Hello,

I have a question about software marketing. We're a tiny (2 ppl)
software company and 2 months ago we started selling an encryption
utility. Though we had several sales these months, they are only
enough to cover our hosting and other expenses (download.com presence
etc).

So there is the question:
What are the best ways to market software provided the software is a
little utility?
Supposing the advertising budget is $100? $500? $1000?

We tried google adwords - gives us only 1-2 clicks a day

Also I'm curious about press-releases distribution. Is press-release
distribution that usually costs $200-$400 is worthwhile in our
situation? (we've been using only free PR services for now)

How about those services that give your website high search engine
rankings?

--
Andrey Ptitsyn
Sauritus Computing
Personal encryption software for Windows XP
http://www.sauritus.com/

Sauritus Computing wrote:

>So there is the question:
>What are the best ways to market software provided the software is a
>little utility?
>
>
Who is the target market?

What is the main benefit they achieve by using it as compared to what is
available now?

These questions need to be answered first. Many times there is a way to
market the product that is real easy compared to traditional methods,
but you have to know the target and why they benefit from
purchasing/using the product.

--
_____cliff_rayman_________________________________ ____
Business Consulting and Turnaround Management
[web] http://www.rayman.com/
[web] http://all-clear-turnaround-management.com/
[eml] cliff _at_ rayman.com
[phn] 888-736-3802 x701
[fax] 818-743-7404
__________________________________________________ ____

"Sauritus Computing" <root@sauritus.com> wrote:
> I have a question about software marketing. We're a tiny (2 ppl)
> software company and 2 months ago we started selling an encryption
> utility. Though we had several sales these months, they are only
> enough to cover our hosting and other expenses (download.com presence
> etc).
>
> So there is the question:
> What are the best ways to market software provided the software is a
> little utility?
> Supposing the advertising budget is $100? $500? $1000?
>
> We tried google adwords - gives us only 1-2 clicks a day
>
> Also I'm curious about press-releases distribution. Is press-release
> distribution that usually costs $200-$400 is worthwhile in our
> situation? (we've been using only free PR services for now)
>
> How about those services that give your website high search engine
> rankings?

Before working on getting more traffic, I think it is very important you
work on your copy/content. The content you have really doesn't say anything
worth while to the visitor who visits your web site.

Your product seems like its something I'd need for my laptop, but you
provide no information educating me about the software. At first glance, I
would think you were some kinda security consultant talking to security
managers that run large IT departments.

The jargon is to intimidating and I would leave the site within the first 5
seconds of reading the headline and first 1-2 sentences...

I'd come up with a headline that talks directly to your customer so they'll
know you indeed offer a solution for their problem...

Here's an example:
How to Easily Protect Your Data From Unauthorized
Viewing Using Methods Used by Federal Agencies...

How You Can Legally Protect Your Data From
Unauthorized Viewing Using Encryption Methods
Using by Government Agencies...

Techno-Geeks Releases New Software That Allows
You to Easily Protect Your Data From Unauthorized
Viewing Using Methods Endorsed by Federal Agencies...

These are just a few examples off the top of my head, it really takes me
hours or days to come up with some good ones, but people need to know right
off what you're selling. If you modified your content, you probably can
double or triple your sales without doing anything else...

Once you get the headline right, the copy/content is equally important. You
must keep them reading. After reading your content, they have to say to
themselves "I'm a damn fool if I don't purchase this software right now" or
"I'm asking for trouble if I don't at least try this"....

1-2 clicks a day from google adwords??? what headlines are you using? what
does your description say? You can probably multiply the clicks 10-20 times
by simply modifying what you're ads say.

I have a client that sales night guards (for teeth grinding), his ads on
google were basic, heres an example:

Night Guards Online
-------------------------
Description:
We sell night guards. Visit our
site for more info.

We modified that headline to say:

Dentist Night Guard Scam
---------------------------
Description:
Stop paying upwards of $500 for a night guard.
Get custom fit for $99

Which one would you read? Of course, the latter...that ad generated 10 times
more clicks per day, on one term he was averaging about 5-10 clicks per day,
when the ad was modified, he was getting 50-80 clicks per day from that ad.

Try testing your google ads, if you're not running 2-3 ads simultaneously,
you're not going to increase your click-thru ratios. Simply by modifying and
testing, you can increase your click-thru rate significantly.

