 |
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Thursday, November 30, 2006 at 11:40 AM
Just a quick follow up on some of the advice from the shareware conference. The big pieces of advice I've made use of so far came from Dave Collins ( Shareware Promotions). Web Log AnalysisI downloaded WebLogStorming and fed my raw weblogs through it. This was really eye-opening, I found out that I could clearly track how many completed downloads I'm getting, tracing them back to a source or to search terms. I've been able to track basic things with the various web based stats services I've used, but the most important stat was never there. The raw logs hold the bandwidth figure for each hit on the trial executable, so I can now tell how many times the download was completed. Some interesting tidbits from the month of logs I had to analyze:- - There were about 100 completed downloads from three download sites (not tucows or download.com). They probably aren't sales leads, as the names all imply "free", but I was surprised all the same.
- As far as I could tell, Yahoo sponsored search hits were hardly ever resulting in completed downloads. Comparatively, hits from MSN were looking like better value.
- Some of the more expensive paid keywords I've been chasing were hardly ever resulting in downloads.
- A surprising number of hits from Google's content network were resulting in downloads. This called into question the theory that this was wasted money, and suggested that I might have made a slight mistake in cutting back that spending (see below).
- Somehow, one of my images became the #4 google image search result for "american". That also explained some of the strange hits I've had from various unrelated forums.
One criticism of the software, it doesn't seem to do anything useful with xml/rss hits, so I couldn't really get a lot of useful info about my blog traffic from it. If you've never used a raw log analyzer, I strongly recommend giving it a try, I don't think I'll ever want to rely just on web stat services again. Taming Adwords Dave painted a pretty bleak picture of Adwords in some of his presentations, he was convinced that if we weren't tracking our account carefully we would be throwing money away. He was right. I hadn't really been paying attention to the split between Content and Search network, and I have the same campaign running on both. In October about half of our spend went on Content network clicks. I'd cheerfully increased the bid on a number of keywords, this had led to a bit of a surge in Content impressions and clicks. I spent a bit of time doing some housekeeping:- - Cut the Content network completely from the main campaign, and added a second campaign for just the Content network. The Content bids are much lower. After realizing that I did get some useful traffic from the Content network, I've started increasing the bids slightly to get more coverage, but I'm being very careful and deliberate about it.
- I deleted some ad-groups with poorly performing keywords, and I made sure each group had at least two ads.
- Then I created a group for each set of keywords, and set the bids right back to the minimum. For the past couple of weeks, I've been making judgment calls when an ad stops showing, or when the position drops too low.
So far I seem to be getting more clicks for less money, and I'm able to keep an eye on the more expensive keywords. Also, the content network spending is much easier to track. I feel like I'm in control again. Yahoo! Sponsored Search I've added a tracking parameter to these ads to make sure I'm not missing any traffic, and I've trimmed my bids on some of the more expensive keywords. The fact that Yahoo! UK has a GBP20 per month minimum spend means I'll probably have to drop that soon. They can't give me enough traffic on affordable keywords to cover that, and the more expensive clicks don't seem to be worth the money. Conclusion I should have done all this months ago... Tags: eswc06 micro isv adwords
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Wednesday, November 29, 2006 at 7:56 AM
If you're in or around London, you should head down to Hyde Park on Friday afternoon to join the Robert Scoble and Hugh MacLeod party. There's even a couple of parties afterwards... it's as if Robert brought silicon valley here with him. If you're anywhere near New York, don't forget to go to Andrey and Jon's Micro ISV gathering next week (email them for details). Both of these events are sure to be a blast, I wish I was able to go to either or both. A consolation offering for US residents comes from Adam Caudill's blog, a free Vista and Office 2007 license, as long as you aren't in the Partner program or MSDN.
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Tuesday, November 28, 2006 at 10:50 PM
I can't be the only one here who's spent a few hours with Street Fighter 2, so I feel a duty to post a link to these videos (parody, catching up with the characters in their normal, post SF lives):- Street Fighter: the later yearsvia Kotaku.
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Monday, November 27, 2006 at 8:00 AM
A weekly roundup of Micro ISV news, announcements and relevant blog posts. News and AnnouncementsRelevant Blog Posts and Articles- Why Micro ISVs should exercise, from Bob Walsh. Also, Widgets mean money for Micro ISVs.
- So you want to be an Indie Developer, from Lemmy and Binky.
- So you want to be an Indie Developer, from GameProducer.
- The Phenomenal Force of Focus, from Dharmesh.
- Choices = Headaches, from Joel Spolsky.
- Localization doesn't matter, from Eric Sink.
