Arbitrage Advantage

I found that I needed to buy some toilet paper. Normally I buy it in bulk from Amazon. These sales are normally through a third party that advertises on the Amazon web site. I had found such a buyer this time. The price seemed reasonable. I liked that they offered free shipping. I made the purchase.

It was weird that the package was delivered by Federal Express. Normally somebody else delivers Amazon packages. The other strange situation was that the box came from Walmart. I looked at the invoice from Walmart. The price was much lower than what I paid. There was also a shipping cost of $6 plus tax collected.

Turns out the Amazon seller absorbed the shipping and tax. They still earned a couple dollar profit from the transaction. They connected me with the actual seller (Walmart), and took advantage of the price difference between Walmart’s price and what I was willing to pay.

I was not even mad that Walmart offered a lower price. This Amazon seller was providing me with a service. If I had not purchased through them, I would have paid more from another Amazon seller. I wonder if it is worth the trouble of potential customer problems by becoming such a middleman for selling goods?

Hot Topic Spamming Failures

I follow a friend into a Hot Topic store in the mall. Saw some cool merchandise. Decided to buy something. The salesperson asked me a bunch of questions, including my email address. I gave them one that I give all people that ask. I wonder what they are going to do with it?


When I get home, I find that I have been signed up for some nonsense newsletter from Hot Topic. Okay. I always unsubscribe from those things. I scanned the email and found the links at the bottom. The unsubscribe link was disabled. WTF?


I thought about contacting customer service. But why waste me time? I just reported the email as spam and blocked the sender. Simple as pie. Way to go Hot Topic. I buy something from you, then you spam me, and make it hard to unsubscribe? That's how you alienate new customers.

Sales Requires Respect

I sold my old car recently. After turning in the license plates, I called my insurance company to cancel the insurance on the car. They said they could also provide homeowners insurance to me. I listened to their pitch. Took 10+ minutes to go through the details of my house.

One of the questions they asked was how old my roof was. I had no idea really. The rep I was talking with got snippy with me, trying to force me to give her an answer. At that point I gave my best guess. But they had already lost the sale.

I did continue on just to see what their end quote was going to be. Turns out it is higher than what I am paying now. You cost more and you are rude? Nope. No sale for you. When are these fools going to learn?

Fail by Fee

I somehow got on a marketing list for National Pen Company. Might stem from when I was running my own business. They sell customized SWAG you can give away to customers. For over 10 years, National Pen has been sending me samples to get me to buy some pens from them.


Here is the thing. They have nice pens. When it came time to buy, I figured why not give them a shot? They persevered for such a long time. I placed an order. They had a "first time buyer" discount that sweetened the deal.


They called me up to confirm my order. Then it arrived. They even shipped it without me first paying. The invoice was included with my shipment. That's when the bad surprises came. Yeah I expected they would tack on a shipping fee. But they also added a setup fee.


The setup fee feels like what I call a garbage fee. This is not a third party fee such as the real money they have to bay UPS to deliver the package. This is some in house nonsense extra money I need to pay. Hey if you have costs, roll them into the cost of your project. Don't try to trick your customer by gouging them with a surprise fee.


It is a shame. Their marketing and project was really good. The pricing and billing killed any repeat business they might get. Now they are going to get bad publicity. Every time I talk about them, I will say they have good pens but they try to rip you off on the transaction. Fail.

Chik Fil A?

I was talking with an old buddy of mine. He said his cash flow was bad. Previously he had planned to leave his old job, collect a severance, and start a new job. The severance was paid out monthly. My buddy thought he would effectively be getting double paid while the severance lasted. Unfortunately it took him a long time to find a replacement job. Thus no doubling.


My friend wanted to have another $50k to $150k in the bank. Well then maybe he should do some lucrative contracting on the side. His problem is that he is a busy guy. He barely gets his work done with all his other commitments. We got to talking. I asked him what other ways could he make a big windfall. He thought he could run a fast food franchise.


