Why don't Indians buy software?
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There, now you too are disappointed there wasn't a punchline.
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We were going over our analytics the other day and a question came up: "Why don't Indians buy software?". We sell a small to medium sized business application online and we have regular sales in over 70 countries. In our web analytics we see India quite high on the list of countries where people download our software, very high, like fifth out of all countries, as well Indians regularly request a full trial license from us to fully test our software so we know they are engaged and interested. The mystery is that in over a decade in business we still have zero sales to India, not one single one. This despite thousands of downloads by Indians. The countries below India in downloads, even *way* below India still account for a large amount of sales. It's not piracy, we monitor that regularly. We've contacted the Indian people who requested a license as we do everyone and we always get an answer like "We thoroughly checked it out and decided to go with another package". Is there some kind of cultural thing we're not getting? Is it that they will always try to find a local equivalent if they can? Does anyone have a theory as to this mystifying behaviour?
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They do (or at least that's our experience, albeit in a different sector - dev tools). For us by far the worst major country for sales is (no surprise) China. I'd be really surprised if piracy isn't a significant factor in that case though; I know our online merchant is really strict about credit card orders from that part of the world.
Anna :rose: Tech Blog | Visual Lint "Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"
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Your product is very likely more professional looking than any of the local products. So their first instinct is to somehow convince their managers to approve your product so they can use what seems to them a better product. But the higher ups usually look for actual usable functionality - which the local apps will do better than yours will. This is my best guess.
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
Oddly we sell really well all over the world, I'm not exaggerating when I say that, from Anguilla to Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso to Turkey, you name it, India just stands out as being it's own thing entirely and I'm still a bit confused as to why.
There is no failure only feedback
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Oddly we sell really well all over the world, I'm not exaggerating when I say that, from Anguilla to Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso to Turkey, you name it, India just stands out as being it's own thing entirely and I'm still a bit confused as to why.
There is no failure only feedback
India has 1000s of software shops (many of them run out of one room home offices). So there will be cheap alternatives for pretty much every piece of business software you can think of. Of course there may be significant compromises in quality/stability etc. but because they are so cheap, users get value for money.
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
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They do (or at least that's our experience, albeit in a different sector - dev tools). For us by far the worst major country for sales is (no surprise) China. I'd be really surprised if piracy isn't a significant factor in that case though; I know our online merchant is really strict about credit card orders from that part of the world.
Anna :rose: Tech Blog | Visual Lint "Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"
Yeah I thought JC was selling dev tools too, but apparently not. He sells business software! Never knew that all these years :-)
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
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Yeah I thought JC was selling dev tools too, but apparently not. He sells business software! Never knew that all these years :-)
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
Not that many devs are dumb enough to try selling dev tools - it's a tough market to crack. :doh:
Anna :rose: Tech Blog | Visual Lint "Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"
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We were going over our analytics the other day and a question came up: "Why don't Indians buy software?". We sell a small to medium sized business application online and we have regular sales in over 70 countries. In our web analytics we see India quite high on the list of countries where people download our software, very high, like fifth out of all countries, as well Indians regularly request a full trial license from us to fully test our software so we know they are engaged and interested. The mystery is that in over a decade in business we still have zero sales to India, not one single one. This despite thousands of downloads by Indians. The countries below India in downloads, even *way* below India still account for a large amount of sales. It's not piracy, we monitor that regularly. We've contacted the Indian people who requested a license as we do everyone and we always get an answer like "We thoroughly checked it out and decided to go with another package". Is there some kind of cultural thing we're not getting? Is it that they will always try to find a local equivalent if they can? Does anyone have a theory as to this mystifying behaviour?
There is no failure only feedback
Are there other countries with emerging economy among the other 70? This could give you some pattern, or at least will exclude the product’s price from the possible reasons.
There is only one Ashley Judd and Salma Hayek is her prophet! Advertise here – minimum three posts per day are guaranteed.
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Not that many devs are dumb enough to try selling dev tools - it's a tough market to crack. :doh:
Anna :rose: Tech Blog | Visual Lint "Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"
:laugh:
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
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Oddly we sell really well all over the world, I'm not exaggerating when I say that, from Anguilla to Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso to Turkey, you name it, India just stands out as being it's own thing entirely and I'm still a bit confused as to why.
There is no failure only feedback
maybe you should look for blunders in the Indian localization then. :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles] Nil Volentibus Arduum
Please use <PRE> tags for code snippets, they preserve indentation, improve readability, and make me actually look at the code.
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Are there other countries with emerging economy among the other 70? This could give you some pattern, or at least will exclude the product’s price from the possible reasons.
There is only one Ashley Judd and Salma Hayek is her prophet! Advertise here – minimum three posts per day are guaranteed.
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India has 1000s of software shops (many of them run out of one room home offices). So there will be cheap alternatives for pretty much every piece of business software you can think of. Of course there may be significant compromises in quality/stability etc. but because they are so cheap, users get value for money.
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
Yeah I guess that explains it. It just seems weird to waste our time and their time when they know they aren't going to buy. Makes me want to just make our website go dark to India to save the hassle all around. I won't but it makes me want to. :) Thanks for the insights Nish.
There is no failure only feedback
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They do (or at least that's our experience, albeit in a different sector - dev tools). For us by far the worst major country for sales is (no surprise) China. I'd be really surprised if piracy isn't a significant factor in that case though; I know our online merchant is really strict about credit card orders from that part of the world.
