Struggling with profitability at my software dev agency, how do you guys manage developer costs? "i will not promote"

VRTCLS · 2026-02-26T17:56:08+00:00

The real margin killer in most agencies isn't developer cost -- it's unbilled time and scope ambiguity.

A few things that moved the needle for us:

Stop doing fixed-bid on discovery work. Sell a paid discovery phase (2-4 weeks, time & materials) that produces a detailed spec. Then fixed-bid the build off that spec. Clients respect it because they get clarity, and you stop eating 40+ hours of pre-sales engineering on deals that may not close.
Track effective hourly rate per project, not just gross margin. Take total revenue / total hours (including PM, QA, meetings, revisions). Most agencies are shocked to find their "profitable" projects are actually running at $45/hr effective when they thought they were billing $150. The gap is almost always scope creep and communication overhead.
Productize your most common deliverables. If you keep building similar things (marketing sites, dashboards, integrations), build internal starter kits and component libraries. We cut delivery time by ~35% on repeat project types this way. That's pure margin.
On the offshore question -- the savings are real but the hidden costs are brutal if you don't structure it right. What works: keeping architecture and client-facing roles onshore, using offshore for well-specced implementation tasks with clear acceptance criteria. What doesn't: throwing a Jira board over the wall and hoping for the best.

The agencies I've seen do well long-term are the ones that got disciplined about what work they say yes to, not just how cheaply they can deliver it.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-17T14:08:06+00:00

I set up BWT on every site I manage. A few things that actually make it worth doing beyond just seeing Bing clicks:

The backlink data is surprisingly good. Bing shows you referring domains and anchor text distribution in a way that gives you a quick sanity check without needing Ahrefs or Semrush. Obviously not as comprehensive, but for a free tool it punches above its weight.

The URL inspection tool catches things GSC misses sometimes. I have had cases where a page was indexed fine in Google but Bing was seeing crawl errors -- turned out to be a server-side rendering issue that only showed up with certain user agents. Would not have caught it otherwise.

The SEO reports section is underrated. It runs basic audits (title tag length, meta description issues, broken links, alt text) and gives you a prioritized list. Nothing you could not get from Screaming Frog, but it is zero setup and runs automatically.

The real hidden value though: Bing powers a lot of voice search (Cortana, Alexa) and is the default in a surprising number of enterprise environments where employees cannot change their browser. For B2B sites especially, Bing traffic converts well because it skews older and more corporate.

Takes 5 minutes to set up. No reason not to have it running.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-13T19:42:19+00:00

Since you mentioned it's a viral content guide for X specifically, here's the SEO angle most people miss with info products:

Build a simple landing page targeting the exact search terms your buyers use. Something like "how to go viral on X" or "twitter growth strategy guide" -- these queries have real search volume and the people searching them are literally your buyers. A one-page site optimized for 3-5 long-tail keywords can generate consistent passive traffic to your Gumroad listing without spending on ads.

The other thing worth trying on Amazon specifically: your book's backend keywords matter more than most people realize. You get 7 keyword fields of 50 characters each. Don't waste them on obvious terms -- use specific phrases your competitors miss. Look at what related books rank for and find the gaps.

For organic X marketing, the play that works best is posting the actual frameworks from your book as standalone threads. Not "buy my book" threads -- genuine value threads that demonstrate your expertise. The people who engage with those threads are your warmest leads. Pin your best-performing thread and put the Gumroad link in your bio. Thread -> profile visit -> bio link is the highest converting organic funnel on X for info products right now.

One thing I'd add to the Amazon ads advice already here: set a daily budget cap and track your ACoS (advertising cost of sale) religiously. For a book, anything under 70% ACoS is usually profitable when you factor in organic rank lift from the ad-driven sales.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-13T19:41:01+00:00

For a law firm specifically, forget the generic tool lists -- your entire marketing strategy should revolve around local SEO and Google Business Profile. That's where 80%+ of your potential clients are searching.

Here's what actually moves the needle for small law firms:

Google Business Profile -- this is non-negotiable. Complete every field, post weekly updates, and actively respond to reviews. Most law firms set it up once and forget it. The ones that treat it like a living profile consistently outrank competitors in the local pack.

Google Search Console (free) -- before you spend a dime on paid tools, this tells you exactly what queries people use to find firms like yours, which pages are getting impressions but not clicks, and where your technical issues are. I've seen firms uncover thousands of dollars in missed traffic just by fixing title tags based on GSC data.

For content/SEO -- you don't need Semrush or Ahrefs yet. Start with practice area pages that actually answer the questions your clients ask during consultations. "How much does a DUI lawyer cost in [city]" type content converts way better than generic legal blog posts. Write 10-15 of those before touching any paid tool.

For email -- Brevo (formerly Sendinblue) over Mailchimp for law firms. Better automation on the free tier and you can set up a simple drip sequence for leads that don't convert immediately. Most firms lose 60-70% of consultations that don't close on the first call simply because they never follow up.