- The Zone of Expendability, from Creating Passionate Users. Also, a great post on Adding Graphics.
- Pinprick, from Daring Fireball.
- How important is your installer, from FollowSteph.
Further (mostly relevant) ReadingTags: microisv digest entrepreneurship startups shareware
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Monday, November 20, 2006 at 8:30 AM
A weekly roundup of Micro ISV news, announcements and relevant blog posts. News and AnnouncementsRelevant Blog Posts and ArticlesFurther (mostly relevant) ReadingTags: microisv digest entrepreneurship startups shareware
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Friday, November 17, 2006 at 3:59 PM
Day 1 round up.The sessions in order for the second day of the conference are as follows:- Additional Notes:- That's all folks. We skipped the 2nd day evening event because so many people seemed to have left already. If anyone has pictures or feedback from the Sunday evening, including the awards ceremony, feel free to email me or add a link in the comments. Tags: micro isv eswc06 shareware
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 3:23 PM
Bob stepped in as a last minute replacement for Sharon Housley for this Website Critique session. Dave Collins asked for volunteers for a scathing website review. I did make a note of most of the websites, but I think the most appropriate way to write this up might be to anonymize it! - The page title of every page should be unique.
- Use keywords at the start of the title rather than the company name.
- Always show your pricing. [USD was recommended, and mostly supported. Some audience suggested it was easy enough to use Geo-coding to display appropriate currencies. Others felt that this was unreliable, and that having pricing in USD wasn't really a big problem to anyone.]
- Problems with big logos, or irrelevant photos. Wasting space, and not explaining the product clearly enough.
- Don't show the logo of your payment processor. Your user probably doesn't know who they are, it's just confusing.
- Some pages looked a bit homegrown, not exactly ugly, but they could be transformed very easily, either for ~$30 at pixelmill, or for free at oswd.
- Nice sites which suffered from bad color choices, like florescent green Download and Buy buttons.
- Don't use ampersands in your page title, write out the word "and".
- Avoid confusing or meaningless titles, don't use "Welcome" on your page.
- Don't post shareware awards on your front page, replace them with testimonials, or magazine review scores. Customers won't know who most of the sites are.
- Don't use blinking buttons, they are distracting.
- Dates have to be recent, and don't fill your product page with your release history.
- Watch what you choose for images, if the picture is the first thing you look at it's probably taking too much attention (unless it's somehow explaining your product).
- Don't have too many buttons and links on the main page.
- Don't overwhelm with information and text, there were a couple of sites which must have been 15 screens long. Way too much, impossible to tell what the product does. Just get to the point and give the details elsewhere.
Tags: eswc06 micro isv shareware web design
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 11:10 AM
Remembering that some BoS posters had asked what happened to the Channel 9 Micro ISV Show, and knowing that no new interviews have been posted for quite some time, I was surprised when Michael Lehman mentioned it on one of the slides in the Glidepath presentation. After the presentation, I asked Michael what happened to the show and whether it was going to continue. He said Vista & Glidepath have been taking up most of his time, but that the show would definitely be part of the whole Micro ISV evangelism and the new Glidepath spotlight programs. So, there you have it. Tags: eswc06 micro isv glidepath vista
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 8:45 AM
 Michael Lehman's (Microsoft) presentation was all about Project Glidepath, Micro ISV evangelism from Microsoft, and preparing for Windows Vista. - Vista is coming, new PCs next year will run Vista. Some software will not run. This is an opportunity to sell more software, as customers will be looking for software with more compelling user experiences (and 256x256 icons).
- Creating software for Vista requires a mastery of many new skills. UI Design and security are different in Vista, along with the 8000 new API calls, and the standard support of .NET 3.0. .NET 3.0 is marketing speak for .NET 2.0 plus WPF, WCF, WF, and Cardspace.
- It's no longer possible to know everything, you can't remember entire APIs anymore. Although developer documentation from Microsoft has become more expansive by being tied to the code, it now has less context.
- Glidepath is an attempt to add guidance and context back into the development process. The Glidepath content is made up of workflow guidance, templates, custom tools, and new wizards. It includes both technical and non-technical view-points. This includes advice on Vista and .NET 3.0 compatibility, code librarys and objects to take advantage of new Vista dialogs, and it can all be used with new or existing applications.
- Tools and information for VB6 and Delphi developers will also be delivered through Glidepath, and on the website.
- The delivery of the Glidepath content is via RSS enclosures, as used for podcasting, so it is possible for third parties to product Glidepath modules for the community. Bob Walsh has produced a Micro ISV module, Robert Scoble produced one on Blogging, etc.
