Recently my beautiful wife, a talented artist, who runs an online vintage store, went into our local Riverside tailor shop, to get her clothes altered. She had spent a good amount of time online trying to find a Riverside, CA Tailor. She finally found a reference to his store 9 or 10 pages deep…at the wrong address. After talking to Miguel Cruz, the owner of Cruz Custom Tailor, he really wanted help getting his site and online presence in order. He still had dial-up through AOL at his business, and really wasn’t tech savvy, but he knew that people were looking for him and had no idea what to do or how. We then came to an agreement that I would help him get his business listed locally online, and he would tailor me a custom suit.
After hammering down the details of how much the suit was worth and how many hours I would spend, we put it down on paper. 1 month later, he’s now listed and getting business from online referrals, and I have a beautiful custom suit.
A Tropical Paradise for a Website Redesign
I was talking to Heather Rhoades, at SMX West this last week, she is a technical services manager over at The Search Guru. She was telling me how she recently went out to a long planned vacation in Belize, South America. When she arrived her host started talking about the troubles she was having with her site about it not being user friendly, and completely useless. After talking at length to the owner of the vacation home, they agreed that they could help each other out. By creating a new web site layout and design the owner got a substantial improvement in her business and Heather got a free week long stay at the hotel! I asked Heather if she thought that this was a good or a bad practice. Her thoughts are that this is a continuation of the regular economy, and since you may not be able to afford their goods you need, businesses do need your services. So it’s a natural market exchange.
Barter Smarter
Reaching out into the twitterverse, there was a mixed bag of responses when it came to bartering services. Sean Carlos was worried that there might be a lack of commitment and follow through on both sides of the table. I think this is a valid concern, but Oliver Amar, of Compucall Web Marketing makes a fantastic point about the system of bartering.
We have (bartered for services) and if you do just make sure the contract is very specific about what is expected i.e hours, results etc
It would seem that you have to be very upfront about what you want, and what they’ll get in return, even more so I’d say than a cash paying client. When I worked with Miguel Cruz, I provided him with a printed copy log of hours worked and what was gained from that time spent, which went a long way to satisfying both sides of the barter.
A Paying Proposition?
What about your experiences? Have you ever bartered? Did it work out well or did it cause more problems than it was worth?
7 responses so far ↓
John Jones // February 18, 2009 at 8:18 pm |
I’ve personally had mixed success with barter jobs. I’ve probably learned more of my hard knocks from doing barter based jobs and have had to adapt contracts and even turn down jobs through out the years due to what I’d consider a risk factor that comes with barter jobs.
I’ve done plenty of barter jobs and still take them every now and then. Ironically I just passed a proposal to a potential client just last night that was barter related.
All but one of my barter jobs have been local business based. I’ve had the most success with this type of barter and have to admit that the one business that was out of town that I bartered with was probably one of my worse experiences ever. I won that one though as the customer had to buy me out at $2,000.00.
Spider Bait SEO // February 18, 2009 at 8:48 pm |
In my experiences bartering works better when it’s for similiar products. For example exchanging domain names for hosting. Search Marketing for Web Design. But I have found exchanging web design for say all you can eat a the restaurant you did a website for never tends to work out. One party tends to think they got the better end of the deal. Your really need to have a clearly defined contract. Unless you are doing something for a friend and you understand you aren’t going to get much in return.
webhost // February 19, 2009 at 5:00 am |
i have never bartered but seems interesting……….want to try it………………where can i get this information?
jeremypenguin // February 19, 2009 at 6:31 pm |
@webhost
Well Like @john said, local businesses seem to really need SEO services, perhaps going to your local business owners and talking about the general subject. Of course don’t door to door sales it, I think barter implies a certain trust, and that comes with a relationship and not just a sales relationship.
@spiderbait
I think you’re right about estimating value, but I think that small business people really can be made to understand the value of internet advertising mediums.
webhost // February 20, 2009 at 6:22 am |
thanks jeremy………..i will surely look in again……..to understand the theme ……..no doubt it is catchy…..but i need my brain filled with more details on it.
technical seo // March 7, 2009 at 9:55 pm |
What an amazing resource! this article is just what I have been looking for.Thanks for posting.
social media consultant // July 16, 2009 at 7:08 pm |
I have bartered for consulting with good effect.