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I built a desktop app (Poker Copilot) in 2008. I figured if I did it well, I'd have my own one-person software company supplying a steady stream of income with

I built a desktop app (Poker Copilot) in 2008. I figured if I did it well, I'd have my own one-person software company supplying a steady stream of income with little ongoing effort. My product would be so intuitive that it wouldn't need a user guide. It certainly wouldn't need marketing because everyone in my target audience would spread the word that my product was what they needed! Ha, what a fool 2008 me was. What I didn't realise was that my two main tasks for years would be marketing and customer support. Coding new features (of which many were requested) and fixing bugs (of which there were many) had to be scheduled around the twice-daily customer support windows and the marketing efforts. Nine years later, and still the stream of customer support requests has not relented! Nine years and still I'm focusing on marketing one day a week! And of course, there are still bugs.

SyneRyder 10y ago
"Nine years later, and still the stream of customer support requests has not relented!" I wish I could upvote this more than once. Customer support burden is always underestimated. It's time consuming, especially if you want to do it properly & not just outsource to someone overseas following a script. Even releasing something as freeware is likely to cause an unintended stream of support enquiries. I have no idea how the folks selling 99c apps manage it, even one short email enquiry would wipe out a dozen sales or more (if you put a monetary value your time). Kudos on charging a sensible price for your app & upgrades! I imagine at that price point it's okay if a sale incurs a support ticket or two.
- WA 10y ago
  I sell B2C software with a subscription of 1.99€ per month. I have 7,000 active users. I get 5-10 emails per day max. Before I charged money for my software, I was afraid of the overwhelming flood of customer support requests. Except they never came. > even one short email enquiry would wipe out a dozen sales or more (if you put a monetary value your time) Per email, yes, absolutely. Sometimes I take 20 minutes to answer a more complex email. But since I know that I don't receive more than 5-10 emails, I take the time and this person might recommend my software to other people, because of the great support. An easy way to mitigate customer support is to have FAQs and lots of written texts on the website. Most people prefer to help themselves I think, because its faster. Sometimes I wonder if this is a mentality thing. My customers are all Germans. Maybe US customers are faster to send a short email than browsing through FAQ.
  - cannam 10y ago
    Even with "only" 5-10 support emails a day, though, you have to be very organised. I'm guessing you probably just are, and that's why you think that's no big deal. If you're used to carving out a slice of your day to respond quickly to a batch of such emails, then it's fine. But if you're in a frame of mind where you're primarily worried about something else you really feel you need to get done, it can seem very hard to set that aside and reply to even a single email in any meaningful way. (But yes, I've also had the experience that charging money does not suddenly make your users any more demanding.)
  - SyneRyder 10y ago
    Your support metrics look similar to mine - it looks like about 20% of your customers send an email once a year? And up to 20 minutes per email sounds right to me as well. I guess that isn't a flood, but even half an hour of support per day adds up to a month of full-time work per year. > Maybe US customers are faster to send a short email than browsing through FAQ. I get some emails where the entirety of the support question is "The program doesn't work. Is it a bug? Please advise." Some customers don't mention which product they're using, or will even send me support enquiries for competitors products. Not meaning to be ungrateful (I'm lucky to do what I do!), just that I couldn't afford to do it on a $5 one-off app purchase.
    - WA 10y ago
