navigating Complex Project Estimates
I’ve been scoping and building software projects for over 25 years, and I still catch myself underestimating complexity. It happens to everyone. But what separates the agencies that survive from the ones that slowly bleed out is how they handle the gap between expectation and reality.
Legacy Systems Modernization Guide: Steps, Benefits, And Solutions
Businesses that take a proactive approach to legacy system modernization gain an advantage by improving workflows, reducing costs, and integrating with emerging technologies. On the other hand, organizations that delay modernization often find themselves constrained by outdated infrastructure that slows progress, limits future opportunities, and endlessly frustrates their teams and system users.
The Critical Mistakes Non-Technical Founders Make Growing SaaS & Software Businesses
A client came to me today who’s trying to disrupt a billion-dollar industry, but made the same three mistakes that I see new entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs, specifically non-technical ones, making over and over.
How To Destroy An Acquisition
Since they are heavily entrenched in the market, it seemed like they thought they could sell the product to their existing customer base. Of course, why not? They had tons of customers in this market who mostly liked or loved them. How could this go wrong?
SaaS Go To Market Strategy Analysis
Whether you’re going to market with a new product for a new audience, reviewing your GTM strategy for an existing set of products or services, or just working on planning, knowing the steps to follow and a methodical system that delivers results is the difference between spinning your wheels and gaining traction.
Example Sales Commission Policy
This commission policy was built over the course of many years and is used for outside sales personnel. We are putting this sales policy out publicly so that other agencies and consultancies can save the time and cost it took us to create a similar sale commission policy.
Quantifying Market Segments In SaaS
Most of the marketers I’ve worked with create customer avatars that look something like this: The usual customer profile looks something like this. Buyer Segment: Quick Decision Makers Name: Noah Ogle Title: Director of Development Location: Counsel Bluffs, Iowa...
SaaS Business Forecast Readiness: Your Step-by-Step Guide
Building out a forecast for a SaaS business is a daunting task, especially if you’re not in finance. So we built out an entire step-by-step process and walkthrough on what you need to do to prepare for building out the forecast.
How to Estimate the Cost of a SaaS or Enterprise Software Development Project
Dive deep into SaaS cost analysis: Learn how to accurately estimate the cost of building a SaaS platform with our detailed guide.
SaaS Launch Secrets: 5 Tips to Overcome Unforeseen Costs
You don’t know what you don’t know when launching a new SaaS. So here are some areas that a lot of SaaS entrepreneurs only find out AFTER they have launched. In this article, we’ll dig deep into the following areas.
Marketing and Demand Generation
Building a Sales Team
Developing Robust Systems
Navigating Litigation
Preparing for Market Instability
The Universal Growth Principle For SaaS
Before diving into SaaS sales teams, demand generation, product development, and everything in between, the first and most crucial aspect must be in place.
Building a SaaS Business From An In-house Application
Transform your in-house software into a profitable SaaS venture with expert guidance. Learn app monetization and commercialization strategies.
Great Leaders Build Leaders, Not Followers
You can’t have a business led by a team of followers, you need leaders. People who have the skills to take the organization to the next level, own their responsibilities, push the organization forward, and then grow their own great leaders.
How we 100X’d leads with our podcast and tradeshow lead gen process.
When was the last time you went to a tradeshow or convention and were breaking down your booth at the end of the show and thought to yourself, “What a waste”? Here’s how we turned that around to produce tons of leads from every show we attended.
Why do SaaS Companies Fail?
Discover why SaaS companies fail and learn strategies for success. Avoid pitfalls with expert tips and insights. Make your SaaS venture thrive!
UX in SaaS Development
UX designers take systems that are complicated and make them seem easy. They make processes with many variables easy to understand and flow through. They deliver systems that make sense. When users see these final deliverables and use those systems, they often think “of course it would be that way, how else could it possibly be?”
SaaS Financials Spreadsheet
This is a great resource for any SaaS business that needs to either plan out their financials or is getting started.
8 Steps You Can Take to Make Sure You Always Get Paid
Most people are averse to confrontation. Especially confrontations where they could be painted in a negative light.
But there are ways to broach the topic of payment without coming off like Uncle Scrooge. Take a look at our list of tips to help ensure you always get paid while improving your relationships with clients.
What are Sales Funnels and How to Create an Effective One
Master sales funnels to boost revenue with JH Media Group’s expert guidance. Unlock the potential of your business.
The Agency Sales Formula 20 Years In The Making
We’ve learned a few tricks over the years when it comes to getting sales. You’ll never guess what our secret is.