Micro ISV Evangelism - Windows MarketPlace will feature a Micro ISV spotlight slot. You have to have a free version, and you can set a limit on how many copies you are prepared to give away, but you will be featured on the MarketPlace site and be promoted. You will need to be using Vista in some way to participate, but using one of the new task dialogs in place of the existing windows dialogs would probably qualify your product.
- The Glidepath community and spotlight. Michael plans to blog and podcast on the Vista Micro ISV community, and to showcase products. Contact him if you want to participate in this program. The community forums will provide a means for sharing information and Glidepath packages.
- There could be some kind of directory of Micro ISV software that runs on Vista. Get involved now, download Glidepath, submit feedback, see your software on the Microsoft sites.
- This will all start in January 2007, when Vista launches, but Michael is already accepting applications/nominations. Preference will be given to Glidepath users.
- There's also the Vista Logo programs. "Works with Vista" is free and self-assessed using a tool. You just have to register and run the tests to get listed in the directory. "Certified for Vista" is a paid program, in which your product is verified by a third part. Here you can qualify for additional co-marketing options.
Other Points/Responses to Questions - Although the Glidepath content is delivered via RSS directly into Visual Studio 2005 (Standard or higher, not Express), the content is also available for viewing directly on the website.
- Yes, downloading these Glidepath add-ins to Visual Studio can be a security risk, so we test all the ones we make available directly from the site. No easy answer for those coming from other sites, are looking into a new security model for this.
- Using some Vista UI elements is easier in C++ (although it's still not trivial), and is harder from .NET. Glidepath components are available to make this easier to do from .NET. [In other words, even though Vista has some nice new common controls, if you want to use them in your software you'll still have to look at third party libraries]
- Visual Studio isn't fully Vista compatible yet, but the Service Packs are coming.
- .NET 3.0 will not be forced onto Windows XP, but it will be encouraged, and the new Vista software which uses .NET 3.0 will encourage uptake.
- Java on Vista? Ask Sun.
The slides for the presentation will be made available via the Glidepath site. Tags: micro isv eswc06 shareware vista glidepath
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Thursday, November 16, 2006 at 2:28 PM
I just saw over on Escape from Cubicle Nation that Pam is appealing for holiday gift suggestions that would help support small companies. Do you have a Micro ISV product or game that you think would make a good gift for someone? Head over and nominate yourself. Off the top of my head, I could imagine Patrick's Bingo Card Creator might be a good gift for certain people, and that Andy's Perfect Table Plan would be a great gift for anyone planning a wedding or event. Tag: micro isv
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 2:24 PM
 I hardly have any notes from the second panel of Day two, which was about supporting users. Either there wasn't a lot of action, or I was getting sleepy... I'm betting on a combination of the two. Thomas Wetzel of WiscoMarcel Hartgerink of Wibu SystemsGary Elfring of Elfring FontsBob Walsh of My Micro-ISVTony Edgecombe of FrogmoreMarck Pearlstone of BrainStorm Software (Moderator) Q: Telephone support?Those who took calls liked the fact that you can address all the beginner issues at once, rather than having to go back and forth with emails for a few days. Whether telephone support is offered varied, usually depending on the market, the number of users, and the price of the product. Q: Where do you draw the line?You have to be patient with support. It's easier in forums and email, and if you have too many calls it can be difficult. It's great if you have an active forum because other users will help out with beginner issues. Q: Does it take a lot of time to control forum content?Not really, no. Q: Any more phone issues?It's not as time consuming as you might think, the people who call are generally very interested, and therefore tend to be worth speaking to. Bob [I think] mentioned that it's very frustrating as a user when you can't find a number or even an email address. A bit of a discussion and a few audience polls about Contact forms vs published email addresses. Most prefered to be able to find an email address rather than fill in a form. Q: Issues keeping up with email support?Some recommended using the Bat email client, for it's templating facitilites. Andrea Nagar's Direct Access was also mentioned as a useful email support tool because of it's text substitution features. [I've noted a discussion of license key issues, but haven't made any notes... I think it was about what to do when users lose their license keys, and everyone seemed to agree that it should be easy enough in most systems to find the original key and email it to the user.]Q: What if you have localized versions, what do you do about support?It's usually acceptable to have a policy about what language support is provided in, most people understand and this isn't too much of an issue. Q: Anyone outsourcing support?No. The session broke early for coffee. Tags: eswc06 shareware micro isv
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 10:22 AM
My WiFi router popped, filling the room with that nice dead hardware smell we all know and love. I guess that'll hit the Wii fund... Any brand or model suggestions for a replacement?