      > but even half an hour of support per day adds up to a month of full-time work per year. 1. You could repurpose emails and turn them into FAQ content (= small SEO improvements). 2. If I take the time to answer an email for 20 minutes, I just find it intriguing and such an email almost always helps me to improve my expertise a bit. 3. Even if it's a whole month of support per year: So what? This is my job and I get paid good money for it ;) > "The program doesn't work. Is it a bug? Please advise." Some customers don't mention which product they're using, or will even send me support enquiries for competitors products. Get aText or TextExpander or something like that, make a predefined template that asks for more information. While I answer every single email, I try to spend the least amount of time on people who seem a bit...weird in their questions. If people don't take the time to write a good question, I don't take time to provide a good answer. Requesting more information is a good way to annoy them a bit back. Maybe they either clarify what they want or they'll try to help themselves. > just that I couldn't afford to do it on a $5 one-off app purchase. Have you thought about turning this into a subscription? If it provides value on a daily basis, people might pay more than you think, let's say $12 per year.
- hashmal 10y ago
  > I have no idea how the folks selling 99c apps manage it they don't. or they quit. or they raise their price...
lettersdigits 10y ago
>Nine years later, and still the stream of customer support requests has not relented! You gave me an idea for a business model - Let's say you offer a pingdom-like service (to monitor your site availability and reliablity) - You can just do the following: 1. Offer the service 100% Free, at your own risk 2. Offer a $x/month subscription . if you don't pay - you won't get any customer support. Or, you can will still offer free support for non-paying customers, but without any priority (their tickets will be handled only after the paying customer's tickets) Does anyone know of a company that is offering this type of model ? (edit: added missing words and spacing)
- sharemywin 10y ago
  pay cancel -> 1yr -> pay cancel. Also, you'd be incentivizing your company to make support more complex so users call, email etc.
  - lettersdigits 10y ago
    what ? please explain.. If you cancel the subscription, you won't get support. I don't understand your point :)
    - jclardy 10y ago
      I think they are saying someone will pay for support, use it, then cancel the subscription. The assumption there is that you offer a refund for the service, which I don't think is necessary (Especially once they have used a support inquiry.) Apple in-app subs let you "cancel" but only in the way of not paying for the next renewal, so it is a widely used model already.
      - lettersdigits 10y ago
        > The assumption there is that you offer a refund for the service, which I don't think is necessary exactly this. Just cancel his subscription the NEXT month, and you solved the problem, financially and technically :) And who would HATE this proposition ? the spammers :) now they won't be able to do what the OP has suggested they might do (pay -> get support -> cancel ):) (edit: spacing.
gnicholas 10y ago
I'm curious to know if you've tried cutting down the customer support questions by offering different availability to different tiers of customers? I spend a decent chunk of my time on support requests and have thought about this quite a bit. While the number of incoming support requests are evenly split across (1) people interested in purchasing, (2) people who have already purchased, and (3) people who are on our free tier, the latter group ends up having the longest support conversations. I've thought about setting up an autoresponse that asks people to add their subscription ID to the email for priority service. I don't know if this would work, backfire, or do nothing, and I'd be interested to know what others have experimented with.
- stevoski 10y ago
  We only have one tier of customer :) It's an old-school desktop app with a 30-day trial period, a single payment to unlock the app, and a major new version released every two years available for an upgrade fee to existing users.

