Two new bundles were announced this week: “The Indie Mac Gift Pack”:indiemacgiftpack.com (6 great Mac apps for $60) and the “Fusion Ads Holiday Bundle”:fusionads.net/bundle/ (an assortment of web design-related apps, icons, and more for $79). I love apps in both of these bundles and recommend you check them out, buy what you need, or gift them to a friend. There’s a fear among many developers that a bundle can cheapen the healthy Mac software market, but both these bundles avoid that with a higher price and the feel of being put together carefully.
As a comparison, here’s a “Macworld article on holiday bundles from 2009”:www.macworld.com/article/1… That collection seems kind of random despite several good apps in the list.
And sales for the Indie Mac Gift Pack are split evenly to the developers, so we know it’ll be a nice revenue boost for them during the holidays. From the FAQ:
"Hey... you're ripping these developers off, aren't you?" ... "No... we ARE these developers. Our six small companies decided to band together and do a promotion, to see if it works for us. We're splitting all the proceeds evenly. There's no middleman here."
I’ve never participated in a bundle, but after some of the “MacHeist controversy”:homepage.mac.com/simx/tech… I developed a set of rules that I run Riverfold promotions on. These are the easy things that I can always say “yes” to without much thought:
Coupons are great. My coupons rarely expire and I don’t care if sites like “retailmenot.com”:www.retailmenot.com keep a list of them. Saving a few bucks might be the difference between someone buying my software and not.
Giving out software to bloggers is great. Inspired by “Wil Shipley’s C4 talk”:www.viddler.com/explore/r… I’ve “blogged about this”:www.manton.org/2008/04/w… Apple employees get free licenses too.
Small promotions are great. I freely give out copies to small sites that want to give away licenses of my software to encourage people to post comments. I think readers interpret these (correctly) as software developers doing something generous for a small site, instead of the gut reaction when you see software listed on MacZot or MacUpdate Promo (“are sales so bad they had to sell their software for half price?").
Charity is great. I loved being a part of “Indie+Relief”:www.indierelief.com/, the Pan-Mass Challenge auctions, and other bundles that go directly to a cause. Just like smaller promotions, these are good for users (deals on software), good for developers (helps with marketing), good for charity (donated money), and good for the software market (these aren’t developers who are making a sacrifice because their sales aren’t doing well — it’s charity).
Now that I’ve seen a bundle like the “Indie Mac Gift Pack”:indiemacgiftpack.com, I think I can more clearly judge a unique bundle opportunity when it comes along. Does it minimize the middleman? Does it respect the individual apps as peers? Does it use the total bundle price to underscore the value of software rather than cheapen it? Then it’s probably a good deal for everyone.
