Selling to developers

Most dev teams are going to make the technical decision internally. They already have a process for making build vs buy decisions.

This process likely looks like creating a pros and cons list similar to what you use for decisions in your own life.

It's an expected value calculation, though devs (individual contributors) sometimes forget:

  1. Their own time
  2. The overhead of hiring
  3. Bus factor

CTOs account for these, but individual developers often forget. They're focused on the task at hand (what your software does) and the technical merits of your software. The business case often takes a back seat.

The solution:

  1. Share criteria from other evaluations you've done
  2. Show them how to use your software

It's really that simple.

Yes, budget, internal politics, security — these all take time.

But getting the technical win? It's as simple as winning the "build vs buy" decision and making sure they really know how to use your software.

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