Price of an application

[GL]

Hello

I have developed an Access application. This application is unique of its
kind and took me about 800h to finish it. It includes 50 forms, 34 queries,
30 reports and a lot of VBA code. Now a company is interested to buy it and
use it on a network by ten of its managers. My problem is that I have been
involved into selling software and I don’t know what price I could ask for
that. The software has a very specialized area of application so I could
never sell more than three copies.
Can anybody give me a rough idea about how much I could ask for such an
application?

Thank you

GL

 

[Al Camp]

GL,
A very difficult issue... with many varying opinions, I'm sure. But, I
don't think too many folks responding to your question would want to commit
to a specific price.
I'm not being critical here, but... perhaps you should have had a fairly
good idea what the value of such an application was before investing almost
a year's work on it. That said...

I think the real question should be... "How much value does this product
provide the customer?"
A specialized product like your app should not be solely priced according
to the raw materials (your hours) it took to produce it... but according to
the "value" it provides the buyer. Bottled water costs about $ .03 cents to
produce, but sells for $ .089.

First, consider the "intrinsic" value. If your application saves each
manager 8 hours per week in raw labor, multiplied by 10 managers, multiplied
by X years... what's that worth? And given that intrinsic labor value,
versus your price, when might the client expect to start getting positive
return from the purchase of your program?
For example, if you pay $5000 for a new furnace for your home, you
usually expect to start seeing a payback after 3 years or so, through lower
heating costs.

Also consider that there are other "non-intrinsic" values to be
considered. If your app provides the customer the information and control
they need to eventually increase sales, identify and solve business issues,
improve product delivery... etc... etc.. what's that value?

And last but not least, consider that your app may not have any
competition. If it's highly specialized, or highly customized for your
particular target client, that should be considered, and pricing adjusted
accordingly.

These are some of the basic guidlines I use when considering pricing.
(actually, most of my work is more "contractual" in nature) I'll be very
interested to see what other folks might have to contribute to this subject.