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 8:20 AM
Dave Collins ( Shareware Promotions) on how to get your Adwords account under control. I took a lot of notes, and I really enjoyed this presentation, but I'm not sure how to summarize it in the best way. It's probably worth also checking out Dave Talks for Dave's own version. - Google Adwords is configured to help Google. As a certified Adwords professional, Dave has a love-hate relationship with the system.
- Most people don't know how to use it, and they are throwing money away. They have poor campaigns, inaccurate keywords, they are mixing content and search in the same campaign, and they are trusting Google to select the best options for them.
- The goal of this presentation is to help you get control, write good ads, beat Google, and spend less.
The Golden Rules - Never forget how the system works.
- One size doesn't fit all.
- Control is Vital.
- Don't overcomplicate.
- Balance is Vital.
- Google likes it when you do things right, you get rewarded with lower bid thresholds.
- Quantity is good.
- Experiment and Purge.
- The defaults are for Google.
Basic Principles - Remember it's not for everyone.
- Know the Google 80:20 rule. 20% of your ad spend will be generating 100% of your revenue, the other 80% will be easy money for Google.
- Dave's conspiracy theories: Broadmatching is enabled by default, Campaign negative keywords are hidden, you can't see when or where your ads are displayed, it's complex by design, there's no what's new list, the info from the content network is useless. Basically, the system keeps getting harder and harder to keep on top of.
Understanding the System - Look at campaign settings. Take control over the different networks by using Campaigns to split your keywords instead of AdGroups. Don't use your search bids on the content network. Bid different amounts for different countries. Understand the difference between Google Search and the Search Network. Look at your budget, you need to get a balance between playing it safe and limiting your ads. Know that the keyword traffic prediction tools are practically useless.
- Quality Score. It's an abstract concept, no-one knows everything that's involved. Think of it as the Adwords equivalent of PageRank. Why should you care? Because it's Google's opinion of you. Your Quality Score can have a massive impact on the performance of your account.
Improving Quality Score - Having Keywords with no impressions might be bad.
- Having a high Click Through Rate (CTR), is good.
- High Impressions and low CTR is definitely bad.
- High Clicks with a low Bounce Rate is a good thing. The Bounce Rate is the number of visitors who spend very little time on your page, before returning to Google.
- Too many Keywords can be a bad thing, but make the most of the good ones. Use all three matching options (add phrase and exact matching versions), as you might get lower bids or better performance for exact/phrase matching compared to broad matching. Use single and plural versions of your keywords, vary verb forms.
- Having only one Ad is a mistake. You need variety to learn what works. Include your keywords, look at competing ads, appeal directly to your customers interests. Try using rhythm or alliteration, try something short and snappy. Speak their language. Give new ads at least a week, use url parameters to track ads yourself, and don't reuse tracking when you change ads. Filter out invalid customers with your ad. Eg, specify Windows only. Always have at least two ads, and change the worst performing ad regularly.
- Your Landing Page should be a extension of your Ad. The relevance of these is becoming increasingly important to the Quality Score.
- Reports. There are useful reports in the system, but it's slow and inflexible. You can set it up so that Google will email you a report on a regular basis, this is very good. It reminds you to check your account and keep it under control. Dave recommended Thomas Wetzel's Adwords Reporter.
Getting down to business - ROI. Perry Marshall says that P1 is for losers, because you're paying too much for the click, and can get similar results at P2-4. Dave has an example: You're 1st for $1, and you get $1000 clicks. You have a 5% conversion rate on a $30 service. You will get $1500 back from your $1000 investment, a $500 profit. At 4th for 40c, you get 300 clicks. Assuming the same conversion rate, you will get back $510 profit on $120 spent. This is a profit of $390. Which do you choose?
Dave suggests you chose 1st place, despite the better ROI on 4th, because ROI isn't your primary goal, you are using adwords to make sales. Adwords isn't just an investment, it's about getting more customers.
Another example, you have a $500 service. Would you buy 1 guaranteed customer per month for $10, 2 for $100, or 3 for $500? The fall in the ROI doesn't matter as much as the overall increase in sales. - Peel+Stick. When you have good keywords, take them and create a new group. Tailor the ads and the landing page. Build on your strengths.
- Give new groups or Ads time.
- What to do about inactive keywords? Keeping them in your account will affect your Quality Score. You don't have to raise the bid. Improve the relevance on the landing page, or create a new ad which includes the keyword.
- Monitor. Don't ever leave your account unattended, you will definitely be throwing money away.
