"There are certain expectations on the part of the clients [who] use them that they're going to get the lowest price out there," says Thursday Bram, who runs digital content consultancy Hyper Modern in Savage, Md. The pricing structure on some sites, which require contractors to pay a percentage of each job and, sometimes, additional fees, can take a bite out of profits, she notes.
But for some companies, the benefits of access to an online marketplace outweigh the disadvantages. Mediafly, a Chicago firm which helps big companies present their content on mobile devices like the iPad and smartphones, has been able to grow without an infusion of venture capital so far, partly because of one service offered by Ariba: "dynamic discounting." Mediafly submits invoices to one of its biggest customers through Ariba, offering a price break if they are paid quickly.
"It gives us an opportunity to get our cash much faster," says Matt Suggs, vice president of enterprise sales. Sometimes, for a small company, that concern trumps a lot of other things.
