Advice on my new venture and website

[darren atkinson]

Hi Everyone,

I post here from time to time, but read daily.

I have been working flat out on my new venture / website and I would be grateful for your advice or comments on the new website and the idea in general.

www.helpsheets.co.uk

Basically I am going to sell computer help tutorials and guides through my website. Prices start at just 50p with instant downloads and SMS txt message billing included.

The first phase of getting the website up and running is now complete, any comments both positive and negative are welcomed.

Thanks

Darren

[creative-keyrings]

Hi Darren,

First impressions are good, it's a clean and no fuss website and also is easy on the eye.

Im pretty sure you will do well with this if it's marketed correctly.

And when your fully up and running why not invest in some promo keyrings for only £49! :):):):)

Well Done!

Regards,

Callum Slade

[Rob]

The site looks good, and it’s clear what the visitor gets and needs to do. My only concern is the offer, which is obviously the crux of the site. Here are my thoughts:

1. A number of your solution sheets are available via the help facility in Windows. I can access them for free and much quicker so why should I buy it?
2. For an item being charged 50p I don’t know if I could be bothered getting my card out to buy credit to get something worth 50p. Is it worth the hassle?
3. I didn’t go far into the site but how much credit do I have to buy? Am I likely to use it all? This is another barrier to people signing up.

I see you are offering some bundles and I think this is the route to go down. Find out a list of top problems people have when it comes to PC’s and write more substantial documents which you sell an a mini-report or e-book.

How about a complete start guide to PC’s; how to get started on e-mail; how to troubleshoot; how to protect your PC against attacks etc?

An e-book or report, charged at say £4.50 or more, is more likely to get me spending than 50p is.

Sorry to blow your model away. You’ve got something here for beginners but you need to re-look at it.

[creospace]

I would say all the information is avaialble via the web or free on geek fileld forums full of people only too happy to solve your problem, why would anyone pay ?

I dont' mean to be negative but it's the first thought that crosses my mind.

Gary

[darren atkinson]

Hi again,

Thanks for all your feedback.

Rob:

You are correct in saying that some of the sheets have similar content to the help facility in Windows. I guess the point in people buying it is that they are getting the info in a much easier to understand format, with a bit more detail.

Your points are all valid and are things I have considered. I agree bundles might be the way to go. I am going to monitor things for the time being, while building up the collection of help sheets available.

Thanks again for your input.

creospace:

You are correct in that most of the information is available somewhere on the Internet. It is actually harder than you would think to find decent quality help guides on the Internet though.

When you do find help web sites, they are always packed with adverts and look poor when printed out, and you can not save the info electronically.

Thanks for your thoughts.

[Rob]

Darren, I typed this reply offline before you posted your comment. I support what you say. Here's my additional thoughts ... and by the way stick with because you are starting to head in the right direction ...

================================

I kind of agree with creospace. Yes the information is freely available but it can take time to locate, posting the question on a forum etc. If the subject is big enough to warrant buying a report or e-book for a reasonable price then there are many people out there who go for it in order to save time. Surfing for one subject can end up consuming precious minutes and even hours!

My point is the perception of value – something charged at 50p has little or no perceived value attached to it – you may as well give it away free. However, something charged at £5 or £10 has a perceived value to someone and they are more likely to pay the higher price than 50p provided it solves their problem.

[darren atkinson]

Rob:

Thanks for taking the time to comment for me.

The site currently is the first incarnation of my idea. I have further thoughts on developing it, including offering different formats for the help sheets. Possibly including those CBT videos on certain subjects.

Then there is the possibility of selling CD's / DVD's with the help content on them. I do feel I need to seriously build up the content first though.

It may be that the main items for sale on the site are 'bundles' or eBooks, i.e. collections of information on a certain subject, and the individual help sheets will just be available as a side line.

I am quite open to changing almost anything regarding my business, as long as it is for the right reasons.

Thanks again for your time and honesty.

Darren

[mattk]

Without being overly harsh, the factsheets you have are pretty bread-and-butter and similar help can be found on a million Web sites.

Why not try aiming a bit higher? Look at the threads people are asking about on here, these are things that people want help in and are often struggling to find useful advice.

Wireless networks, Google AdWords, search engine optimisation, Firefox, Linux, open-source etc.