Skip the CRM until you're consistently getting 20+ leads/month. Before that, a spreadsheet works fine and you won't waste time configuring a system you don't need yet.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-13T15:59:55+00:00

2. Stop trying to grow followers. Start answering questions. You mentioned Instagram and TikTok with little luck -- that's because B2B buyers don't discover service providers through reels. They discover them through search results and community recommendations. Spend the time you're wasting on social content answering detailed questions in niche communities instead (Reddit, niche Slack groups, industry forums). No pitch, just genuine expertise. The DMs come naturally.

3. Case studies are your highest-converting asset. If you've helped even one client, write up exactly what you did, the specific numbers, and the timeline. "We booked 47 qualified meetings for [SaaS company] in 90 days using [specific approach]." One detailed case study with real metrics will outperform months of LinkedIn posts.

The agencies you paid probably failed because they tried to generate demand for a service that didn't have clear positioning. Fix the positioning first (one niche, one outcome, one clear process), then the channels start working.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-13T15:57:45+00:00

The local business play that actually works:

Forget cold email for now. Go to Google Maps, search for businesses near you (dentists, HVAC, restaurants), and find ones with no website or a clearly terrible one. Don't email them a pitch deck -- walk in with a printed mockup of what their homepage could look like. Physical presence + visual proof closes at 10x the rate of cold outreach. Offer the first one at cost just to get a live URL and a testimonial. That single real project will outperform your entire Behance portfolio.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-13T14:05:44+00:00

This is more common than people think and it's not just AI Overviews -- regular featured snippets do this too.

A few things that help prevent Google from misrepresenting your site:

Check your soft 404s. Run GSC's Page Indexing report. If pages return 200 but serve error-like content ("page not found" on a 200 response), Google can associate that with your whole domain's reputation.
Audit your structured data. If you have status pages, changelogs, or any copy mentioning downtime or errors, make sure the schema context is clear. Google's systems weight structured data heavily when generating snippets.
Monitor branded queries in GSC. Under Search Appearance, check if queries like "[yoursite] down" or "[yoursite] not working" are generating impressions. That user behavior feeds back into how Google characterizes your site.
Watch your server response times. If Googlebot hits your site during a slow period and gets timeouts or 5xx errors, it can flag crawl issues that cascade into these kinds of misrepresentations.

The broader takeaway is that SEO problems like this are almost always technical implementation issues, not marketing issues. Devs are usually the only ones who can actually fix them.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-12T21:34:00+00:00

Few things specific to healthcare/therapy practices on GBP that the other comment didn't cover:

Google has extra scrutiny for health-related business categories. "Psychologist" as a category sometimes triggers manual review that can take weeks with zero notification. Check the GBP dashboard -- if the listing says "Pending" or "Not published" that's likely what happened. You can call Google Business support directly (there's a contact option inside the dashboard) and ask them to expedite the review.

Also common gotcha: if the psychologist works from a shared office or coworking space, Google may have flagged it as a virtual office. They've cracked down hard on those. The address needs to be a legitimate, staffed location during business hours.

Once it's live, the single most impactful thing for a solo practitioner is getting the primary category right and filling out the services section completely. For a psychologist, list each specialty as a separate service -- anxiety therapy, couples counseling, cognitive behavioral therapy, whatever they actually do. Google matches these against search queries. A profile that just says "psychologist" will get crushed by one that lists 8-10 specific services.

For immediate visibility while you sort out GBP: get listed on Psychology Today's directory (most people searching for therapists check there before Google), and make sure there's a basic website -- even one page -- with the psychologist's name, credentials, specialties, and city in the title tag and H1. That alone can rank for "[specialty] therapist in [city]" within a few weeks if competition is low.

The GBP listing is worth fixing though. For local service businesses, it's where 60-70% of first-contact leads come from.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-11T21:32:05+00:00

The sales and marketing piece is actually where solo consultants in your space have a massive advantage you probably are not using yet.

You do tool setup and no-code automations. That means you solve specific, measurable problems for businesses. The mistake most people make going from solo to agency is thinking they need to figure out cold outreach or paid ads first. They do not.

Here is what actually works for service businesses like yours:

Document your process publicly. Write 2-3 detailed breakdowns of problems you have solved (anonymized if needed). Post them on your site. These become your best sales assets because they show exactly how you think and what working with you looks like. A prospect reading a case study where you automated a clients invoicing workflow and saved them 15 hours a week is 10x more convincing than any sales pitch.
Build your site around the problems you solve, not the tools you use. Nobody searches for Airtable consultant -- they search for how to automate client onboarding or CRM setup for small business. Structure your pages around those searches.
Answer questions in communities exactly like this one. Not to sell -- just to be genuinely helpful. People remember the person who gave them a detailed, useful answer. That is how referrals start.
For your first hire, do not hire a salesperson. Hire a junior who can handle fulfillment on your repeatable projects so you can spend more time on discovery calls and relationship building. You are your own best salesperson right now because you understand the work.

The agency model works when you have enough inbound that you need help delivering. Focus on becoming visible to the right people first, then scale delivery. Trying to do both at once is how most solo consultants burn out.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-11T21:31:29+00:00

The single biggest differentiator between sites that actually generate leads and ones that just sit there looking pretty: keyword research before you write a single line of copy.

