Thanks, for the other tips too. I will be updating my web site soon with new copy. I’m going to do this outside of the release schedule in the hope that I’ll be less tired and spend more time on these things.

I meant remove it from your tag-line on the product page. Guess the brain was faster than the fingers there

On the other hand Keep It Together immediately tells me this is an app that may help me organize stuff, that solves a problem I may or may not have.

Your tag-line also simply repeats the name. I’d try to think of ways to increase the information throughput in your copy. Say Keep It Together every time you mention KIT, so people who land on e.g. this page via Google by accident realize this may be something they have a use for. Remove the “keep things together” part and instead mention how your app’s workflow goes, something like “tag, group, label, organize and find across applications” or whatever. (You know your app better than I do from reading your product page once)

Clever names are nice to google for an app or to get trademarks, but if they don’t make it clear what they do from context every time they’re used, you’re missing a very cheap opportunity to get known.

Freeware/Shareware Developers: Advertise (almost) For Free on Hardmac.com

http://www.hardmac.com/news/2006-12-12/#6222

maybe the best way for the Mac community

I praise MacZOT for bringing KIT exposure and me some great feedback and users. It did, however, create a lot work that was beyond what I expected, that the exposure only goes so far and that, if you’re poor, you want to be careful because it could end up costing you more time and money than you can spare. I was there once, back in 2004 when I first launched KIT.

So that was at least part the point of this post - what it’s like for a developer, not what’s right and wrong about indie software pricing, MacZOT or related sites.

Again, I’m glad that I found out about your product. Keep up the good work.

My point? I would not have purchased KIT if it had not been for that macZOT. You see, while the price may have been bargain basement, the exposure is what made the sale. Until that point, I had been trying out Yojimbo and had just extended my trial of DevonTHINK Pro. I would have purchased one or the other had I not heard of KIT and tried it out.

I will be upgrading to all future versions of the application as long as you continue to develop it. In addition, I have not sent one support email to you since my purchase, so for all of the work that it caused you, consider those who did not contact you. I’m sure you have all the numbers and can speak better to the ratios, but I’m willing to bet that there are some others who didn’t need support for the application.

In any case, I like your application, but I’m a bit put off by the attitude. Gruber does not contribute by developing an application that I use. You, however, do. Gruber can shoot his mouth off about how offering a discounted price is a horrible way to attract people to your application and to build a user base, but then I would question why a prolific company like the OmniGroup would offer their OmniWeb browser at 50% off for the entire month of November? And you know what? At $9.95, I decided their browser was worth licensing. I’m glad I purchased it because I will continue to buy upgrades as long as they develop it.

So a high initial cost of entry is not always necessary. Mind you, I paid full-price for my copy of Final Cut Studio. But there’s a vast difference between the functionality it offers and the small indie applications out there, no?

http://reinventedsofwtare.com/kit/

is incorrect, it should be:

http://reinventedsoftware.com/kit/

feel free to delete my comment after your correction.

- James Head

Well, can’t say HoudahSpot took off after that. Sales are slow. The conversion rate is the expected 1%. So it is actually a lack of traffic I am suffering from. Still most of my traffic comes from macupdate.com and versiontracker.com.

I am still wondering if this BlogZOT thing hurt my sales. Maybe I gave free copies to just the people who would have bought HoudahSpot…

Yet I am tempted by http://www.mupromo.com. Maybe MacUpdate has less of a techie audience.

BTW, I believe very few of the BlogZOT people actually use the license they got for free. But I still get the occasional mail from people who got it for free, forgot about it and now want to retrieve their license key.

P.S: The link for KIT is broken: typo in the domain name.