One big name that came to mind was Chick-Fil-A. I assumed my friend could not afford the franchise fee. However a little researched showed that the franchise fee was only $5k. You also needed another $5k in liquid funds to begin. Woo hoo. Sign me up. Of course there were a lot of other costs that could range between $250k and $750k. But my friend thought he could convince a bank to loan him the capital.


Who knows? Maybe this is the right way to go. Chick-Fil-A restaurants seem to always get a lot of customers in our local area. I presume there is enough demand for another restaurant or two in the area. This is running a business. Fast food might be a tough market. But with the right franchise in the right place, profits may be forthcoming.

The Reach of Marketing

I love a good original chicken sandwich at Burger King. That's why I head there when I get a coupon from them that sweetens the deal. I might get a free fries, drink, or even a second sandwich. The coupon gets my attention and reminds me to go. However it is the tasty sandwich that seals the deal.

As I was waiting for my sandwich to be cooked, I stared and the digital display of food in Burger King. Their latest promotion is for chicken fries. They got a cooky looking animated chicken running around their display. I smiled when the chicken winked and me. And I laughed when the chicken drank a coke on screen.

The problem with the chicken fries is that they just don't taste good. No amount of gimmicks is going to get me to buy them. You got to start with a good product. Then use your marketing to draw in the crowds and hook them. The hook does not work if you are selling snake oil.

The Art of Pricing

I am downloading a couple free books I found referenced on a cool web site. Before I download a book, I figure I had better research what the book is about. One particular book I checked out was "Don't Just Roll the Dice". Apparently this is a book that talks about how to price your software. Sounded good to me.

The real funny thing was that the book was going for $350 from third parties on Amazon. What were those clowns doing? Maybe they used some algorithm that went wacky to price their second hand merchandise. So a book on pricing goes for a huge price. Ha ha. I already downloaded the book for free. Might just have to check it out since it comes highly recommended on Amazon.

Kohl's Discounts

I saw an advertisement in this week's Khol's circular. I could get $10 off my purchase. I could also earn Kohl's cash. Now I know the family has shopped at Kohl's before. I inquired with them. Found out Kohl's cash is a reward that you get on purchase. It is time sensitive. You have about a week to use this "cash" to discount further purchases.

Tonight I was doing some shopping online. I went to Kohl's. Found I could use my $10 off coupon online. Cool. They had some furniture I needed. They also offered free shipping since my order was over $75. Things were looking up. Then on the payment page I saw that I could use up to two coupons. What? I don't want to leave any money on the table.

Spent ten minutes googling around to find a 20% off coupon that I applied. Nice. Now that I was spending at least $100, I was also expecting two $10 Kohl's cash coupons back. I was just over $100 with my taxes. I could not find details anywhere to see whether the Kohl's cash was awarded on merchandise only, or whether it included tax.

Turns out the Kohl's cash must not count the tax. Ouch. I just lost one $10 Kohl's cash oppotunity. Well we shall see how Kohl's online does for me. If the experience is good, I might just redeem the Kohl's cash and make more purchases. This experience has taught me a lesson. New merchants must navigate many chances to turn off new customers. Kohl's almost failed. Let's see if they recover.

AdWords Revisited

I got some people buying copies of my apps in the Windows Store. However I want them buying my premium enterprise apps. I figured I should drive some traffic to my Windows Store page using Google AdWords.

My hosting company gave me a coupon to use. If I spent $25 on AdWords in a month, they will give me $100 of free advertising. Not sure if this is a global campaign bonus, or just an incentive for some type of local AdWords deal. I need to attract global customers.

Hey. I guess it is worth a try. However I figure it will take more than $25 or $100 to figure out how to use AdWords effectively. But I got to start somewhere. Why not start with AdWords?

Breaking Branch

Saw this web page that showed the evolution of source code control. Cool. Then I found an offer to get a Breaking Bad t-shirt. They got me. All I had to do was follow their evaluation guide. No problem right?