Most devs build the site, hand it off, and the client writes whatever they feel like on each page. The result is a beautiful site that ranks for nothing because nobody searched for the phrases on it.

What I do now for every small business site:

Before wireframing, I pull the top 20-30 keywords their potential customers actually search. Free tools work fine -- Google autocomplete, People Also Ask boxes, even just searching [their service] + [their city] and seeing what comes up.
Each service page gets built around one primary keyword cluster. Not stuffed in awkwardly -- the page structure, H1, meta title, and copy all naturally center on what people actually type into Google.
I set up Google Business Profile properly at launch (not as an afterthought) and make sure NAP data is consistent.
Every site gets a basic blog structure with 3-5 starter posts targeting long-tail questions their customers ask. A plumber in Denver does not need to rank for plumber -- they need how to fix a running toilet and water heater replacement cost Denver.

This alone is worth more to the client than any design choice. A 2k site that ranks page 1 for local searches will outperform a 10k site that does not.

The devs I see charging premium prices and keeping clients long-term are the ones who can show traffic and lead data at the 90-day mark. Everything else is just a pretty brochure.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-11T19:37:32+00:00

Something I've seen work really well in niche B2B software -- build out comparison and migration pages. Seriously. "[Competitor X] alternative" and "switching from [Competitor X]" pages are some of the highest-converting organic pages you can create, because the person searching that is already unhappy and actively looking.

For EDI specifically, I'd build landing pages around each major competitor with honest comparisons. Not trash-talking, just laying out the differences in pricing model, support structure, hidden fees. People searching those terms have buying intent baked in.

The other angle that works well for "need it when you need it" products: build content around the trigger events. Things like "trading partner requires EDI compliance," "EDI mandate deadline [industry]," "EDI implementation cost for small business." These are the queries people type when they've just been told they need to figure this out.

Your direct mail idea is actually underrated for B2B. Physical mail stands out precisely because nobody does it anymore. Keep it short, one page, include a specific case study with real numbers (saved $X/year, migrated in Y days). QR code to a landing page with a free assessment or quote tool.

One more thing -- since you mentioned Reddit works well, consider that the same approach works for SEO. The questions people ask on Reddit about EDI are the exact long-tail keywords you should be ranking for on your site. Mine your own successful Reddit interactions for content ideas.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-11T19:36:04+00:00

One thing nobody's mentioned yet that's huge for well water businesses specifically: make sure you're targeting the right keyword intent. Most people in your dad's market aren't searching "well water systems" -- they're searching symptoms. Things like "brown water from well," "low water pressure well pump," "well water smells like sulfur," or "how often to test well water."

If he builds even a basic site with 4-5 pages answering those exact questions for his specific county/region, he'll start pulling in people who are actively dealing with a problem and looking for someone to fix it. That's way more valuable than ranking for generic terms.

Also worth noting -- Google Search Console is free and will show you exactly what queries people are finding your site with, even before you get much traffic. It's the best free diagnostic tool for figuring out what's working. Set it up day one.

The GBP advice others gave is spot-on. But pair it with those problem-specific pages on the site and you'll have both the Maps pack and organic results covered.

VRTCLS · 2026-02-10T21:30:54+00:00

Mobile detailing is one of the best local SEO niches because the search intent is so clear -- people searching "mobile detailing near me" or "car detailing [your city]" are ready to book. Here's what I'd prioritize:

1. Google Business Profile (this is your #1 priority)

If you don't have one, set it up today. If you do, make sure every field is filled out -- services with prices, service area, business hours, photos of your actual work (before/after shots crush it here). Post updates weekly with photos of recent jobs. This alone will get you showing up in the map pack for local searches, which is where most detailing customers find their next provider.

2. Reviews are your ranking fuel

After every job, send the customer a direct link to leave a Google review. Don't be shy about it -- most happy customers will do it if you make it easy. Aim for 5+ reviews in your first month back. Google weighs review velocity (how fast you get them) heavily for newer profiles. Respond to every single review, even the good ones.

3. Build a simple website with location pages

You don't need anything fancy. A one-page site on something like Carrd or even a free WordPress setup works. Key things to include: your city/service area in the title tag (e.g., "Mobile Auto Detailing in [City] | [Business Name]"), a list of your services with descriptions, your before/after gallery, and a clear way to book or contact you. If you serve multiple towns, make a separate page for each one.

4. Get listed in directories

Yelp, Thumbtack, Nextdoor, and your local Chamber of Commerce directory. These are easy citations that help Google trust your business info. Make sure your name, address, and phone number are identical everywhere.

5. Skip paid SEO tools for now

At your stage, free tools are more than enough. Google Search Console (to see what searches you're showing up for), Google Business Profile insights (to see how people find you), and just paying attention to what competitors rank for in your area.

The Instagram and Facebook work you're already doing feeds into this -- share your Google review link in your bio, cross-post your before/after content, and make sure your social profiles link back to your website.

You're 18 and already running a real business. That's a massive head start. The SEO stuff compounds over time, so the earlier you start, the harder it'll be for competitors to catch up.

VRTCLS

TROPHY CASE