Q: Any advice for choosing keywords? Wordtracker.com and Keyword Discovery.
Q: How to prioritize all this work on Adwords, is there anything we should spend the most time on? It should be rough equal between writing ads, honing keywords, and tracking logs. Tags: micro isv shareware eswc06 adwords
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Wednesday, November 15, 2006 at 3:22 PM
If you're a Share-it, RegNow, or SWReg user, it's worth noting the price plan quoted in the eCommerce panel from Jessy at SWReg. There were flyers at the conference about their new pricing models, which looked like a move towards a tiered offering from Digital River. The basic info on the flyer puts SWReg at $1 + 2.9%, Share-it at $1 + 4.9%, and RegNow at $1 + 6.9%. It seems that Share-it will just have a single pricing model, rather than the two it currently offers. It's also worth noting that the percentage varies depending on options. For example, with Share-it, you can only qualify for the 4.9% rate if they distribute your download as part of the payment process, otherwise it's 6.9%. I'm not sure whether you can just make your trial executable available for download, I guess that will depend on the wording used on the download page, and how that will affect the customer experience. I'm sure the full details of all these plans will become clearer over the next month or two, but regardless, it's probably going to be a good time to have another look at your payment processing options. Tags: eswc06 shareware ecommerce micro isv
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 8:00 AM
 The first panel of the second day was about eCommerce issues. Dave Collins of Shareware PromotionsSharon Housley of NotepagePhil Schnyder of Avanquest USA (not pictured) Guy Wilnai of PlimusDaniel Kleinberg of PlimusEdward Leigh of OSoLiSJessy Jex of SWREG (not pictured) David Boventer of ESWC eV (Moderator) Q: Are the payment processors on the panel afraid of Google Checkout?Not really, software registration is a lot more than just taking payments. Google Checkout isn't targetting this market. One of the Plimus guys suggested that maybe PayPal should be worried, because Google Checkout is really going after that mass-market payment processing. All the extra services on the software distribution providers such as upselling and branded order pages gave them an edge for now. Dave Collins: Worried about how much Google knows about our businesses. They already have mail, ads, searches, analytics. With Checkout they will know how much money we make too. Q: What about a single ID, why hasn't this been acheived yet?There are too many factors and too many parties, and most of them just aren't interested in making this happen. Microsoft tried it, and if they couldn't make it work, who could? It would require a lot of trust and confidence from consumers, and everyone is paranoid. It used to be possible for anyone slightly technical to be 100% sure that their PC was safe & clean, these days most people aren't so sure. PayPal fraud is increasing because it's only secured by a password, so any single ID system would probably need more security. Most sites now offer not to save your card details, it's almost like we're moving in the opposite direction. An anecdote about a greetings card sent to the home addresses of customers highlighted the care needed when dealing with personal information. Although the customers in this case didn't really mind receiving the card, it did make them uneasy as they weren't aware that their home address was passed on by the payment processor. Q: Do digital IDs have less customer comeback than credit cards? That's true, credit cards offer so much protection, and the banks have major ad campaigns to drum in that feeling of protection. If you start to make people more accountable online with digital IDs, who knows what will happen. Q: What about Verified by Visa?They don't seem to have followed through, it's problematic, the protection policies have loopholes, and the process takes users away from the site they are on, when we're trying to puch integration and a seamless process. [I've lost the context, but Avanquest noted that only 10% of their software sales were online.] To move forward with something like this, it needs to be verified by more than just a password, and it's hard to do that online, but we'll see what happens in future. For example, in Germany you have to prove your age at the post office before you can sign up to use 18+ services online. Q: Do you payment processors differentiate in any way other than price? Basically, will you help me sell more?They try, the software distribution service has to include some form of sales and marketing too, but there's no easy answer. OSoLiS offers a free frugal feed, Plimus tries to innovate with pricing schemes and upselling/cross selling, SWReg try to offer different services for different business types. Q: But you all sound the same. Do I just go with whoever seems nicer? Is there anyway to find out which will be best for me?We do sound the same, but you need to spend a bit of time with us, invest the effort and you will be able to see who is the most suitable for your business. Some solutions are better for some customers than others. There used to be more difference, but it's becoming a commodity business, we have to keep checking to see who has the best services for our unique needs. We sometimes expect too much for these guys, they need to be reliable, available and affordable, but do we really expect them to sell our software for us? Q: What about Credit Card Fraud?Fraud isn't going away, and credit card companies don't really mind that much. They make money either way, and although fraud is inconvenient, it usually doesn't end up costing the consumer. The algorithms for detecting the fraud can be good, but still maybe 1% of fraudulent transactions go through. Most of the time, fraud