SyneRyder 10y ago

"Nine years later, and still the stream of customer support requests has not relented!" I wish I could upvote this more than once. Customer support burden is always underestimated. It's time consuming, especially if you want to do it properly & not just outsource to someone overseas following a script. Even releasing something as freeware is likely to cause an unintended stream of support enquiries. I have no idea how the folks selling 99c apps manage it, even one short email enquiry would wipe out a dozen sales or more (if you put a monetary value your time). Kudos on charging a sensible price for your app & upgrades! I imagine at that price point it's okay if a sale incurs a support ticket or two.

WA 10y ago
I sell B2C software with a subscription of 1.99€ per month. I have 7,000 active users. I get 5-10 emails per day max. Before I charged money for my software, I was afraid of the overwhelming flood of customer support requests. Except they never came. > even one short email enquiry would wipe out a dozen sales or more (if you put a monetary value your time) Per email, yes, absolutely. Sometimes I take 20 minutes to answer a more complex email. But since I know that I don't receive more than 5-10 emails, I take the time and this person might recommend my software to other people, because of the great support. An easy way to mitigate customer support is to have FAQs and lots of written texts on the website. Most people prefer to help themselves I think, because its faster. Sometimes I wonder if this is a mentality thing. My customers are all Germans. Maybe US customers are faster to send a short email than browsing through FAQ.
- cannam 10y ago
  Even with "only" 5-10 support emails a day, though, you have to be very organised. I'm guessing you probably just are, and that's why you think that's no big deal. If you're used to carving out a slice of your day to respond quickly to a batch of such emails, then it's fine. But if you're in a frame of mind where you're primarily worried about something else you really feel you need to get done, it can seem very hard to set that aside and reply to even a single email in any meaningful way. (But yes, I've also had the experience that charging money does not suddenly make your users any more demanding.)
- SyneRyder 10y ago
  Your support metrics look similar to mine - it looks like about 20% of your customers send an email once a year? And up to 20 minutes per email sounds right to me as well. I guess that isn't a flood, but even half an hour of support per day adds up to a month of full-time work per year. > Maybe US customers are faster to send a short email than browsing through FAQ. I get some emails where the entirety of the support question is "The program doesn't work. Is it a bug? Please advise." Some customers don't mention which product they're using, or will even send me support enquiries for competitors products. Not meaning to be ungrateful (I'm lucky to do what I do!), just that I couldn't afford to do it on a $5 one-off app purchase.
  - WA 10y ago
    > but even half an hour of support per day adds up to a month of full-time work per year. 1. You could repurpose emails and turn them into FAQ content (= small SEO improvements). 2. If I take the time to answer an email for 20 minutes, I just find it intriguing and such an email almost always helps me to improve my expertise a bit. 3. Even if it's a whole month of support per year: So what? This is my job and I get paid good money for it ;) > "The program doesn't work. Is it a bug? Please advise." Some customers don't mention which product they're using, or will even send me support enquiries for competitors products. Get aText or TextExpander or something like that, make a predefined template that asks for more information. While I answer every single email, I try to spend the least amount of time on people who seem a bit...weird in their questions. If people don't take the time to write a good question, I don't take time to provide a good answer. Requesting more information is a good way to annoy them a bit back. Maybe they either clarify what they want or they'll try to help themselves. > just that I couldn't afford to do it on a $5 one-off app purchase. Have you thought about turning this into a subscription? If it provides value on a daily basis, people might pay more than you think, let's say $12 per year.
hashmal 10y ago
> I have no idea how the folks selling 99c apps manage it they don't. or they quit. or they raise their price...

lettersdigits 10y ago

>Nine years later, and still the stream of customer support requests has not relented! You gave me an idea for a business model - Let's say you offer a pingdom-like service (to monitor your site availability and reliablity) - You can just do the following: 1. Offer the service 100% Free, at your own risk 2. Offer a $x/month subscription . if you don't pay - you won't get any customer support. Or, you can will still offer free support for non-paying customers, but without any priority (their tickets will be handled only after the paying customer's tickets) Does anyone know of a company that is offering this type of model ? (edit: added missing words and spacing)

sharemywin 10y ago
pay cancel -> 1yr -> pay cancel. Also, you'd be incentivizing your company to make support more complex so users call, email etc.
- lettersdigits 10y ago
  what ? please explain.. If you cancel the subscription, you won't get support. I don't understand your point :)
  - jclardy 10y ago
    I think they are saying someone will pay for support, use it, then cancel the subscription. The assumption there is that you offer a refund for the service, which I don't think is necessary (Especially once they have used a support inquiry.) Apple in-app subs let you "cancel" but only in the way of not paying for the next renewal, so it is a widely used model already.
    - lettersdigits 10y ago
      > The assumption there is that you offer a refund for the service, which I don't think is necessary exactly this. Just cancel his subscription the NEXT month, and you solved the problem, financially and technically :) And who would HATE this proposition ? the spammers :) now they won't be able to do what the OP has suggested they might do (pay -> get support -> cancel ):) (edit: spacing.

gnicholas 10y ago

I'm curious to know if you've tried cutting down the customer support questions by offering different availability to different tiers of customers? I spend a decent chunk of my time on support requests and have thought about this quite a bit. While the number of incoming support requests are evenly split across (1) people interested in purchasing, (2) people who have already purchased, and (3) people who are on our free tier, the latter group ends up having the longest support conversations. I've thought about setting up an autoresponse that asks people to add their subscription ID to the email for priority service. I don't know if this would work, backfire, or do nothing, and I'd be interested to know what others have experimented with.

stevoski 10y ago
We only have one tier of customer :) It's an old-school desktop app with a 30-day trial period, a single payment to unlock the app, and a major new version released every two years available for an upgrade fee to existing users.