How Little Problems Become Big Problems At Scale In A SaaS
Sometimes a small issue appears and looks like an easy, but time-consuming, fix. So it’s flagged for later. Later just doesn’t roll around until the system has grown three, four, ten times as big as it was when the issue first appeared.
Growing Your Business By Niching
Open doors by choosing your focus. Here’s how specializing leads to more opportunities and more profit.
How to Build Wireframes for Increased Profitability and Scope Creep Avoidance
One of the most overlooked steps is in website and app projects is wireframing. Timing in the project flow is crucial. Here’s how wireframes can make or break a project and how to always get them right.
SupportMy.Website Announcement!
To fulfill our ongoing mission to be the best website and web-application support company on the web, we are so happy to announce our latest addition to our ever-growing catalog of businesses SupportMy.Website!
How to estimate projects precisely.
I remember the last straw for me before we started building BrainLeaf. A developer had given us an estimate of 50 hours to complete a feature set, but 400 hours later it still wasn’t done. Frustrated and upset is a huge understatement of what I was feeling. I had to deal with big losses, multiple missed deadlines, a frustrated and demoralized team, and a very upset client. Sound familiar?
Building a Tool vs. a Platform – Know the Difference!
Are you a SaaS startup grappling with whether to build a tool or a platform? Learn the differences and why starting with a tool can set you up for success.
The #1 Indicator Of Success In A SaaS Business
The more times you’ve done something, the better you are at it. Building and running a SaaS Business is just like everything else: a career with a specific set of skills that you have to master.
Every SaaS In The World Does These Things
There are thousands of different SaaS systems on the market, and we’ve taken the time to prepare a list that covers all of them. You ready?
SaaS Validation: Avoiding the Easiest Way To Fail In SaaS
Lack of SaaS validation is the most common pitfall in SaaS management. Learn how to validate a SaaS idea effectively and avoid this costly mistake!
A SaaS Business Is A Sales & Marketing Business
Learn why sales and marketing are crucial from the very start of a SaaS business. Get insights on effectively launching your SaaS product.
Determining if you want to work with a SaaS client.
How do you know you want to work on a new project? Here is what I look at when I am considering a new project and a new client, specifically a SaaS project.
How to Calculate the Cost to Build a SaaS System
Learn to estimate SaaS costs and timelines, including design, scoping and SaaS development costs, testing, and business expenses in our detailed guide.
The Order of Importance of Digital Marketing Tasks
Explore the 9 essential digital marketer tasks and prioritize your marketing task list for success. Learn how to optimize your digital marketing strategies to drive results for your business.
You Can’t Expect Unless You Inspect
All work, at any level in the organization, should be double-checked by somebody. That does not mean that the owner of the business should be looking over the collective shoulders of every employee in every department. That’s neither desirable nor feasible.
Work Time vs. Duration in Project Management
We want to make sure that we have plenty of time for conversations and time planned for internal company exchanges at clients’ businesses. We need to be able to send data out and get data back from the client and account for this time in our projections. Without time budgeted for this, you won’t be able to manage the project well, and things will start to fall apart!
What is Scope Creep?
Scope creep is an uncontrolled growth in the scope of a project. This happens because of an unclear initial scope of work which is then added to with a lack of checks and balances in project management processes.
What Are The Parts Of A Website, Application, or SaaS Scope Of Work?
A Scope of Work or SOW for a website, web-app, mobile-app, application, or software-as-a-service (SaaS) has a few specific aspects which we're coving in today's article. These are the: Contract Creative brief Information architecture (IA) Project flows or wireframes...
Thinking Before Doing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxV1KULezdc When you're running an agency, or really any business for that matter, it's almost always mid to high-level stress. Which is why you NEED to think about your strategies and execution before acting. The business is busy, and...
Knowing Your Priorities
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBQJ8AWnAOQ Knowing your priorities is one of the most important things you can do in life and in business. When you know your priorities, you can make decisions that you stand by every time. Here is a story about how I learned what was...
How to Get Developers to Give You Accurate Estimates
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpLlEY-yN_U Are Inaccurate Estimates Killing Your Business? This is something that happened yesterday and today that I want to share with you. We were working on creating estimates for a fair sized project, perhaps a 3 or 4 month...
What Is The Google Sandbox And What Does It Mean?
What is the Google Sandbox and what does it mean for you? Find out here!
Scope vs. Proposal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPa8Y3aJl4g A Proposal And An SOW Are Not The Same Thing! So many design, marketing, and even web development agencies do not have a clear understanding of a project scope of work vs. a project proposal. Many companies include only one...
