Learning to Whistle a New Tune

As a long time analyst programmer employed on a nine-to-five basis either as a contractor or on a salary, I often dreamt of marketing software products from my own web site; the prospect of writing a software application once, then (hopefully) selling multiple copies was - and still is - an attractive one.

Having then made the difficult decision to turn my back on a guaranteed income to go it alone, the transition from programmer-for-hire to software vendor has turned out to be a protracted one. With a couple of desktop applications in the final stages of testing, all but ready to be unleashed on the world, the problem is devoting enough time to complete the all-important testing and put in place the necessary mechanisms relating to purchase and licensing.

The lag time between presenting my products for sale and realising any income from them is an unknown, despite my confidence that they're useful, attractively-priced tools. In the meantime, the rent needs to be paid on time and having food in the fridge most of the time continues to be an attractive prospect! As a sole operator therefore, striking a balance between earning an adequate income while striving to get a new product to market is the constant challenge.

In reality then, although my dream is ultimately attainable, the transition to fully-fledged micro-ISV is likely to be a gradual one. While I go about the business of earning a living as best I can, I manage to snatch an hour here and an hour there putting the final touches on my first two products, impatient to market them, but always alert to the dangers of releasing them prematurely. My patience, I remind myself repeatedly, will be rewarded in the long term.

Cheers
Pete

The Reluctant Client

I had the opportunity recently to meet with a prospective client who was keen to replace an ancient DOS-based application central to the running of his business. I suspected from the start that money would be an issue but pressed on regardless, listening closely to his ideas about the features he wanted and offering some suggestions of my own along the way.

Reflecting on the meeting later on, I figured that if he was to be enticed at all, I needed to come up with a basic prototype which would impress him enough that he'd give the go-ahead to proceed with development. It was a calculated risk, but one I thought was worth taking.

Some twenty-plus development hours later I had the basic shell of the application ready for demonstration and arranged to visit again the following week. To cut a long story short, I showed him what I'd achieved and presented him with a project proposal and quotation. He was certainly excited about what I'd accomplished but, as I'd feared, baulked at the estimate - perhaps the plethora of cheap shareware products on the 'net had shaped his expectations of price!

The lesson I learned, which seems pretty obvious in hindsight, is that once I have a gut feel for how much a client might be up for, it's best I let them know my thoughts immediately, even if I can give them a ball-park figure only. Had I done so in this instance, his reaction would surely have confirmed my suspicions and I wouldn't have invested time and effort in developing the prototype; at most, I would've sacrificed a couple of hours of my time. Live and learn.

Fortunately in this case, I'm confident the application can be developed further in a generic enough fashion that I can offer it for sale from my web site and recoup my costs - eventually. One more idea to be added to the ever-expanding "to do" list!

Cheers
Pete

Hello World!

I often think about my ongoing transformation from disgruntled employee to independent software vendor and can only assume that most of the issues I've had to negotiate confront others flying solo for the first time.

If there's any purpose behind my blog entries therefore, it will be to share my reflections and discoveries with anyone contemplating - or already experiencing - life as a micro-ISV. I hope my posts strike a chord with you or are even helpful if you're travelling the same path and jumping the same hurdles!

As this is my first blog entry, I'm unsure how often I'll be inspired to post, or what form the entries will take. Stay tuned!

Cheers
Pete