You have finally finished the program you’ve been working on, and now it’s ready to be sold. How do you get your fledgling business off the ground successfully, though? When you create a sound business plan centered around selling software, marketing to your target audience and building strategic partnerships, you’re on your way to a potentially lucrative and fulfilling business venture.

The Key to Successfully Selling Software: Marketing

You may have just finished a program capable of revolutionizing your share of the market, but you can’t make money if you can’t make a sale. Your audience may be waiting for a product just like yours, but they can’t buy it if they’re not aware it even exists. This is where marketing becomes a vital part of your overall sales strategy.

Your organic reach, or the number of people in your extended social network, will make up the full scope of your marketing ability if you don’t seek outside help. When faced with the prospect of expanding reach, some content creators and merchants will choose to pay for things like banner ads and sponsored social media posts. These can be helpful in many ways, but they also come with a few drawbacks for the average new merchant. First and foremost, they tend to be quite expensive. In order to see a meaningful impact, you may be forced to make a sizable up-front investment. Unfortunately, there’s also no guarantee you’ll actually see a return on this investment. For the vast majority of content creators who sell software, marketing plans which cost money only when they’re successful tend to be a better choice.

Affiliate marketing programs are ideal for anyone working in online sales, but especially for newcomers seeking to expand reach and invest wisely. When you work with an affiliate marketing partner, you’re connecting with someone who already has an established web presence. You can profit from the audience-building work they’ve already done without spending money for targeted ads. Your affiliates will promote your software, marketing to the people you most want to reach. They’ll only get paid when their work results in a sale, so you’re not paying for potentially ineffective promos.

Consolidating Tools and Services for Sales Success

You’re a software designer, not a marketing and sales professional. Your time is best spent developing new products and establishing your brand. For this reason, it’s important to streamline your sales process to save time and energy. The most efficient sales option is to work with a dedicated eCommerce platform to manage the mechanics of online sales. These services combine secure file hosting and automated content delivery with payment processing tools connected with trusted vendors like PayPal and Google Wallet. Platforms like PayLoadz.com also include built-in access to an affiliate network, which further simplifies your entire business model. You create and upload software; marketing professionals help to sell it for you. When you partner with the right tool and service providers, you can build a successful business from the ground up more easily than you ever dreamed.