Re: Making Money with EUPHORIA
On 9/25/05, Shawn <guest at rapideuphoria.com> wrote:
> posted by: Shawn <pringle at techie.com>
>
> There are several models for making money with software. Any comments?
>
> shareware: Share it and beg for registrations in the Help Box.
> cripple ware: Like shareware but provides incentive (like EUPHORIA)
> open source: give the software and the source and pray someone hires you =
to improve it.
> trying to sell online
> trying to put it into the distributor-retail chains around the country.
>
> Tell me, what are your experiences with these methods.
> Please no moralistic flames. I would only like to hear people who tried =
to
> profit from thier software. Authors of EUPHORIA itself are invited.
Well, the biggest difficulty with making software is that on the
internet are MILLIONS of people who are doing the same thing. If you
make a widget that does $thing, there will be possibly hundreds of
people out there with software that does the same thing. Some of them
will be like you, trying to profit from it, while others release it as
freeware for kicks or are involved in open-source projects.
The key problem is: With the internet users have ready access to
alternatives, so if they initially don't like the idea of paying you
money for your product, they can simply google for another person's
free program.
My recommendation would be multi-pronged...
1. Find a problem that doesn't have a solution yet. Everybody and his
dog have written FTP clients, instant messengers, games,
anti-vir/anti-bug programs... Find a program you can write that
addresses something that not everyone has done already.
Minimise the number of competitors.
2. Find a problem with the right target market. Lets say you write
your widget, and get 400 users interested in using it. If you have 400
teenage girls interested, you won't get anywhere NEAR as many sales as
if you get 400 small-businesses interested.
Your best market will be small business, because they don't have the
rigid IT policies (so are able to easily purchase new software) that
large companies do.... and *possibly* something that a family would
use, not just the 14 year old girl.
3. Don't give the user too much OR too little for nothing. Lets face
it, everyone uses winzip... how many pay for it? I would suggest
crippleware as an ideal model, with a few caveats:
* Don't do time-limits, watermarks, no save option or anything that
reduces productivity with the free version to zero. I install a lot of
software at work, and I refuse to touch any shareware with a
time-limit... with all the time I spend configuring things to work
correctly, why would I want something that just falls apart?
* Try to show the user just how fantastic the full version really
is... I think an ideal thing in a user application would be to
grey-out any menu items that do not exist in the free version, with
[full version only] beside them. A splash screen advertising the full
version when the free one is run is feasible, but let the user click
past it whenever they choose.
* Don't make the free version TOO fantastic, or nobody will even think
of upgrading. One possible solution is a size-limit on documents, and
definitely limit things like any export functions the widget might
have.
4. There is more to sell than just the product. The biggest concern of
businesses is support. Who will tell them how to use the system?
Remember, they're your primary target market.
Remember, you'll be competing against the OSS and freeware solutions,
so support is an easy way to differentiate.
I would suggest including in the full-product's price 12 months of
free phone tech support. Make online training available to anybody who
has a full version of the software. Sell *inexpensive* support
contracts to customers who've already had the software for 12 months.
5. Don't be evil. This is a given... no spyware, adware, anything like that=
.
--
MrTrick
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