The great big leaky sales funnel: a micro-ISV primer
1,000,000 people read about timesnapper... 50% don't click on the link to the website. (500,000 people remain) 50% visit the site, don't bother to download it. (250,000 people remain) 50% begin to install, but get distracted and forget. (125,000 people remain) 50% install TimeSnapper, but never run it again. (62,500 people remain) 50% run it, but can't work out how to use it. (31,250 people remain) 50% can use it, but don't find it very useful. (15,625 people remain) 50% want to buy it, but can't find the website again. (7,812 people remain) 50% find the website, but can't see where to purchase it. (3906 people remain) 50% find where to purchase it, but don't like the price. (1953 people remain) 50% don't mind the price, but don't trust paypal. (977 people remain) 50% trust pay pal, but enter the wrong credit card details. (488 people remain) And that's how 1,000,000 people can become your first 500 precious customers! Double the effectiveness of any one step in the chain, and you double the number of customers at the end of it all. Obviously, once you've found a customer, treat 'em good. Listen to what they suggest in the forums, help them when they have problems. (I'm currently preparing a talk for the Queensland MSDN user group -- November 20 -- about building a micro ISV. The above thought struck me, so i decided to share it here.)
Please come along! I'll blog more about it in time, of course.
'Marcos' on Sun, 11 Nov 2007 12:08:02 GMT, sez: YOU ARE A GENIOUS =)
Interesting conclusion.
I will do the same for my job.
The Marcos funnel
200 people work at the company
50% dont known us (100 left)
50% dont like IT secction (50 left)
50% dont like Developers (25 left)
50% are waiting for some app that we never finish (12.5 left, better 12)
50% dont like our apps (6 left)
50% said that our apps dont do what they must (3 left)
These are me and my 2 co workers :P
NOBODY LIKES DEVELOPERS AT MY COMPANY!!!
LOL
PS: I strong recomend you to watch IT Crowd
http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/I/itcrowd/
Maybe you already do that, is an incredible funny commedy only for geeks :P
'Emad' on Tue, 13 Nov 2007 19:08:02 GMT, sez: Great post... I agree 100% with your conclusion... But my biggest problem is finding the 1 million eyeballs :)
'Simon Harriyott' on Tue, 11 Dec 2007 11:40:27 GMT, sez: I would have liked to have been in Queensland on the 20th, but I was stuck in England that day. Are there any slides or recordings of your session? Is your book out yet? ;-)
'Jonathan' on Mon, 17 Dec 2007 12:19:28 GMT, sez: Your software looks awesome, but please make it cheaper!
'Tz' on Mon, 21 Jan 2008 15:42:27 GMT, sez: Why do you need to record your day and play it back to yourself? I hate my life in real time let alone seeing it again and recorded.
What is the purpose of such useless software..
'Mike' on Thu, 24 Jan 2008 01:21:01 GMT, sez: I think you mean 485 first customers because 3% have macs :)
Be sure to post at YC news once the mac version is released.
Goodluck
'Eduardo Rocha' on Thu, 24 Jan 2008 12:22:56 GMT, sez: It turns out that it's a exponential function, and it could only be linear like you suggest in semi-log scale.
The one that went to the middle of the process has much more chance of continuing than the one who is in the first step.
'lb' on Thu, 24 Jan 2008 19:22:36 GMT, sez: @Eduardo -- yeh, this is true. But I'm happy to gloss over that because of a different factor which is at play.
Possibly the developer's attention to quality also falls as you get further into the process. So each step gets harder to complete than the previous.
'Freemasons' on Sun, 03 Feb 2008 06:24:19 GMT, sez: useful rating, yhanks
'marmelade' on Thu, 10 Apr 2008 17:16:15 GMT, sez: that's really great! thank you!
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