Conversion-sation
A few weeks ago (ok, i had really hoped to do this post sooner), there was a thread on the MacSB list about conversion rates. In web parlance (of our time), a conversion is when you get the user to do something that you want them to do. For Micro-ISVs, that usually means buy your product. To get a handle on my conversion rate (number of downloads divided by the number of purchases) i just did the math based on every download and purchase since we went on sale on 3 December 2007. I had assumed (based on no data) that a 1% conversion rate was pretty good. Thus, i was pleasantly surprised to see my rate come out to 1.3%. Then i followed the links in the MacSB thread and found 1.3% to be the lowest conversion rate of anyone that i could find who went on record. Most of the other developers out there were seeing better than 3% with some going as high as 10%. So much for my wholly unearned smugness. At 10%, i'd be in shouting distance of the brass ring, quitting my day job and doing this full time. At 1% i'm, well, i'm blogging when i should be sleeping (so that i can get up when the 4.5 year old alarm clock goes off). The MacSB thread threw into stark relief how much room for improvement my conversion rate has. I decided then and there, that i would add increasing conversion rate to my 2008.0 goals (check back in about 4 months to hear about goals for 2008.5)
The timing of this internal discussion (did i just admit that i talk to myself?) was fortuitous as Bob Walsh had just released his new E-book. The book is called "Micro ISV Sites that Sell" and covers how to think about your web site in terms that will get your customers to buy your product. More importantly, the book gives you a model for how you can turn your site into one of the ones that really sells the product. Bob is a bit of a mentor of mine, in that i read his "Micro-ISV From Vision to Reality" as part how-to and part inspirational text as i was putting Helium Foot together. I liked the micro ISV book (and it really is the micro ISV book) so i plunked down my $19 right away. I've enjoyed the book and it would be a bargain at twice the price.
I'm going to refrain from giving a full review, but here's the executive summary: If you have your own micro ISV and you don't already have a strategy for how to get your website visitors to buy your product, then you ABSOLUTELY should get this book. What i liked most about the book is that the information in it is eminently actionable. After reading this book, i have a very clear plan for how to make my site more effective and over the next two weeks or so, you'll see the effects of those plans on this site. Additionally, there are very good examples of how some other micro ISVs have acted on this same information and what it does for them. If i had to give some criticism, i would say that Bob takes his marketing-as-design-pattern metaphor past the point of useful example and into the realm of gimmickry. However, this is pretty hollow criticism since the book is terrific with or without the metaphor, and the design pattern metaphor does lend itself to some lively prose.
Stay tuned to see how i put these dreams into action.