
Outsource your idea | Launch your business for 1/4 the price
What do Slack, Skype, Fab, Klout, and GitHub have in common?
They all started by outsourcing their product development. They didn't have technical founders, they didn't recruit a team of in-house engineers, and they didn't have gigantic development budgets. Oh, and did I mention that they're now collectively worth over 20 billion dollars?
Every single company or startup outsources in one way or another. Whether it's your product development, your advertising, your testing, or your customer service - you need to be equipped to take advantage of the opportunities that outsourcing presents you. As an entrepreneur, outsourcing is an essential skill for saving money, being lean, and being successful.
Outsourcing is the go-to strategy for saving time and money in order to launch ideas that otherwise would never make it to market. You can build a world class product without hiring an in-house team or recruiting partners. When you finish this course, you'll be able to outsource like a professional. You'll cut your development costs by up to 90% and become a much more capable and skilled entrepreneur.
At the end of this course, you'll be able to:
- Create, conceptualize, and map out your idea in a way that anyone can easily understand
- Take your idea, create visual wireframes, mockups, and prototypes that are crucial for solidifying your vision and communicating it effectively
- Sketch, rapidly build, test, and collaborate on your feature ideas
- Understand, in intricate detail, the forces that effect your outsourcing project and how to position your project to be successful
- Write job desc that bring in the best bids
- Put together professional documentation for your idea and identify potential pitfalls before you spend money
- Select the best possible long-term team using a framework that's built over 100+ professional outsourcing projects
- Employ advanced techniques for getting the best price and cutting your deployment time in half
- Tailor popular tools like Asana, Trello, and Google docs to masterfully run your outsourcing project
- Spot bugs before they become a significant problem
About the Instructor

Hi, I'm Evan Kimbrell. Thanks for checking out my course.
Currently, I'm the Founder, Director of Sprintkick, a referral based full service digital agency based out of San Francisco. Over the last 4 years, I've overseen the development and launch of over 100 web and mobile apps. Clients range from 1-2 man team startups bootstrapping their initial idea, to multibillion dollar Fortune 100s like Wal-Mart, Dick's Sporting Goods, & GNC.
Previous to Sprintkick, I worked as a VC for a brand new firm called Juvo Capital, based out of L.A. I spearheaded the firms expansion into Silicon Valley deal flow and into Consumer Web tech category.
Previous to working for Juvo, in the long long ago, I was a co-founder for a educational software startup called ScholarPRO that raised a ton of money and then spectacularly blew up (in the bad way). Before it exploded like the Death Star, I went through 5 tech incubators (yes 5) with Tech Stars, Excelerate Labs, MassChallenge, Babson Venture Program, and Sparkseed.
I'm an avid AirBNB host for the Fishermans Wharf district of San Francisco. My space has the #1 search ranking for my area, has hosted over 200+ people, and is currently booking out 18 months in advance :) Over the last year I've helped multiple other hosts get their properties listed and maximize their price per night. Results range from an extra +50% in price for established hosts, and +400% for brand new hosts.
Hope you enjoy my courses!
Course content
Section 1:Introduction | ||||
1 | Course Overview | Preview | 7分34秒 | |
2 | What is outsourcing | Preview | 6分27秒 | |
3 | What is it good for and not good for | Preview | 12分12秒 | |
4 | How much should I budget? | 12分13秒 | ||
5 | Section 1 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 2:Getting Started | ||||
6 | Where to find outsourcing firms and freelancers | 7分46秒 | ||
7 | Introduction to Upwork | 19分38秒 | ||
8 | Going further in depth with Upwork | 5分51秒 | ||
9 | Introduction to Freelancer | 8分44秒 | ||
10 | Other techniques for finding contractors | 5分38秒 | ||
11 | Section 2 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 3:Dive Deeper | ||||
12 | Choosing your ideal subcontractor strategy | 8分24秒 | ||
13 | Deciding between a Firm or freelancer | 19分52秒 | ||
14 | Understanding outsourcing zones | 18分34秒 | ||
15 | Understanding Price and Autonomy | 8分08秒 | ||