Anna :rose: Tech Blog | Visual Lint "Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"
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We were going over our analytics the other day and a question came up: "Why don't Indians buy software?". We sell a small to medium sized business application online and we have regular sales in over 70 countries. In our web analytics we see India quite high on the list of countries where people download our software, very high, like fifth out of all countries, as well Indians regularly request a full trial license from us to fully test our software so we know they are engaged and interested. The mystery is that in over a decade in business we still have zero sales to India, not one single one. This despite thousands of downloads by Indians. The countries below India in downloads, even *way* below India still account for a large amount of sales. It's not piracy, we monitor that regularly. We've contacted the Indian people who requested a license as we do everyone and we always get an answer like "We thoroughly checked it out and decided to go with another package". Is there some kind of cultural thing we're not getting? Is it that they will always try to find a local equivalent if they can? Does anyone have a theory as to this mystifying behaviour?
There is no failure only feedback
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Yeah I guess that explains it. It just seems weird to waste our time and their time when they know they aren't going to buy. Makes me want to just make our website go dark to India to save the hassle all around. I won't but it makes me want to. :) Thanks for the insights Nish.
There is no failure only feedback
One thing worth trying is to try and find a reputed software vendor/dealer in India. You may not find a national level vendor but you may find some city specific ones for major cities like Bangalore or Bombay. Offer them a commission and they may help you get some sales. Worth a shot anyway, I mean it's crazy that there are all those millions there and you can't sell to them. The USD to INR conversion is not good though, so even something that's affordable here (say 50-150 bucks) will be quite expensive there (2500-7500 INR). You might want to think of a slightly function-reduced India edition that you can sell for a lower price.
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
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Yeah well China I don't even count at all. Do you have local people in India or just sell direct online?
There is no failure only feedback
We've a couple of resellers over there, but in practice they don't seem to be anywhere near as effective (efficient?) as their US and European counterparts. I imagine it probably won't come as a surprise if I reveal that most of the purchases in that area are on behalf of multinationals rather than SMEs or lone developers.
Anna :rose: Tech Blog | Visual Lint "Why would anyone prefer to wield a weapon that takes both hands at once, when they could use a lighter (and obviously superior) weapon that allows you to wield multiple ones at a time, and thus supports multi-paradigm carnage?"
modified on Tuesday, February 15, 2011 3:24 PM
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maybe you should look for blunders in the Indian localization then. :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles] Nil Volentibus Arduum
Please use <PRE> tags for code snippets, they preserve indentation, improve readability, and make me actually look at the code.
Kinda funny, but less than 1% of software used in India is localized. Everyone uses English language applications. (you won't think that from the grammar used by Indians in forums these days)
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
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One thing worth trying is to try and find a reputed software vendor/dealer in India. You may not find a national level vendor but you may find some city specific ones for major cities like Bangalore or Bombay. Offer them a commission and they may help you get some sales. Worth a shot anyway, I mean it's crazy that there are all those millions there and you can't sell to them. The USD to INR conversion is not good though, so even something that's affordable here (say 50-150 bucks) will be quite expensive there (2500-7500 INR). You might want to think of a slightly function-reduced India edition that you can sell for a lower price.
Regards, Nish
Latest article: Code Project Posts Analyzer for Windows Phone 7 My technology blog: voidnish.wordpress.com
We do have a version that is function reduced and a fraction of the full price and it sells very well in *far* poorer countries than India. The local distributor thing is definitely an idea, we've avoided that successfully since day one but it might be worthwhile. Cheers!
There is no failure only feedback
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maybe you should look for blunders in the Indian localization then. :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles] Nil Volentibus Arduum
Please use <PRE> tags for code snippets, they preserve indentation, improve readability, and make me actually look at the code.
It's not practical or necessary in the case of India. We do French, Spanish, German and English in the "box" and our users can easily translate it right in the interface and have to many other languages. Even Thai which was the most complex language we had to support.
There is no failure only feedback
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We were going over our analytics the other day and a question came up: "Why don't Indians buy software?". We sell a small to medium sized business application online and we have regular sales in over 70 countries. In our web analytics we see India quite high on the list of countries where people download our software, very high, like fifth out of all countries, as well Indians regularly request a full trial license from us to fully test our software so we know they are engaged and interested. The mystery is that in over a decade in business we still have zero sales to India, not one single one. This despite thousands of downloads by Indians. The countries below India in downloads, even *way* below India still account for a large amount of sales. It's not piracy, we monitor that regularly. We've contacted the Indian people who requested a license as we do everyone and we always get an answer like "We thoroughly checked it out and decided to go with another package". Is there some kind of cultural thing we're not getting? Is it that they will always try to find a local equivalent if they can? Does anyone have a theory as to this mystifying behaviour?
There is no failure only feedback
John, It is very intriguing question. I wish I can offer you a simple answer, but given your situation it is plausible. Given your account not even single sale, I have to suspect there is something you did not think or imagine of India. Given the size of it's population (1 Billion +), the size of downloads, the duration and frequency, I ought to assume some sales however small, even if handful. The only thing I can suggest given the number of downloads and interest, you or someone need to take a closer look into the data, target specific region(s) within India and set up a trip. I am sure you will learn a lot more and it may pay back, at least it may answer some of your questions. Good luck and let us know your findings.
Yusuf May I help you?