doesn't originate with these payment processors, it comes from banks not disposing of things correctly, phishing, or some kind of physical theft or scam. Plimus don't have any outside call centers, no paper records, and everything is audited and encrypted. The payment processors are usually taking this stuff much more seriously, and are secure. Some of the techniques they use are excluding or deferring orders from "hot" countries, based on time of day, proxies, etc. Profiling fraudulent transactions does work pretty well, it needs to get better still, but it is working. Also, authors aren't usually penalized for fraud by software registration services. Q: How many valid transactions fail because of false positives?No exact numbers, there's always a grey area, similar to with spam filtering. They have manual procedures in place to deal with boundary cases. Q: Do you support pay-per-use, and Micro Transactions? Do you see a future there?Plimus support them, and they are an incredibly powerful concept. It's not been popular in shareware so far. Another perspective was that Dynamic Pricing was better, let the software figure how much it should cost based on the usage & features required. Q: Affiliate Screening?It's best to monitor the initial transactions and build a profile, we try. Affiliates often sign up for a discount, or run fraudulent cards to get their commission. Q: What's your commission on a $99 product?Plimus: 7%, OSoLiS: 10% + 75c, SWReg: between 2.9 and 6.9 + $1, depending on options. It's important to look into different pricing systems, they can work for you. Consider financing and taking payments in installments. For UK readers, a new service from HSBC was mentioned, which allows you to open a US dollar account with a US bank, free of charge. I'm sure that's well worth looking into. Gary Elfring mentioned a possible test scenario for multiple processors. By adding an image map to your Buy Now button and sending clicks to one of two processors, you would be able to monitor the number of transactions from each and get a better idea of which has the best experience for your customers. Tags: micro isv shareware eswc06 ecommerce
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Tuesday, November 14, 2006 at 1:17 PM
 Thomas Wetzel's ( Wisco) second presentation of the conference was about application protection. Options for us, as software developers, to make sure users of our software pay appropriate license fees. - You need protection to generate money.
- If you provide the full download after purchase, the full version could be posted online.
- If you provide a license key to unlock the trial version, the license key can be spread online.
- If you build your own security, use partial key security. Only analyze small parts of the key so that it's never completely decoded, and vary the check points in your code so that it's not too trivial to break. Obviously you need good code obfuscation for this to work.
- You might have a problem with customers buying and then asking for refunds. To work around this, you could use a time limited key during the refund period, then send the lifetime key once the refund period is over.
- Binding to hardware can prevent against one customer installing the software on multiple PCs, but it's much harder to support, and often customers will buy from a different PC than they intend to use.
- Activation is common with big companies, but you probably don't have the same level of trust as big companies, you will need good servers and reliability to pull this off.
[just to make sure it's clear, I think the advice started to go off the rails around here. This is just my summary of Thomas's presentation, I wouldn't personally support or recommend the following methods.] - Controlling multiple installations? It is possible to use broadcast packets to detect other instances of the software on the local network, but this will be caught by most firewalls. Also, you can call home, and send some information to the web server during the "Check for updates" process. It's not exactly software activation, but it provides most of the same benefits. You can keep track of version usage and monitor for mass key overuse.
- What about keys spread online? What can you do? Get in touch with the unofficial user and offer a discount.
[Thomas said his conversion rates here were pretty good, although some of his methods were questionable. For example, to get an email address, his Outlook add-in needs to identify the real email address of the user and post it to the server as part of the "check for updates" process.]
This was an interesting session, with plenty of debate on the more controversial suggestions. The general consensus I picked up from the audience and from the people I spoke to afterwards was that software protection is important, but that it shouldn't make life more difficult for your users, or violate their privacy, and that you shouldn't let it become an all-consuming obsession. Tags: eswc06 shareware micro isv software protection
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 7:35 AM
These are the first of my notes for the presentations on Day 2 (Nov 5th) of the European Shareware Conference 2006 in Cambridge. All of my Day 1 notes were posted last week.
I had to duck out halfway through this presentation (sorry Dave, I was enjoying it), but I thought the notes I did take might still be useful. Here are some of Dave Collin's (Shareware Promotions) tips for creating a website that will sell your product:- Initial Impressions - Don't have too many links.
- Don't forget to focus on the purpose of the page.
- If you have any dates on there, make sure they are recent.
- Have clear navigation. Make sure there's a clearly marked path or process for the visitor.
- Never be more than one click away from Home, Download & Buy pages.
- Add links to the bottom of your page too, especially if the page is long.
