In the thread about documentation (on both the regular and improvements
mailing lists) several people have mentioned that documentation could affect
bringing other users to Revolution besides the niche market of users coming
from other card-scripting languages. At the same time, I think quite a few
people are using Revolution and MetaCard, which is very good, but at the
same time, I think Revolution deserves a bigger user base, so I thought a
thread about that might be worthwhile.
My first thought is that this niche market of ex-xCard users wouldn't be at
all bad if you really got a big piece of it. There were a lot of
disenfrachised HyperCard users, including teachers and hobbyists, and many
of them went to HyperStudio, which was in about the same price range (and
still is if you buy from the cheaper online store rather than the more
expensive one).
The good points of Hyperstudio is the excellent support for the drawing
environment and the ease of doing things without scripting, as well as the
clip art and media and the turtle graphics commands, which are very
enjoyable. Most scripting other than turtle graphics is (from an xTalk
standpoint) very tedious and extremely limiting. Other than design tools and
a few unique strengths, there's no comparison as far as features.
So, I would try to reach teachers and show them how much Revolution offers,
compared to other systems or just looking at what it can do, and pointing
out that if they came from HyperCard and were looking for a replacement,
here it is and then some, and stressing the free trial and low site license
cost. I see that Revolution is planning an education section, so maybe some
teacher-centered materials and introductions, with effective promotion,
could be worth a higher priority than additions to existing documentation.
I would also try to reach general ex-HyperCard users, and try to get listed
on HyperCard sites and web directories, because people will still be looking
at these pages if they are searching for a similar product.
Then, there are those outside that big "niche" that need to be informed that
a product like this is available. BASICs are doing very well. Products
following QBasic and Visual Basic have lots of users, and so do other ones
with different features. People know to look for "Basic" for a range of
simple but powerful languages, and every dialect is still "Basic". However,
xTalk languages don't have a simple all-inclusive term like that. They are
"English-like scripting languages" or "HyperCard compatible", etc.
I think Revolution would benefit by making sure that "basic" is a keyword in
the search tags for the website, and including the word in the site content
in both the context of a basic, simple language for beginners or expers
alike, and also in the context of comparing Transcript to BASIC. When
someone who uses basic visits the site, they should immediately see an
exciting link to a section geared toward BASIC users.
I don't think it's "right" that xBasic's are getting so much more attention
that MC/Rev. Two examples I've experienced are RealBasic and DarkBasic. Both
of these are good products, and they have a lot of fairly excited users. I
think these products deserve their attention, but the point is, I think
Revolution should be getting the same kind of attention. I'm not sure
exactly how, but people need to be informed that Revolution/MC offers such a
strong general feature set which is faster and better for many tasks than
something like RealBasic.
DarkBasic, on the other hand, is a good example of a product which attracts
a lot of game producers and youngsters as well as some other types of
traditional developers. There are several similar 2D and 3D products like
this for Windows, and they are all very community oriented, with message
boards (which people sometimes seem to find more exciting than mailing
lists), most recent news always right there on entering the site, and
frequent user contests. Perhaps Revolution could learn something useful from
the way RB and DB get people involved, and sponsor their own contests (no
cash prize is necessary, just for recognition and free software) and add
some community-oriented features. And reaching out to kids and game makers
(MC/Rev seems good for certain types of games) would be worthwhile and
really add to the user base.
I've really gotten long-winded, but it's because I'm so appreciative of the
power and ease of programming in Revolution which I've only tried for a few
days but know is what I've been looking for all this time. So, one more
point is about pricing. I can't get in the minds of other people, but here's
what was going on in my own:
I never considered MC because of the price tag. The site didn't emphasize or
explain the Starter Kit enough to make me see that it could actually be a
way to really start out rather than just a demo, and that the limitations
weren't so limited that you couldn't make something. Revolution really took
a big step and did a good job in explaining on their site how the starter
kit worked up front before and after downloading; otherwise I probably never
would have tried out the MC engine at all. The Standard Edition price tag
also looked more attainable, and that also factored in heavily in my
decision to download.
However, I think it may be important to consider one more psychological
factor about pricing: some people (many when we consider all the potential
downloaders) may not want to use the free version extensively if they feel
they can't afford to buy the whole thing sooner or later. I know that 350 or
1000 is nothing for some people who already have a good setup in consulting
etc. or a good income from the day job, but I know that there are a lot of
people out there who see even 350 as a big investment, and I'd be willing to
bet 350 dollars that a significant percentage of those people wouldn't feel
comfortable using the starter kit for a long time if they didn't think they
could buy it eventually if they used it enough.
Now, that's good on the one hand, since people can get started right away
and will be motivated (by appreciation, honesty, and any profits) to pay as
soon as they can. But for people struggling with the monthly bills, some may
not feel that they have a realistic chance to buy the product, so they may
simply not download. That may be hard for some of you to imagine, but I can
guarantee that it's so, and it was almost true for me; if Revolution hadn't
had the less expensive Standard Edition, I wouldn't have, and a short time
ago, I very likely would have considered the 350 too much too.
You see, it doesn't matter the type of limited version, trial or actually
useful, many people won't want to download unless they feel they can pretty
definitely get the whole thing--because they don't want to waste time in the
case of the trial, and they don't want to cheat the company in the case of
the limited but very useful version. It isn't only what they think after
trying the download; it's also whether they will download in the first
place.
This psychology is very important to consider in selling, since it all
happens in just a few seconds or couple of minutes when a potential user
visits your site. I would suggest the possibility of one more pricing
option: a registration of the Starter Kit itself, either purely for peace of
mind, or perhaps with some added value such as slightly increased script
limits. If this licensing option were offered for anything less than 100
dollars, Revolution might find itself with twice as many users.
Also, I'm betting that all those Revolution hobbyists would shell out 50 or
75 without blinking--providing you a whole new stream of revenue from your
existing users. I'm sure they would be overjoyed to contribute some even if
the limitations stayed the same, and if there was a bit of extra feature
included, all the better. So, this option would bring in new users and allow
your existing starter-kit users to contribute.
(At the same time, if there are any small edits that will make the Starter
Kit itself even more compelling as a free download, that wouldn't hurt
either.)
Now, the very obvious--why isn't Revolution Starter Kit in download.com?
MetaCard isn't either. A lot of people go looking at download sites like
that, and if the description included Mac, Windows, and Unix/Linux--people
go crazy about anything like that. Not posting Revolution at download
centers is just passing people up at will! (If there's some technical
reason, like wanting people to visit the site, solve the technical
difficulty one way or the other and get the download out there rather than
losing such a big opportunity for a relatively minor reason.)
Also, Revolution doesn't seem to be in Yahoo--and many people browse the
programming languages section looking for a new tool. MetaCard is, but only
in the Multimedia section. There might be another good section for
Revolution (and maybe for MC) which would show up for people looking for a
more general type language and not under just Multimedia. Big sites can have
an alternative listing directory, I thought, and also, there can be separate
related sites such as user sites or specialty sites about Revolution for a
particular group, which could be set up by third parties or separate sites
put up by Revolution.
I think Revolution has taken some good steps already in reaching people, but
I think it could be improved. I'm sure that the various professional people
who use Revolution could also give some tips and let Revolution know about
opportunities and ways of promoting that they have access to. Well, "enough
said"--literally in this case! I'm sorry to write such a long post, but I
think this issue needs to be addressed, because Revolution deserves more
attention for its great features and because more attention will mean more
revenue and more features, so it will come back to benefit us all.
Thanks,
Curry Kenworthy
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
