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How Do You Sell Linux Software?
smelroy asks: "My software company recently released a Linux port of our business instant messaging product, but we are not sure of the best way to sell it, since to many people selling Linux software is an oxymoron. Users on each end of the computer knowledge spectrum associate any and everything Linux with free. Even when we tried to get people to beta test it for us they said, 'It runs on Linux so why isn't it free?' Another comment from a reporter in response to our telling him of our Linux release was 'So it is open source then right?' So my question to the Slashdot community is when is Linux going to be prevalent enough on the desktop that people will pay for applications and not always assume they are free? Better yet, where are the people who feel that way now?"
A good marketing technique would be getting your company's product posted to the front page of slashdot...
Maybe the problem is that the world doesn't need yet another proprietary instant messaging platform.
No offense, but IM is infrastructure that should be under control of a standards body, or at the very least open source and distributed, not jealously guarded by a bunch of companies each with their own extremely evil EULA.
Perhaps your customers rightly recognize this state of affairs. I know I do, and that's why I prefer Jabber for IM.
I and the people I work with purchase all kinds of linux software, from development tools to high-end graphics applications, to games. Perhaps your problem isn't linux, it's your product.
...You want free advice?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Hopefully never - when people use GNU/Linux they will realise that Free software is better for a whole host of reasons. Once they've had their eyes opened to this, then using closed-source proprietary software becomes a much less appealing proposition.
Blaming GW Bush for the Iraq war is like blaming Ronald McDonald for the poor quality of food.
Perhaps you could release a scaled down version of the product for free to help garner interest and produce another version with more bells and whistles for sale. Also, I think the traditional model for making money off of "free" software is to charge money for support and services associated with implementing, running and maintaining it.
Just my 2 cents.
Co-founder and designer at Music Nearby: http://musicnearby.com
If there is a compelling reason to do so. Lots of people have bought programs like Oracle or VMWare for Linux.
Expecting to sell an instant messenger to anyone is a different story. You have low-to-no cost competition from Lotus, Microsoft Exchange and Jabber.
Instant messenging is a mature product that has already begun to consolidate into a few big players.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
Make Good Linux Software?
Do I prefer to pay money for good software rather than use some buggy unsupported hack? Hell yeah.
Problem is, there's a lot of good, free, open source software for Linux. If you want to sell something to that crowd, it better be damn good.
Wax-Museum Fire Results In Hundreds Of New Danny DeVito Statues
Perhaps is the server AND the client were available for GNU/linux you'd have a better chance.
Also providing a cut down 'free for ever' version would help get it through the front door.
???
Users on each end of the computer knowledge spectrum associate any and everything Linux with free. Even when we tried to get people to beta test it for us they said, 'It runs on Linux so why isn't it free?' Another comment from a reporter in response to our telling him of our Linux release was 'So it is open source then right?
I think this might be an "urban legend", or perhaps your choice of sample for your researched was biased in some unintentional way. For example, Oracle is available on Linux, and it's very much a pay-for product. Oracle, as far as I know, haven't come under any serious pressure to make the Linux version free (speech or beer) - at least not any freer than it is on any other platform. I don't think anyone seriously expects MATLAB or Houdini or any other serious application to be free on Linux either.
If you face any expectation of no-cost it's most likely because MSN, ICQ, AIM and all the rest are free. You're better off positioning your product as something other than IM/chat and selling it on what it does that free chat doesn't.
--you offer it in different thresholds, and that's about it. Free to hobbyists, support for the payers. Software is worth paying for once it actually works as advertised for the customer, that's the pain threshold, that is usually classed as alpha or beta or full release-stable. Stable that is sold should come with the ability to actually get ahold of a human being in a timely manner for any troubleshooting questions or contracted/requested work on a feature enhancement, etc. Those with their cash transferred to you get their feature enhancements and problems bumped to the top of the line obviously. And the docs NEED to be written (the final draft) by an english major, someone who's task is to stand over the engineers once the coding is finished and it's time to finalize the man pages and docs with a clue by four until everyone is satisfied the docs are understandable and thorough and accurate. A small paragraph where every other word is an acronym is *not* a working doc to anyone except a coder. I've seen that phenomenon way too often with linux programs. Assume people who might be interested in purchasing the full release are not "all" coders, proceed from that point.
I know I pay for software for BOTH the convenience of having it on a quality made cd and ALSO because I then have a working dead trees manual that doesn't require me burning out my printer. I like the convenience of owning the cd, I like most of the time reading docs from a book, not on a screen. Some do, some don't care, that's just my "paying customiser" opinion. Free is free, a lot of people enjoy downloading constantly and compiling and whatnot, a lot more want the thing to work and be right there and easy to install (or reinstall) and have a reference manual. That's the part worth paying for, and keep the costs reasonable enough. This is like the clueless music/movie sellers. Instead of selling zillions of 5$ cd's, which they could, they make less money trying to sell 20$ cd's. Clue-less morons. It's called getting greedy, only works for a short time, then people do something else, yes?
Another thought, your program must be useful and functional to a degree at least two steps above whatever else is out there. Not one step, at least two steps better, or don't try to sell it.
Now that that's out of the way, I think it's better to just make your money admining linux in the commercial arena, then work on your custom coding and app development the same as almost everyone else is, spare time or allocated free time at your employers. The basic concept of "sharing" needs to be drilled into the bean counters heads as the long haul way to cut costs and get "more", but sharing only works if it's two ways. Everyone benfits by shared code, so the company can concentrate on building and selling their widgets. By using open source as the BASE of a company's IT, they save money. By finally bingoing that a little across the board sharing is what's allowing them to save money, perhaps they will cut some slack and allow a little company time to be used for your interesting app. That's the difference between leeching and sharing. Leeching-only as a concept is just not cool, either short term or long term. Your company benefits from open source in general, and they get first dibs on the product, useful for their business, and score brownie points as being a "friendly" and ethical company in the gestalt of society as it were. They develop a "good rep". With todays business climate, public perception is important. People are skeptical of businesses now, with dang good reason-a lot of them are shall we say less than forthright with their numbers and pretty dismal in the ethics department.
If there's no way to do this and you absolutely need to make your money off of your new application, then it must be customizable to a degree that large companies would pay for the application, it has to have a bona fide usefullness that is unique, perhaps security? That part I don't know, too many variables and wildcards. Usually in software there's the full release, then "release lite" to the non paying hobbyist public, that seems to be what is working now for some people. You offer the customized features for a customized premium in cash.