Step 1 of the guide wanted me to download their software. To download the software, I need to log in. To log in, I need a username a password. Clicked the register tab. Nothing happened. I can't log in. I can't download their software. Fail.

Okay. I am a good guy. I will let them know something is screwed up on their registration page. Tried to leave a comment on their evolution of source code control page. It required me to log in. Okay. I got a Google ID. I clicked the button to authenticate using Google. But get this. I could not choose my Google ID.

Umm, maybe it is a good thing I found out how messed up their web site was. Do I want their software controlling my source code? No way in hell. I had better go to some t-shirt web site, and pay $20 for my own Breaking Bad t-shirt.

More on AdWords

My web host had sent me a letter in the mail for a $150 coupon towards free AdWords ads. Sounded awesome. Then I read the fine print. This was for AdWords Express. Apparently this is some type of ads for local businesses.

I am not a mom and pop's pizza shop. I am trying to sell Windows 8 apps online to the world. So AdWords Express was out. Maybe I will wait until I get a valid coupon for free AdWords advertising. Or maybe I will start out with some small AdWords campaigns.

The real holy grail is to get organic exposure to my web site. Right now I need to get the word out on my Software Schedule Estimator product page. Any ideas?

AdWords Discounts

I figured it was finally time to advertise my Windows 8 apps on Google AdWords. My web host gave me a promotional code worth $150 of advertising. I figured I could do some good with that. Turns out the offer expired last year.

Found another offer from my web host. It offered $100 worth of Google AdWords advertising if you spend $25. Sounded fair to me. Once again, this thing expired last year. I am a little late to the party. Guess I will have to get the word out myself.

If you have Windows 8, then check out my Software Schedule Estimator app in the Windows Store. Figure out how long your software development project will last. Prevent surprises from lengthy such as requirements gathering and quality assurance.

I also decided today to start logging the work I do on my app business. Got to measure to figure out what needs improvement.

Edgy Rebranding

I just read that 37Signals is changing their name to Basecamp. That seemed odd initially. I know them by 37Signals. Why give up all that brand juice? Sure I get that they want to rally behind their main product. Feels like a bold move.

They will most likely keep their URL. I guess what the are really saying is that their other products will slowly be phased out. Good thing they make a lot of revenue from their main product. The moral of the story is to try to gauge the future and choose your company name wisely.

Piracy Not Theft

I read an article a long time ago about piracy. It asked whether pirating some software is the same as stealing. The article itself was not enlightening. But there were a lot of comments on the article. There were a bunch of great ideas buried in those comments.

 

There was a thread about telling software developers to stop whining about piracy. Digital goods almost want to be free. Many people conduct illegal activities. Software piracy is not immune to this. Copyright in general is abused. So will software.

 

Let’s get down to the nuts and bolts. The people who steal software were never going to actually buy the software. So there is no real missed opportunity for revenue. If that theft costs you some actual money, such as the cost for extra bandwidth for their downloads, maybe a developer has a beef. But this amount is probably going to be a lot less than the purchase price of the software.

 

The good thing is that not everyone know how to pirate software. You can put some safeguards and protection in there. None of that will be foolproof. But you might be able to make it hard enough to pirate software, so that it is easier for would be thieves to not do it or actually buy your software. This will be especially so if you prices are low.

Marketing Marketing Marketing

Microsoft had an initiative that rewarded new Windows 8 or Windows phone apps with a $100 bonus per app. Sounded like an easy way to earn $100. I planned to write 10 apps for a cool grand. Turned out I was burned out after nine apps. Three of them got rejected. I did get six Windows 8 apps in the Windows store.

The beauty was that the $100 bonus was in addition to any proceeds you make selling your apps. I figured I would get the bonus, then do some marketing for the apps. It took a long time to get my bonus. So I did not start the marketing early. What was the result? I sold no copies of my apps. Ouch.

