Track your screensavers (or any shareware of yours) installs
Ok guys, as I have received several request to ask how I could track efficiently my screensavers installs, I am going to share my script.
I immediately wrote that script because when it comes to the web, it is essential to track your projects, for 2 reasons:
1) It is always encouraging to see that people are actually using the stuff you make, so it is a good motivation to go on.
2) When you do something, you must measure if that works or not. If it works, do it more, if it doesn’t do something else.
Most of the time you will read blogs of “internet gurus”, they talk about their projects which are so successful, with thousands of subscribers, thousands of $$$, and you think “I wish I was bright like them and know what I need to do to be successful on the web”.
The truth is : They didn’t know more than you do when they started, and even now when they start a project, they usually don’t know how successful it is going to be. The trick is : they just try! And then they track how their project is going, and if it is good, they can brag about it! But be certain that for one success, we all have 10 failures. The good thing is that on the internet, you can fail and it is not the end of the world. Just try something else. (This rule applies to real life too, by the way)
Anyway, enough said, you can download the script here to Track your screensavers installs.
Please note that it can be used for any software that you would write !
It is not rocket-science, the principle is the following:
Once you have your software/screensaver ready, you must create an installer. There are many softwares to do that : InnoSetup, Nsis, etc.
You can make your installer execute a windows command at the end of the setup (if your installer maker doesn;t support it, throw it away and use another one).
The command you want to execute is
This command will open an internet page to an advertising/Thank you/readme page.
This ad page simply tracks what software you just installed.
I included another page that will calculate several stats about your installations.
You need PHP/MySql to put the pages on your server.
Just read the instructions in the zip file and have fun with it!
Side note: This script is very useful when you bundle a pay-per-install program such as Zango or Rasermedia, because you can compare the stats they will give you and how many screensavers you know have really been installed.
Nice, thanks! I’m going to try this with my next batch.
yes that is good to know how many programs are installed,but what if user is not connected to internet when hi installs your program?Than an emty IE page will open and user will think that your software is doing something bad or ilegal
If the user is not on the internet, it will give him an error page indeed. I always put in my setup a popup that says that an ads page will be opened at the end of the installation, so if there is an error, the user will not worry about it.
And if the computer is not connected to internet at all, it means this install will never generate any money so I don’t care if it is not logged.
It would be easy to add some tracking php code in your “google” home page, so the first time the user opens it, it logs him. And one week later, it logs him too. You would know how many people install your homepage, and how many people keep it! But for that I rely on the stats script, it is not 100% accurate, but it gives me enough info to measure the effectiveness of my homepage!