- Make links obvious to the user, don't try to change default link behavior. If you do, make sure you test it in all current browsers.
- Make your buttons look like buttons. Use "Buy Now", not Order or Purchase.
Remember that people don't use your website the way you think they do. They don't read every word, they won't click on what you think are the most obvious links. Make sure you don't overwhelm or distract them, and try to put things where they expect them. Clear Communication - Your website is not a book, visitors will scan it quickly, so get to the point.
- Think about what you are selling, and emphasize the benefits. People aren't shopping for features.
- What you are saying is never as obvious as you think.
- Don't focus on your mission statement, history, or latest releases.
- Don't scare people away with tech talk.
- Reassure visitors about security during download and buy. Convince them they are safe, you won't lose sales by over-reassuring. For example, how long have you been in business, where are you based, how many customers do you have. Can they find your personal information and photo on your site? Dave mentions getting good results from a big prominent photo of the team on their about page. You have to pick and choose which of these are appropriate for your customers.
Q: What about the long one page sites that read like a hard sell sales letter? Dave said although he doesn't like them himself, but they do seem to work. He has thought about testing the idea, but hasn't yet. It's like the web evolution of info-mercials and direct mail adverts. Not sure how Google will treat them, thinking of landing page quality etc. Once again, Dave spoke up against Google Analytics, he found it hard to use, and said that in their experiments it's been way off the figures from their log analyzers. Update: Adrian McEwan posted his notes for this session, and it looks like he stayed to the end, worth checking out for the Good, Bad & Ugly examples. He's also posting his notes from the rest of the sessions over on his blog, even including some colour coding and quote attribution for the panel discussions. Tags: micro isv eswc06 shareware dave collins
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Monday, November 13, 2006 at 8:00 AM
A weekly roundup of Micro ISV news, announcements and relevant blog posts. A slightly bloated links section this week, the hangover from last weekend's Shareware Conference. News and AnnouncementsRelevant Blog Posts and Articles- Startup Lessons, from Yaro Starak.
- Startups for the rest of us, from Mike Taber.
- 10 laws of success, from EntreprenerialMD.
- The fastest way to make more money is to raise the price, from Wil Schroter.
- Godin on Trademark, from Seth Godin. Also check out Why Bother? (short & sweet).
- Two simple words of passion, from Creating Passionate Users.
- Should we release now? from Follow Steph.
- An approximate guide to selling indie games, from Jake Birkett.
- When sh*t happens, from Slow Leadership.
- Connecting to your customers, from Mark Cuban.
- Why you should never keep your new product a secret, from Ian Landsman.
Further (mostly relevant) ReadingUnless I have an off-by-1 bug, this is something of a milestone, digest #52. I know for sure that next Monday it'll be exactly a year since I posted #1. Many thanks for reading, thanks to everyone who has linked here over the course of the year, and thanks to all the Micro ISVer's and bloggers out there who've made it all possible. Tags: microisv digest entrepreneurship startups shareware
Posted by Gavin Bowman on Friday, November 10, 2006 at 3:22 PM
Here are the ordered links to all my posts about the presentations on the first day (Nov 4th) of the European Shareware Conference, in Cambridge. Overall, a great day. I've got another book of notes for the day 2 presentations, I'll either post them next week or over the weekend. Feel free to post any links to additional photos or presentation notes in the comments. More info:- Notes from Bill Rayer
Photos from Dave Collins Tags: eswc06 shareware micro isv
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 3:00 PM
 That's all my notes from the first day posted. For the evening event we watched the Cambridge fireworks display (see Guy Fawkes/Bonfire night), and then went on to a restaurant for a meal and drinks. This evening I spoke a lot to Andrea Nagar, about his Direct Access software, which everyone tells me is fantastic. I also spent a lot of time talking to Georges Garcia, about Outsite-in. I hadn't heard of it, but it's a tool for taking a dynamic PHP & MySQL website and putting it on a CD. The CD can then be used for demos etc. Tags: micro isv shareware eswc06
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 2:55 PM
 Thomas Wetzel of Wisco gave his first presentation of the weekend on growing your Adwords account successfully. - Thomas explained that his goal is to make more money while sleeping, which he hopes to do with his software products. The first product he made was SyncPST for Outlook.
- It's much harder to get visitors now than it used to be, because SEO is a more intelligent and competitive sector. Adwords is the easiest way to get instant traffic, the downside is that it's highly geared in Google's favor. You're working for Google [Thomas showed an amusing pyramid illustrating the Adwords system, which basically showed everything leading back to money for Google, but I can't remember the details].
