Developers as sales representatives

Hello all,

In chatting with another developer today, we were talking about the
pricing of FCS (soon to be FMS 2). Not to get into another gripe
session about the pricing, but I realized that as much as anyone,
developers are indeed FCS sales reps.

Here's why. When we develop an application using FCS the client is
either going to have to do one of the following:
1. Buy their own FCS package
2. Use one we supply on a Lease-Our-App basis--both the FCS and
service, and the more clients we have, the more we'll have to buy
3. Hook up with a third-party such as Media Temple for service,
which in turn buys from MM

All of this is relevant to the pricing because the FCS price is based
on (among other things) cost of marketing and cost of sales. By not
factoring in the FREE marketing and sales the developers add to the
overall marketing/sales costs, I think that MM may have missed a
crucial bottom-line issue.

If one figures it takes X sales call, and X marketing costs to sell
one FCS packages to a single corporate customer, the pricing may make
a lot of sense. However, without good apps, especially those that are
made to spec, not too many sales are going to be made even if PT
Barnum is making the pitch. We all want MM to prosper financially,
and we want the same for ourselves. With the current pricing strategy
a lot of the middle market and small business market gets ignored --
it is lost. However, since they are not a target market for MM
doesn't mean they cannot be for developers, and in my case at least,
are. If we could better afford FCS packages, so could our clients. At
the same time, the market would expand without a dime coming out of
MM's marketing/sales costs.

To this end, I am hoping that the new pricing model will quit
charging for BW (which we end up being double-billed for) and provide
more options for number of connections that we can work with on a
sliding scale and keep playing the role of sales reps for MM.

Cheers,
Bill

bill sanders | www.sandlight.com | bloomfield, ct | 860-242-2260

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