6 ms·

Ask HN: Where am I lacking with my script sales?

I love writing beautiful code, kind of perfectionist. I have developed a PHP script few years ago and now the sales drop to 3 per month. Daily visitors are very low less than 20 per day, the bounce rate is high 65%. Had gone to all those common-sense SEO efforts like posting on tumblr, tweeting, facebook page update, PRs, free directory listing to established directories, YouTube intro, Social Bookmarkings etc. I personally feel that there are two major problems (a) The design might be not prettier (comparing established script in same niche) (b) My marketing skills suck and I dont know latest trends & techniques nor I've ever done paid marketing. Anything constructive/white-hat regarding how to spread the word regarding my script (or pointers) will be appreciated. Marketing Questions: Q#1 Do you think I suck at marketing because I am not willing to invest any penny for marketing? Q#1.a Do you think Paid Blog Reviews (from established & niche bloggers) will help? On average they charge 200$ to 500$ Q#1.b Will paid tweets (once a month) from established agencies would help? On average that cost $100 Q#1.c Will PPC Campaigns (AdWords) will bring any difference? Q#1.d Am I missing any wortful paid marketing technique here? Q#2 Do you think I am missing some important thing in my free marketing (off-site SEO) campaign? Demo/Design Questions Q#3 Design (Background or Forms themselves) is not appealing Q#4 Control Panel at far-left is very weird? Did you notice I am offering live chat sales/support Q#5 Missing some salient/value-feature? Q#6 Not having powered by link at the bottom with released code Marketplace Related Questions: Q#7 The script was never on the featured page or because it is not anywhere on top-selling scripts? Q#8 The lead page at marketplace is not catchy? Product: http://bit.ly/193DKqR Thanks a bunch in advance for reading & making difference.

maaarghk 13y ago
I have had a quick look and I would say where you are lacking is the product, sadly. I would say that it seems to me to be a child of it's time. Go onto any modern site and try to find me a form which looks like that. There are now also free alternatives such as jquery ui, bootstrap which are very popular; that isn't just because they have great features (which they do) - they are also pretty. Does this do ajax? Could it be any faster? Real time? Prettier? It's just... outdated, sorry. Sorry I don't have time to look at your questions really but I hope this helps.
- florettewaldor 13y ago
  Again somewhat less features offered to similar product under same marketplace is making good sales. Your critical analysis though is really appreciated.
  - maaarghk 13y ago
    I had a look at the quform offering and I would say that it's main strength is that it looks better, really. Maybe a redesign should be your first priority. But I would also recommend CMS versions like the other guy!
OGC 13y ago
Parse error: syntax error, unexpected $end in /home/teemya/r0ash.com/demo/reform/source/lib/recaptchalib.php on line 254 clicking features, then reCaptcha. More in general: There is not a single line of text explaining (on the demo page) why i should buy this. Speculative: I think there are typo3 extensions / wordpress plugins doing the same stuff. Maybe you should branch out to these.
- florettewaldor 13y ago
  Thanks for the bug report, its fixed (not sure, when the file transfered half). Your critical comments are really appreciated. If you look at a popular script under same niche on same marketplace, you will see no description, yet they are making 35 sales per week http://bit.ly/195MxJ3 http://bit.ly/195MxJ3. Different versions for CMS could be created and definitely have a worth, but again, the popular scripts are selling quite good.
  - brudgers 13y ago
    Maybe your competitor is buying their own script to inflate sales numbers in the belief that some potential customers will give weight to the number of recent purchases when choosing between roughly equivalent products - i.e. if the only obvious difference between to products is popularity, then popularity can become meaningful, especially if the difference is an order of magnitude. It's like customer ratings for sellers on eBay. Good luck.
florettewaldor 13y ago
One more thing to add. A similar script on same marketplace is selling quite good with almost similar features. So personally I think, thats not the real issue behind low sales, still community comments are really appreciated. Kindly keep them coming.

maaarghk 13y ago

I have had a quick look and I would say where you are lacking is the product, sadly. I would say that it seems to me to be a child of it's time. Go onto any modern site and try to find me a form which looks like that. There are now also free alternatives such as jquery ui, bootstrap which are very popular; that isn't just because they have great features (which they do) - they are also pretty. Does this do ajax? Could it be any faster? Real time? Prettier? It's just... outdated, sorry. Sorry I don't have time to look at your questions really but I hope this helps.

florettewaldor 13y ago
Again somewhat less features offered to similar product under same marketplace is making good sales. Your critical analysis though is really appreciated.
- maaarghk 13y ago
  I had a look at the quform offering and I would say that it's main strength is that it looks better, really. Maybe a redesign should be your first priority. But I would also recommend CMS versions like the other guy!

OGC 13y ago

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected $end in /home/teemya/r0ash.com/demo/reform/source/lib/recaptchalib.php on line 254 clicking features, then reCaptcha. More in general: There is not a single line of text explaining (on the demo page) why i should buy this. Speculative: I think there are typo3 extensions / wordpress plugins doing the same stuff. Maybe you should branch out to these.

florettewaldor 13y ago
Thanks for the bug report, its fixed (not sure, when the file transfered half). Your critical comments are really appreciated. If you look at a popular script under same niche on same marketplace, you will see no description, yet they are making 35 sales per week http://bit.ly/195MxJ3 http://bit.ly/195MxJ3. Different versions for CMS could be created and definitely have a worth, but again, the popular scripts are selling quite good.
- brudgers 13y ago
  Maybe your competitor is buying their own script to inflate sales numbers in the belief that some potential customers will give weight to the number of recent purchases when choosing between roughly equivalent products - i.e. if the only obvious difference between to products is popularity, then popularity can become meaningful, especially if the difference is an order of magnitude. It's like customer ratings for sellers on eBay. Good luck.

florettewaldor 13y ago

One more thing to add. A similar script on same marketplace is selling quite good with almost similar features. So personally I think, thats not the real issue behind low sales, still community comments are really appreciated. Kindly keep them coming.