- Some of the things you will need to swing the balance back in your favor: A log file Analyser (Absolute LogAnalyser Pro was recommended), conversion tracking, an analysis tool for Adwords (Wisco sell one of these), and your brain, time and ideas.
- On a basic level in Adwords, don't mix products in the same campaign, and divide your campaigns between Adsense (the content network) and Google Search. Bid lower on Adsense.
- Choosing Keywords. Use a keywords tool to get site related keywords, but don't just use your site, analyze your competition. Use broad match on obvious keywords. Two word phrases are better than one, and make sure you use negative keywords to exclude irrelevant searchers.
- Creating Ads. Take your time and choose your words carefully. Try to describe the benefits in just a few words, and look at your competitions ads for pointers. Always include a Call to Action. Use a good landing page. Always have more than one ad in rotation, keep changing the least successful ad.
- Budgeting. Bid as low as you can, don't try to be #1 all the time, aim for positions 2-4. These usually generate roughly the same amount of clicks for much less money. Position 8 is also good, because it's the last one, and this can draw the eye. Don't limit your budget in the system, but do monitor the results so you don't end up paying too much.
- Tracking. Use Google's tracking mechanism to track the results of your campaign. It's possible, for example, to pass the value of an order back to the system for analysis. Use your weblogs to determine adword visitors. Thomas said he didn't like Google Analytics.
- Monitor and Improve. Check your CTR and conversion, identify your best keywords. See what phrases are actually used, and add those to your campaign. Add exact and phrase match on common terms as this might give you lower bids than broad match. Delete words with low CTRs [there was some discussion here on whether having poorly performing words in your campaign is a bad thing, but it may affect your overall quality score]. Keep changing your ads and expermenting.
- Adsense issues. Try skipping Adsense completely, but results vary. Many people don't get any useful traffic from the content network. Spikes in impressions can hurt your overall CTR, and can also be expensive.
- Click Fraud. Should you worry about Click Fraud? Not really, Google is onto it, and will refund your money when it's detected. Thomas suggests that something he calls View Fraud is a problem, noting odd spikes in views of his ads on particular days. This was on Google search only, and wasn't related to current news. This is believed to be competition switching off their ad campaigns, followed by a coordinated attack on a particular keyword. This would then reduce the CTR of any competitors (resulting in a need for higher and higher bids to be listed), and when they switch their own campaigns back on, they get a higher position for a lower bid.
- Adwords Reporter. Wisco sell a product called Adwords Reporter, which can be used to analyse the performance of your Adwords account.
In the Q&A, someone recommended Froogle listings for your product, and this seemed to be a generally accepted view. You have to manually do it every 30 days or so, but the results can be worth the effort. Tags: eswc06 shareware micro isv adwords
Posted by Gavin Bowman at 2:10 PM
 Sinan's presentation was about InstallAware, and using it to build MSI installers for Windows software. - InstallAware uses the MSI installer, which was developed at Microsoft in 99 as part of Microsoft Office. Rather than specify a series of steps, with MSI you describe the installed state of the application using a series of database tables. This allows MSI to provide automatic repair functionality.
- Founded by some disgruntled InstallShield employees in 2003, InstallAware's prime function was in making MSI based installs easier, cheaper, and adding functionality that wasn't available elsewhere. The current version generates installers that are Windows logo and Vista compatible.
- Developers using MSI no longer need to learn the standards and the database layout [if you haven't seen an MSI database, we had a little look as part of the presentation... nasty stuff]. This also makes it much easier to do unnattended deployment enterprise software. It's all controlled by a single, human readable, scripting language, which can be edited by hand or using the visual tools.
- Advanced compression reduces the size of your installer, for example, compressing the .NET 1.1 runtime executable to half it's normal size. Also reduce the size by making some components optional.
- Common runtimes such as .NET, SQLServer etc, can be added to your installer with one click in the InstallAware IDE, and nested dependencies are automatically detected.
- Feedback in the installer. If you want to, you can add registration dialogs to the installer, or include survey questions in the uninstaller. Similarly, add authentication for download of updates, or customize installations at runtime.
- Web Update engine. The installer includes the full source code for a working web updates system in the style of Windows Update.
- There's a very neat Dialog Designer, and a bunch of standard customizable themes, you can mimic any of the recent Office, Visual Studio, or Windows installer Styles.
[There were more features demonstrated that I could roll off, but I sound like a press release already. Basically, I liked this a lot, I even bought a copy, I'll let you know at a later date whether it lives up to expectations.] Tags: micro isv shareware eswc06< |