All in all, get the content right and test those ads....this alone will
increase your sales for the visitors who are already coming and by testing
your ads, you can increase traffic by merely changing a few words and
descriptions, which equals more sales in the end...

Cartess Ross

"Sauritus Computing" <root@sauritus.com> wrote:
> How about those services that give your website
> high search engine rankings?

Getting your website higher on search engine rankings is a good idea ... but
you need to also improve your website a bit. There are companies that can
do both. The company I've just be brought on board for (www.fariel.com) can
do such for you. In fact, we can also help you with your PR. Whichever
company you use, get them to bid what they can do for the money you can
spend. You have a limited budget so don't ask them to just submit a bid
since that can easily go into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Simply
send them an email and just say, "I have $***X for this website. I want to
improve my site a bit and get it higher rankings in search engine results.
What do you recommend I hire you to do for that money?" In your email,
indicate that as you get more money, you'll engage them more ... as you
should. They'll then tell you what they would do to improve your site and
raise it in the rankings. Go with one you think will do the best job.

Good luck!

Scott Jensen
--
58% of surfers never look beyond what they find from search engines.
Rank on search results heavily determines how much your site gets hit.
Hit decrease is exponential the further from the #1 spot you're ranked.
Hire Fariel Consulting (www.fariel.com) to cheaply raise yours higher.

Check out a book called 'The Big Red Fez'

Then start searching the newsgroups for messages relating to your topic.
Provide actually helpful answers and just include a link to your site in
your signature. But don't do like some folks and give useless answers to
any and every posting. People will see through you like glass.

"Sauritus Computing" <root@sauritus.com> wrote:
> I have a question about software marketing. We're a tiny (2 ppl)
> software company and 2 months ago we started selling an encryption
> utility. Though we had several sales these months, they are only
> enough to cover our hosting and other expenses (download.com presence
> etc).
>
> So there is the question:
> What are the best ways to market software provided the software is a
> little utility?
> Supposing the advertising budget is $100? $500? $1000?
>
> We tried google adwords - gives us only 1-2 clicks a day

People are bidding around $3 dollars for 'encryption', so you would want
your conversion ratios to be good. I think your website needs to be more
usable.Ask yourself what are the user goals and is the website catererd for
them. This will help with your conversions. Make your ads in adwords
relevent to the keywords as well as the landing page.

> Also I'm curious about press-releases distribution. Is press-release
> distribution that usually costs $200-$400 is worthwhile in our
> situation? (we've been using only free PR services for now)
>
> How about those services that give your website high search engine
> rankings?

I would not waste my money with these services, as google is always ranking
different things high at different times....updated, relevent content is
ranking well at the moment. You have a PR4 which is pretty good. Make sure
you have lots of relevent inbound links to your site. Outbound links are
good also.

Try Software Marketing Resource it has lots of software related
marketing information.
http://www.softwaremarketingresource.com

Hello,

Have you ever tried Pay Per Call advertising? If you are able to receive phone calls to sell your product/service, I think this may be something you should try. With Pay Per Call advertising, you can get top sponsored listing space on search and directory sites and you don't have to pay for any impressions or clicks. You only pay when new customers call you.

Check it out here: http://www.ppcall.bizhype.com

You can actually test out Pay per Call advertising for as little as $10.00. Ingenio is the top Pay PEr Call advertising company. You simply fill out your business description and put a deposit in your account ($10 minimum) AND Ingenio will distribute your business listing across their network that includes AOL.com, AOL Yellowpages, Yellowpages.com ,Infospace, Switchboard.com, Local.com and other search directory sites. There's no set up costs or monthly fees...and You only pay when you get a call from new customers. If you don't get any calls, you don't pay anything.

Check out Ingenio's trial offer: http://www.ppcall.bizhype.com

If you have any other questions about Pay per call advertising, let me know.

Thanks,
Derek@bizhype.com

There's definately a lot of ways to do it. The members above gave you some excellent insight on marketing tactics that will succesfully allow you to passively wait for inbound business. One of the things to note, however, is that there are a lot of outbound marketing and more active marketing tools that can be used.

Business to business telemarketing is still a very successful marketing tactic if you have the right leads and are persistent. Direct mail works, though this does become very expensive. Email spam has gone down hill significantly due to all of the filters, but with some of the databases out there, its possible to use the right mailing lists.

-- Philippe

__________________
--
Philippe Mesritz, President
Internet Services Unlimited, Inc
New Direction Marketing
Representing: TMS Marketing and Sales Software