[darren atkinson]

mattk:

You are correct, I have recently been concentrating on developing the website and as such have only got a limited amount of basic help sheets available so far.

I do intend to cover things such as wireless networking, skype (Internet telephony), search engines, and other topics in the near future.

Thanks for the suggestions.

Darren

[mattk]

yep, Skype is a very good one to look at too

[Andriy]

Colors of your website very similar to those used by people advertising £300-700 per day for 1 hour work.
But probably it only me. Just an opinion.

[Real World Hypnotherapy]

Darren

Al on this forum sells computer training CD roms etc, it would be an idea to get in contact with him for a joint venture.

His e-mail address is asteeleleith@gmail.com

Could work out really well for you both.

Matt, MK Printing

[darren atkinson]

Andriy:

I designed and programmed the website from scratch by myself. Which other website does it remind you of? I'd be interested to see.

MK Printing:

Thanks for this info.

Darren

[WakingDragon]

Years ago I worked on something similar for Microsft UK. We did loads of usability testing and focus groups and all that malarky and spent a lot of time and money developing something pretty hot (which never got used but for a whole host of reasons irrelevant to this).

There is probably still a pretty big demand out there for this kind of material. Have you looked in WHSmiths for print magazines that do the same thing? They have names like "Easy PC" and "PC for beginners" etc.

It is also worth finding people who are your likely target audience and seeing what content would suit them (and how to position it).

I disagree with the comments that a) this is in Windows help and b) you can find it on the web. Windows help is awful and is hardly layman's terms. An experienced web use might be able to find this stuff for free, but inexperienced people will not and the price is low enough to make it worthwhile paying even if you can.

Thinking it through logically would also be a good step. Your first XP article is not about installing it or minimum system requirements but about changing display properties - why? its not the first problem people have! Might be that haven't got round to it yet.

Your design and menus systems are quite unfriendly to beginners. You want stuff like "Total Beginners" sections including articles like "So you just bought Windows XP and want to install it?" Cheesy but simple and clear.

All in all though it is a good idea although I have no idea how you would go about marketing it.

[Andriy]

darren atkinson

I would say color similar to that of microsoft and some popular related sites would be the better options. You straight away think that you get to the right place.

[easyasit]

Hi darren

I have PM'd you :)

Al

[darren atkinson]

WakingDragon:

Thanks for your comments. I am interested to know more about the work you did for Microsoft UK, can you give me any further details on things like type of content, or the distribution model?

PM me or post here if you would be willing to give me some more details.

Thanks for the advice anyway, you are correct when you assume I have not got round to putting the majority of tutorials on there yet. I have lots of ideas for help sheets, but more are always welcome!

Al: I have sent you a PM

Thanks

Darren

[WakingDragon]

Of course. It was part of the Support site before they globalised the whole thing. As you can imagine, MS gets millions of calls from irate customers doing something pretty damn easy to solve. All they wanted to do was get a greater number of them resolved online - so the idea was to do a "for dummies" set of guides to the most common problems as thrown up by their support dept.

It was only ever to be distributed through the ms/support site, but as I say got canned cos of the globalisation.

What was very intersting was that the magazine that we contacted had never given thought to an online distribution model and so were happy to just give the content to us at the time (doubt you would be so lucky today!)

The content was laid out like a comic book inside with the story running from left to right across the page and about 3 lines of cells per page. Never did they use just text. That seemed pretty optimum to allow easy reading, but required some rethinking to transfer to the web.

The types of tutorials were basically what I would consider total novice stuff, but that's what some people need. Even pros have gaps that have formed at the beginning. Help with choosing a computer to buy would be an excellent "bundle" of guides (including 'Guide to USB', 'Choosing a Printer', etc). The content MS had was not as sophisticated but yours should be as you intend to sell it.

But it does need to start right at the very beginning so that customers can maximise their purchase through you as a cycle - leaving at the end of the cycle proficient in what they need to be.

[darren atkinson]

WakingDragon:

Thanks for this information, it is encouraging in a way to know that Microsoft spent a lot of time on this type of idea.

There are many areas where this venture could develop itself, I have many many ideas for expansion.

Thanks for your insights.

Darren

[WakingDragon]

Anytime. Happy to be of help :)