Case Study: MedRev – Improving Patient Experiences
We are proud to announce the launch of our latest SaaS system, MedRev! This project has been in production now since March and is finally at an MVSP (Minimum Viable Sellable Product) state and is going to market. The sales team for this company starts it’s work tomorrow and we are so happy to have helped them get off the ground.
How to Get Started In SaaS
When you have a great idea and decide to get started in SaaS (Software as a Service), you are building a business. Many eager entrepreneurs don’t think through all the Costs Associated With Starting A New SaaS Business. The existence of passive income in SaaS is a myth for 99% of businesses. Making a profit is possible but it requires a tremendous amount of effort and hard work.
Building a Successful SaaS with Paywall Solutions
Discover the strategic importance of paywall solutions for SaaS businesses. Explore the value difference between paying and non-paying users.
The Differences Between Web Developers, Designers, & Digital Marketers
You wouldn’t call a carpenter to fix your car or a podiatrist to work on your heart, so don’t call a developer to market your goods a designer to plan your database or a marketer to build your project.
Starting a Successful SaaS Business
These questions all seem like simple, straight-forward questions that anyone should ask before starting any business. But so often people jump into building software systems without clearly thinking through all of this.So, let’s take a look through some of these questions and the lessons to be learned from them, starting with the big ones first.
JH Media Group’s Website, Web-App, Mobile App, and Software Development Process Flow
If you’re ever wondering what goes into building a website, web-app, mobile app, or piece of software, now you know!
How to Quote an App Development Project
Building a Scope of Work For Your Web Project Means Knowing How to Quote an App Development Project The Right Way With timelines, costs, features, and platforms, there's a lot to consider when you quote an app development project. The mobile app market is experiencing...
The Power Of MailChimp & How To Harness It
It can be challenging for MailChimp users to figure out how to do things, or even to figure out what they want to do in the first place. Not to mention needing to solve problems that arise when the app doesn’t work exactly as you thought it would. Maybe your list isn’t laid out the way you want it or your automation logic is not so logical.
Achieving Success with SMART Goals
We keep the end goal in mind as we help our clients to grow their business. Every goal has to be SMART in order to have the ability to fulfill the requirements of their respective businesses.
How to prioritize user feedback to build better products
A guest post written by David Parmelee Scoping a software, web, or app project is not just a once-and-done exercise Whether you create your product for external clients, consumers, or internal users, your users will eventually see some version of your product. Maybe...
Get The Best Clients To Come To You With Inbound Marketing
Inbound marketing is a strategy that involves drawing people in rather than forcing a message out. In this marketing method, customers find your business through blogs, social media sites, Youtube videos or, search engines results, to name a few. This works out nicely since people tend to seek out content and experiences that are helpful and valuable to them.
Setting Up Payment Arrangements and Avoiding Scope Creep in Freelancing
A guest post from biz-dev hero Mark Thomasson Freelancing comes with plenty of perks and difficulties. Scope creep can be one of the greatest obstacles in the world of a freelancer, and with substantial consequences. When you fall into a situation where your workload...
Our New Digs!
It’s official! We have moved our main offices from Athens the Atlanta! It’s been a long time coming, but we’re here now and settled in on the 8th floor of Ponce City Market in Atlanta!
Building a Scope of Work (SOW) document for a website project
Writing a Scope of Work (SOW) for a website This document discusses the general items you need in a SOW for a website, but because projects can vary so much, you may need to include more items in your SOW. Today, we’re going to look at how to produce a Scope of Work...
Changing Project Managers Half-Way Through A Project
In 2016 alone we had three ongoing projects who were quite successful, but the initial project managers that we were working with left and new product owners were assigned to work with us accordingly. One of the transitions was even more successful than before, but...
Tips for Effective User Research Reports
Guest post by Amelia Wong ESTABLISH YOUR GAME PLAN The audience’s time is valuable. The stakeholder wants to know that the UX professional is effectively achieving the goals and the team is all on the same page. Initially clarifying objectives helps all parties...
Good Cheap Fast – Choose Two
Video By Jason Long Good Fast Cheap, Choose Two (Transcript) Alright, today's lesson is on good, cheap, fast, choose two. What this is, this is a saying that we have in software, app, web development. They can also be applied to many, many, many other places like...
How to Tell Your Client You’ve Missed the Deadline (and Be Professional About It)
Guest post by Simone Smith Missing a deadline is something that happens even to the best of us. Whether you got sick and couldn't finish your tasks on time or the project took you much longer than expected, one thing is clear – you're about to miss the deadline and...
