Reverse engineering an existing app into a business?

[Mr.Marnier]

Just throwing an idea out here and would appreciate your thoughts...!

Ok so been really trying to look at some needs I could have a go at tackling and whilst looking at the long debate over, learning to program vs outsourcing etc... I realized in a way I have already outsourced a successful project and it dawned on me there is a possibility of doing more with that that is happening right now.

So the scenario is I currently manage a friends small business, 13 employees and a small fleet of vehicles that install home TV equipment, wall mounting etc... etc, now as is the case with a lot of businesses that begin with a tradesman, a lot of the business processes did not develop as fast as the growth of the business (in this case they didn't grow at all!).

The first problem I wanted to tackle was the fact the owner was still using a paper diary to book all his work in, now this may have worked for him alone but we were now faced with 10-15x the call volume and had 8 vehicles not 1 to get across our coverage area and he now had office staff booking the work in on his behalf.

The problem was when 3 members of staff are on the line with a customer trying to book them an appointment becomes a nightmare when your colleague is manhandling the diary, it also means you need to physically keep that diary on you at all times.

The solution was this, I spoke to a contact I got through a friend and we went about designing a web based solution to our problem, it was developed in php I believe and basically completely replicated our paper diary online with some cool new features, allowing me or anyone we designate to access our workload from any browser (properly encrypted etc...) even on your iphone.

This solution has been fantastic for us, 3 or more users can be on calls at the same time booking in work simultaneously whilst being able to view our entire workload, in addition, we can now add significant notes about our customers, easily reschedule appointments etc and even use it to create easy and efficient routes for our drivers, and anyone of our staff can book in or change work at any location as long as they have internet and a browser.

Now, I know scheduling software and the like is nothing new, BUT I looked at those options before we commissioned our own solution and at the time those other systems were either too expensive or too complex for our needs, several of our competitors are struggling on with paper systems or very basic variations and it got me thinking, if this is so great for us and our fleet based small business, there is a high possibility of many other small businesses having the same need we did but are intimidated by the big boy solutions like we were or simply haven't looked for a solution.

I realize this is a backward process because the developer obviously owns this system already and simply designed it for us, he is a young guy who has a small business doing websites and programs like this, now I could be wrong but from my dealings with him I would say he is way more "tech" than sales and business, and if I approached him with the idea of maybe polishing this application up and packaging it as a product and go out there hustling it, it could turn into something profitable...he could already be planning that, no problem if he is but I think it is likely his mindset was to view this as a small project for us and then move on to his next client, but I think this kind of thing would make a great subscription based web app for other small business owners.

I've had the obvious doubts "why would he want to cut me in on something he developed" etc etc but then like I say if he wasn't planning on doing anything with it he doesn't have much to lose by someone like me having a shot at turning his single payment from us into an income stream by selling this to others, obviously this whole thing would hinge on him being interested in a venture etc but it is my first significant business idea so i'm putting it up for discussion!

Just wondered if anyone has done something along this line before or any thoughts!

Thanks peeps.

 

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