Now I plan to stand up a web site that markets my apps. Just need to drive some traffic to my Windows app store entries. Just showing up and putting some apps in there does not get you sales. Microsoft manages the sales. They don’t seem to actively market the apps in there.

Publishing Your Own Books

Just read a good post about publishing your own books. Strangely enough the author highly encourages using Box Shot 3D software. That prouct seems real expensive at $199. There is a home version of Boxshot 4 that goes for $49. Apparently you should also farm out the design of the cover of your book. That can cost you a bunch more money. You should get an ISBN number for your book. It is even better if you are listed as the publisher. The best hacks described in the post revolve around creating a pricing war between Amazon and Barnes & Noble. You can effectively get Amazon to lower their price while keeping their payment to you the same. Sweet. This is certainly worth a try right?

All About the Marketing

I was driving down the street in my neighborhood the other day. There were two girls on the side of the road. They must have been selling something. They tried to get my attention and successed. One girl was waving. The other one did a kind of backflip. Seemed like some gymnastics move. Impressive. You don't see that enthusiasm often.

So these girls get an A for grabbing my attention. Where they failed was their signage. They both had signs which they made by hand. However they must have been written on 8 1/2 by 11 paper. There is no way I can read anything on such small paper when I am driving by in a car.

I actually thought about stopping, but I had no clue what they were selling. I did not want to stop if what they were selling was of no value to me. I would have wasted precious time. My recommendation? Grab a big cardboard box and write "Carwash $5" in big letters so they guy in an airplane can see what is going down.

Marketing. It is really tough. Capture your customers' attention, and communicate clearly for a win.

Advertising Gamble

I was reading some trade press rag. Spotted this weird ad from InstallAware. There was a superhero with his head falling off. This was an ad for an installation development platform. The top reason listed for buying the program was that the industry leader copied their features!

Another weird feature of the ad was that there was no information on how to get more info. There was no URL listed. No phone numbers. Nothing. I guess they figure I would Google them if I was interest. I did Google them.

I was happy that their web site was very transparent about how my costs would be computed. Factors such as using the competitors product, having previos versions of their product, and assorted options were all clearly marked.

Now this is some pricey software. Pricey as is in the cheapest version with no frills costs over $1000. If you add some bells and whistles like support, roving licenses, and consutling, the total bill might come out to $20k or so. Very gutsy advertising for such an expensive proposition.

The Value of Marketing

I was recently reading the transcript from a speech by Patrick McKenzie. It was a talk he gave at the MicroConf 2012 convention. He talks about a lot of things. But mainly he describes how he has gone on to do consulting for people who sell over the web. Previously his weekly consulting rate was $20k to $25k a week. But I think the price has gone up.

That's not the real kicker. He did so well for one customer that the CEO was talking about hiring him on full time for around $750k a year. Here is the shocker. He turned it down. LOLwut? Does he love working for himself? Maybe he wants to give all companies a chance to receive his advice. Or perhaps there is only so much he can do for any given company before the returns flatten out.

Whatever the reason, this seems odd on the surface. Wouldn't every developer love making $750k a year? I sure would. From a sheer economic perspective, Patrick has a good thing going with his consulting gigs. He appears to be making more and more money per week with that. Maybe this is not so crazy after all.

All I know is that you have to love a guy who can make money marketing a program called Bingo Card Creator.

Age Discrimination

Read a blurb on LinkedIn about the perils of age discrimination in the tech industry. Seems that companies do not want to pay a senior developer $150k if they can get a fresh college grad ofr $60k. There are multiple reasons behind this trend. The youngsters are thought of as possessing skills in the hot technologies. Plus they can be counted on to burn the midnight oil to get stuff done. Plus they cost a whole lot less, right?

What is an aging developer to do? Go into management. Gray beard in management is a benefit. Or you could try to stay current in your skills. That is tough. But you need to in order to stay competitive. You could also become a consultant. Or better yet, start up your own business. That way you are the boss. You would not discriminate against yourself, would you?