Project Scope And You
Why Scoping Matters Had I scoped every project I had ever worked on, countless dollars would have been saved, countless tears wouldn't have been shed, and I probably could have added years to my life. You see, when you don't scope your project well, you automatically...
The Peabody Awards: A New Site, A New Face
Popular among a highly academic sub-culture, the Peabody Awards started as a ceremony to award those in radio broadcast and a few other forms of journalistic media. As time progressed, the Awards grew to include online broadcasts, documentaries, and nontraditional media that wouldn’t typically garner attention at functions such as the Emmys, Academy Awards or Golden Globes.
Stop procrastinating by watching this video on how to stop procrastinating… then actually stop.
Want to stop procrastinating, but want to procrastinate just a little longer so that you can become both better and worse at it simultaneously? Well, here you go!
Learning to Code with Liz Norton
Liz Norton is learning code on top of working full-time as a manager at a coffee shop. She blogs over at www.lizcod.es. And we are very grateful she took time out of her busy schedule to answer our questions.
How to Choose the Right Clients
What’s that thing everyone always says? Something like, “the customer is always right.” Right. But in web design and freelancing, we quite often forget to choose the right customers. Did your mom ever tell you to choose your friends wisely? Mine did. And you should be...
Learning to Code with Travis Douce
Travis Douce got into programming while working in the field of Geographical Information Systems (GIS). A natural problem-solver, he knew there had to be a better way than manually creating thousands of GIS files for datasets. All he had to do was learn how to code. Fast forward a couple of years: Travis is now a software developer for Big Nerd Ranch, a Rails for Girls coach volunteer and an active participant in the Athens developers’ community.
Dealing with Larger Projects – The Safe Way
A guest post from Mario Peshev, owner and WordPress Architect at DevriX Smaller agencies and consultants are often afraid of swimming in deep water when it comes to serious business leads. If you have spent many years in the market, successfully running your business,...
Working Out Regularly Makes You a Better Business Owner
There is no way to predict when trauma will happen, but exercising keeps the body in a condition that can be the difference in the Emergency Room. There are also more subtle ways exercising saves your life when you are a super-busy, stressed-out business owner.
Want to Learn Code?
Jordan Burke is the Chief Technology Officer at Vitamin C. He currently teaches an Intro to Rails course at FourAthens and is a co-organizer of the Developers of Athens meetup.
Are You Mobile-friendly?
Going mobile is not really optional anymore. If a business or organization wants to stay relevant to 75% of Americans in 2014, and to 85% of the world population in 2017, they have to be mobile-friendly.
Is Your Team Communication Lacking? You Might Like Slack
Let’s talk about how you talk to your team. Do you use email? Do you wish there was an easier way to search for old conversations? I want to clue you in on a communication tool the JH Media Team uses to collaborate and share random things on the internet: Slack.
Who is Responsible for What on Your Website?
Keeping website content fresh and exciting is the best way to attract new people to your business. It’s also the best way to get loyal customers coming back for more. To make both of those things happen, you need to do a little old-fashioned roll call.
5 Ways to Revamp Your Online Marketing
For clients who are beginners in online marketing or completely skeptical of it, I always outline a super simple marketing plan using free or trial versions of software for them to test their marketing ideas. Once they’ve got some numbers on interaction and traffic through testing, then they can really focus on their message and invest in a bigger marketing plan.
How to Write a Blog That Gets an Audience
Blogging! That thing everyone does! A blog has immense potential to generate website traffic…or so they say. I know getting an audience that reads your blog can a BIG problem for business blogs. There is so much content noise already. I know you don’t want to be a noise-maker, but a news-maker. So the question is, what makes your blog better reading than another’s? How do you write a blog that gets an audience?
Finding More Time
You can’t just invent more hours in the day to get everything done. As much as I wish that were true. (Hello, unstained chifforobe sitting in the garage!) Luckily, there are many tools to help you organize and schedule your day so that you can actually get more accomplished. I put together this short guide on different ways you can find more time for the things that make your business succeed.
Putting your website content to work
You’ve heard it a thousand times: content is king. But if it’s so important, where do you start and how can you make it work for you?
How to scope and price a web project #1
This is the first of a several part series on the process of scoping a pricing web and app projects. Here we're just going over some of the basics and making sure we're all on the same page as far as definitions, general process, etc. before moving onto more...
Value-based Pricing vs. Cost-based Pricing in Web and App Development
Whether you’re taking the plunge into freelancing and consulting or running a studio, there is one question that always looms over you: how am I going to price my services? This is one of the questions I’ve answered more than almost anything else over the years. There...