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I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

udeployer.com

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Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#31

Post by csomar »

markessien wrote: post #15
patio11 wrote: post #5

1) You need to radically increase the professionalism of that website to support the $499 price point. That price point is not necessarily high for someone in an IT group at a large company, but he cannot pay it to you because everything about your site -- the design, the copy, the video, etc -- screams "risk." Look at other sites which successfully sell to large corporations with buckets of money and try to hit the…

Your first point is quite wrong. I've been selling $600 value software for years now, and design of the website has typically had no effect at all on sales. What people care about is "does it work" and "will it be supported"?

years ago from now, the OP website is considered quite good.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#32

Post by csomar »

I think you should move on from the website idea, especially if $500 equal to a monthly salary in your country.

My father has a software which sells for around $1,000, but doesn't have a website. He find clients (through his business network, word of mouth, a phone call...) and then install a trial version for them and guide them until they agree and purchase a license.

It's quite important to note that in my country $1K is equal to a professor salary; so that still a big deal for him.

You could do that with Skype, since (I assume) your audience is all over the world map. You may want to spend more time with your customers and to make the product works for them.

If you are selling many licenses, you may consider outsourcing someone to do that work for you. This strategy doesn't work for $0.9-$100 products, but works well for $500. Even if you are paid $100/hour, that still 5 complete hours.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#33

Post by arethuza »

sktrdie wrote: post #23
arethuza wrote: post #16

My immediate reaction on seeing that it is for deploying applications and Windows is mentioned was "Why not use Group Policies or System Center Configuration Manager"? Also the applications that you show being deployed aren't exactly the kinds of things that most enterprises would be bothered about pushing to desktops...

The company I worked for last year actually needed to deploy these 3rd party apps. Flash and other free software needs to be updated to the latest version to avoid security concerns... so the idea for uDeployer sparked.

OK - sounds plausible - but the website needs to tell that story!

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#34

Post by prodigal_erik »

sktrdie wrote: post #26
markessien wrote: post #18

It seems to me that when you ask for feedback here on this site, most answers are about website design and typography and length of text and other unnecessary but very visual stuff. This stuff is unimportant. If a person needs your software, all that stuff will not deter him from trying it. If I need some deployment software and your text is a bit gaudy, I'm not going to abort the download. I've been selling software…

The "human behind" was exactly my selling point. I wanted to show people that I have full interest in their success with my product, and that I'm passionate about my product and its future. And I totally agree that if I'm selling a desktop application I should probably concentrate in making its UI simpler instead of my Websites UI... it's not a web-app. These price-list requests are quite interesting, I would think p…

If I don't see a price, I assume I'll have to endure some pushy sales guy whose job is to pocket most of the consumer surplus by charging almost enough to make us walk, so I'm only going to call as a last resort if none of the competitors work out. I also expect to hear a price many times higher than $500, simply to cover his commission draw for however many hours it takes to land a sale.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#35

Post by regularfry »

sktrdie wrote: post #24
robryan wrote: post #19

What are your biggest competitors? I am assuming the big players would be at a higher price point? More the an GUI complaints people have pointed out the thing that initially gets my attention is that I can only see 6 programs, unless this was able to install just about everything someone needed when provisioning new machines the value proposition seems to be lacking. Something I think of when I think of a suite of a…

The funny part is that there's no competitors. So far nobody (that I've found) has chosen the path of creating a Windows repository of free software (Skype, Flash etc.). But you're right, I need to show and support more apps. After I finished development I just put all my efforts in marketing and now, after one year, I'm quite tired of just adding refinements to the program - I would love for someone to just buy it s…

There's http://windows-get.sourceforge.net/, but I don't see it pushing to multiple desktops.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#36

Post by peterhi »

When clicking on the free download button IT SHOULD NOT take you to a page that essentially says "Dumbass you should have registered first!"

If you need to register then make it part of the download page. Now lets be honest here, I am very reluctant to give my details for a free download which might turn out to be a POS (or worse a trojan) and give my details to someone who is going to spam me. Not to mention another login to maintain.

I'm not saying that your software is a POS or that you are going to spam me but I don't know that :)

I couldn't find the price (but then I didn't register). Being coy about the price makes me think that it is overpriced.

The front page is not really selling the product, it doesn't explain the problem it is trying to solve, it doesn't make clear who the target audience is (school/college/company IT departments).

Make the blog part of the site itself so the the branding and navigation does not change.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#37

Post by sktrdie »

regularfry wrote: post #35
sktrdie wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The funny part is that there's no competitors. So far nobody (that I've found) has chosen the path of creating a Windows repository of free software (Skype, Flash etc.). But you're right, I need to show and support more apps. After I finished development I just put all my efforts in marketing and now, after one year, I'm quite tired of just adding refinements to the program - I would love for someone to just buy it s…

There's http://windows-get.sourceforge.net/ , but I don't see it pushing to multiple desktops.

I've seen that, but like you said, it doesn't push to multiple computers.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#38

Post by markessien »

peterhi wrote: post #36

When clicking on the free download button IT SHOULD NOT take you to a page that essentially says "Dumbass you should have registered first!" If you need to register then make it part of the download page. Now lets be honest here, I am very reluctant to give my details for a free download which might turn out to be a POS (or worse a trojan) and give my details to someone who is going to spam me. Not to mention another…

Yes, that's really silly. The first step in the funnel should be easy - putting a roadblock right at the start is not very clever.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#39

Post by markessien »

sktrdie wrote: post #29
TheRealGL wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that someone who needs that software will not purchase simply because a font is not the right size, but how often do you get frustrated when wanting to buy a product when you don't know the price or can't find the checkout? I'm just saying that if you make it easier for people to buy, then they will. App stores (Apple et al.), music players (iTunes), games consoles (Xbox), independent software developer…

But if someone is buying a $500 product they will not be side-tracked by small annoyances (like not being able to find the Download button). If they're interested they will most likely send me an email - which I hope is clear enough.

Actually, they won't. Very few people take the initiative to send email. It's one of the highest friction things you can build in.

Re: I'm selling my software for too much money and nobody is buying. Any ideas?

#40

Post by Terretta »

Someone has to authorize the purchase. Spending $500 to download 7zip or a couple free utils sounds like a lot. Add software that Windows IT guys have all heard of, so your repository screenshot has a scroll bar.

Then try pricing it at $59 so the IT guy can put it on a corp card now and explain it later if someone asks.

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