Brandon Kelly - Make A Market Out Of Our Community: The Whys and Hows of Selling Add-Ons
- Categories:
- ExpressionEngine
- Tags:
- brandon kelly, expressionengine, extension, fieldframe, playa
- Published:
- 11:21am on Monday 26th October, 2009
Brandon Kelly is an ExpressionEngine add-on developer, responsible for the extremely popular FieldFrame and Playa extensions. He spoke on the importance of commerciality in add-on development.
You can watch a video of Brandon’s talk on Vimeo.
On commercial add-ons
- Got into ExpressionEngine at the beginning of 2008, releasing Playa in April 08 (it won Devot:ee extension of the year). Gypsy was released in December 2008, and FieldFrame in March 2009
- Supporting and working on these add-ons was starting to feel more like a job
- Decided to charge for Playa 2 - $69 seemed like a good number to choose ;)
- Released Wygwam for $29 in September 2009
- Making enough money now to support myself, so going full-time freelance at the end of 2009
- There are lots of free add-ons; we need to change this. Only really simple things should be free
- It pays to sell. Maybe this is a unique siutation to EE; WordPress users won’t pay for anything
- Get paid because you deserve it - you’re never done when you release a popular add-on
- It is easier to support paid add-ons - there are less but better users, more knowledgeable requests, and you feel more obliged to help
- Pricing: Wait until you’re finished before setting a price. Play customer - you’re picking a price that the customer will want to pay
- Effort != Value. Find a price point that feels right
- Marketing: an entry on Devot:ee and a forum post might be fine for free add-ons, as someone else will try it and talk about it more. But you can’t do this with paid add-ons; you need to put something together for your users. Be excited! If you’re not, what do you need to change to have a product you are really excited about
- Playa is a great example for how to set up a site to sell an add-on
- Buy advertising on EE fansites
Q&A
Ever had any issues with piracy?
Not bothered - the time needed to combat it is more than the time stolen in support.
Leslie Camacho: What do you want EllisLab to do for add-on developers?
Would be nice to be able to advertise add-ons on the official site, but ultimately it’s up to the individual developer to market their add-ons themselves.
Why make Wygwam?
I received several requests to make a WYSIWYG editor for FieldFrame. Wygwam represents the first time I’ve made an add-on that wasn’t to solve my own problem.
How do you sell online?
Using a hacked version of Simple Commerce module.
What do you think about an Add-On Store?
Would be good, maybe. But it would need good quality control.
How long do you spend on support?
About 10-15 hours per week.
What happens if you decide to give up?
One of the benefits of selling add-ons is that you don’t want to give up. But probably another commercial developer would take over my add-ons.
Will you accept commissions from agencies?
Possibly, but I have a big backlog of ideas already.
How do you develop?
Frontend first - HTML, CSS, and JavaScript - before looking at the backend.
Any plans to integrate add-ons that compete?
No - competition is a good thing.
I'd love to hear what you think - please use the form below to leave your comments. Anything I consider too offensive, off-topic, or spammy will be deleted at my discretion. Some HTML is permitted, or you can use Textile.
Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.Adam Khan at 8:39am on 30th October, 2009 #