16 | The Goldilocks Syndrome | 7分39秒 | ||
17 | Section 3 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 4:Posting Expertise | ||||
18 | Writing the right title | 9分03秒 | ||
19 | Practicing with titles | 12分37秒 | ||
20 | Writing the right description | 11分04秒 | ||
21 | Getting hands on with writing descriptions | 14分59秒 | ||
22 | Getting the settings right | 18分51秒 | ||
23 | Reviewing your settings further | 17分10秒 | ||
24 | Section 4 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 5:Plan Your Outsourced Idea (Optional) | ||||
25 | The Sx5 framework for solidifying product ideas | 18分18秒 | ||
26 | Coming up with strategy, Sx1 | 11分17秒 | ||
27 | Coming up with scope, Sx2 | 18分13秒 | ||
28 | Section 5 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 6:Documentation | ||||
29 | Creating an overview | 5分41秒 | ||
30 | Adding the functions section | 10分18秒 | ||
31 | Going further into depth with functions | 10分23秒 | ||
32 | Creating the pages section | 19分37秒 | ||
33 | Creating parameters | 10分39秒 | ||
34 | Creating the users section | 11分07秒 | ||
35 | Adding comments | 2分39秒 | ||
36 | Section 6 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 7:Building a Low Fidelity Wireframe | ||||
37 | Intro to sketching | 1分00秒 | ||
38 | Materials for sketching | 3分35秒 | ||
39 | Sketching it out | 8分02秒 | ||
40 | Sketching and the finishing touches | 14分46秒 | ||
41 | Upgrade to a tool, getting started with Pidoco | 10分14秒 | ||
42 | Getting used to the features in Pidoco | 11分31秒 | ||
43 | Creating a quick sitemap upfront | 14分44秒 | ||
44 | The site elements to start with | 5分27秒 | ||
45 | Using templates to save time | 2分22秒 | ||
46 | Handling images in Pidoco | 9分41秒 | ||
47 | Adding and controlling layers in Pidoco | 7分57秒 | ||
48 | Annotate everything | 10分36秒 | ||
49 | Alternative - Using Balsamiq | 19分39秒 | ||
50 | Alternative - Using Balsamiq continued | 3分14秒 | ||
51 | An example project created in Balsamiq | 3分10秒 | ||
52 | Section 7 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 8:Creating a Demo for Outsourcing (Optional) | ||||
53 | Intro to MAP | 9分50秒 | ||
54 | Adding interactivity to your prototype | 14分52秒 | ||
55 | Collaborators and Reviewers | 12分49秒 | ||
56 | Creating a tablet version | 9分46秒 | ||
57 | Section 8 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 9:Selecting the Best Person | ||||
58 | Reviewing bid language | 9分34秒 | ||
59 | Bid language in depth | 13分49秒 | ||
60 | The Response rate test | 6分19秒 | ||
61 | Dissecting the bid rate | 10分57秒 | ||
62 | Section 9 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 10:Strategies for Getting the Best Price and Experience | ||||
63 | The $50 test | 4分02秒 | ||
64 | Rapid cycling posts | 4分42秒 | ||
65 | The Keyer question | 7分31秒 | ||
66 | Repeat the project back to you | 4分00秒 | ||
67 | Get them off the platform | 4分10秒 | ||
68 | The long term strategy | 5分07秒 | ||
69 | Messaging Freelancers | 7分13秒 | ||
70 | Dividing Specializations | 6分14秒 | ||
71 | Section 10 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 11:Outsourcing Best Practices | ||||
72 | 6 pillars for evaluating contractors | 15分42秒 | ||
73 | 6 red flags in contractors | 7分40秒 | ||
74 | Response rate sets the tone | 4分28秒 | ||
75 | How important is site reputation | 4分41秒 | ||
76 | How to handle referrals | 3分11秒 | ||
77 | Is outsourcing a long term solution | 5分59秒 | ||
78 | How to handle extra work | 2分03秒 | ||
79 | Legality with outsourcing | 10分46秒 | ||
80 | Fixed rate versus hourly rate - use my method | 9分51秒 | ||
81 | What is good: Avoid this trap | 9分02秒 | ||
82 | Outsourcing and protecting your IP | 8分58秒 | ||
83 | Section 11 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 12:Managing Your Ongoing Project | ||||
84 | Getting acquainted with asana | 12分16秒 | ||
85 | Getting acquainted with asana 2 | 9分51秒 | ||
86 | Section 12 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 13:Bug Hunting | ||||
87 | Becoming a bug hunting master | 10分53秒 | ||
88 | Bug testing on mobile | 4分49秒 | ||
89 | Some thoughts on bug hunting | 1分29秒 | ||
90 | TIP - Accelerate your testing this way | 0分39秒 | ||
91 | Section 13 review material | 1分00秒 | ||
Section 14:Common Scenarios and How to Handle them | ||||
92 | Low quality work | 6分00秒 | ||
93 | Missing Deadlines | 8分07秒 | ||
94 | Repeatedly missing bugs | 5分58秒 | ||
95 | They ask for money upfront | 5分02秒 | ||
96 | They bid and disappear | 4分05秒 | ||
97 | Contractor raises their price | 8分25秒 | ||
98 | Section 14 review material | 1分00秒 |