After being merely a concept in my head for nearly a year, I've finally taken the time to create and publish Stefanik Software's first product: MouseSwitcher.

It's a simple Windows app that allows you to set 2 different mouse speeds/sensitivity and switch between them with a hotkey. Ever since I got my laptop and a Logitech V270 Bluetooth Cordless mouse, I have been frustrated with the difference in mouse speeds between the touchpad and the mouse. I use the mouse at my desk, but if I take my laptop into the living room I need to use the touchpad.

Problem is, the touchpad is so slow unless I max out the mouse speed in the control panel. But then when I go back to my desk, the wireless mouse is too fast to control, so it's back to the control panel. Obviously, this is a real pain in the ass.

I looked for a solution, but instead found out this is a pretty common problem, so I created my own solution

http://www.MouseSwitcher.com

I'd appreciate any feedback any of you may have. The site and program are still "unpolished", but functional. I figured I needed to get something out there, otherwise it would just sit for another year while I try to make it "perfect". As they say, release early and often.

Hopefully in the next month I'll be working with my brother or another graphic designer and get a proper logo, icon, color palate, and make the website look slick. I also have a long list of improvements I'd like to make to the program, but I'm only going to put in the time if there's a customer base out there. (because for me, it does everything I need!)

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"To be or not to be, is true" - George Boole

Very nice.

You definitely applied the proper principles of "Don't Make Me Think" to the design of the MouseSwitcher site.

Have you started advertising yet?

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Do it for the Lobster

Quote by Chops

Have you started advertising yet?

I was actually going to ask you about that. From what I've read it can take months to get into the Google search index.

Did you just start advertising right away on AdWords? Do you know when you got indexed? How much of your clicks come from AdWords vs organically from search results?

I'm willing to put the initial investment into AdWords. I've been reading about it and just have to find some more time to get started. It's tough to explain MouseSwitcher in an AdWords ad.

I'm also working on my guerrilla marketing campaign of posting on wildly popular forums like gummlanparty.net to get the word out.

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"To be or not to be, is true" - George Boole

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I was actually going to ask you about that. From what I've read it can take months to get into the Google search index.

Yeah, I wouldn't rely on waiting to get indexed.

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Did you just start advertising right away on AdWords?

Yep. And pretty much as soon as I did, I started getting orders. It was also crazy cheap (like $50/month) when I did it because I didn't have any competition. The competition has driven my CPC up way high, and and I'm paying like $550/month now for adwords, but it's worth it.

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Do you know when you got indexed?

It's hard to say because I had poopinashoe.com which had the link to dkpsystem.com in the copyright notice for a long time before I officially launched. So I have no idea.

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How much of your clicks come from AdWords vs organically from search results?

In the past week, I've had 500 clicks from adwords. A LOT of my traffic comes from direct request, but those direct requests are usually people referring other people, but those originals wouldn't have known about it without Adwords.

Another advertisement syndication thing which I'm considering doing (because it's relatively cheap) is http://www.projectwonderful.com. It's a completely different method.

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Do it for the Lobster

"Elimitate the inconvience and frustration. With MouseSwitcher, you're in control! "

You're welcome

Quote by maztur

"Elimitate the inconvience and frustration. With MouseSwitcher, you're in control! " You're welcome

Thanks. Surprised you didn't catch "inconvenience" as well.

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"To be or not to be, is true" - George Boole

damn! haha, it's too long a word

If you're trying to bump your position on Google searches in general, put adwords and/or their traffic monitoring on your site. I've noticed that if you install their software, they tend to index you faster and can help move you up the ranks.

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Google Ron Paul

Good news, several of my pages are in the google index now. Also showing up in Yahoo. I linked my site from facebook, linkedin, and a couple laptop forums and I think that helped. I also am starting to get referral traffic from those sites and got my first visit from a google search yesterday. Also starting to get visits from outside Wisconsin and outside the US.

Haven't had time to work on my AdWords campaign yet or buy a new icon/logo. Hopefully get a snow day tomorrow, and I could really get some work done.

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"To be or not to be, is true" - George Boole

Any orders yet? It's probably a little early yet, but hey, you never know.

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Do it for the Lobster

No, I'll let you know when.

I didn't have to work (for the man) today, so I was able to clean up the website.

http://www.mouseswitcher.com

Didn't get to adwords yet. Hopefully still this week.

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"To be or not to be, is true" - George Boole

I like the new logo. Did Brian do that?

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Do it for the Lobster

Quote by Chops

I like the new logo. Did Brian do that?

No, I bought some icons from a stock photo website. Cheap and easy and I could get it done today. It isn't exactly what I envisioned, but we'll see if I can generate some cash flow, then I'll think about a redesign for version 2.0.

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"To be or not to be, is true" - George Boole

The new site looks really nice. Probably could have avoided the tables, but it looks nice in any event. The menu on the top could probably use a little stream-lining too, but still, much nicer.

You getting any requests for information? Also, have you uploaded the demo to download.com or betanews.com or anything? Can you even submit your own software to the software sites like that?

One suggestion; specify more clearly what buying a license gets you. Does it include free upgrades? For life? What do I get for my $10? A little flash video of a screen grab showing it in action might be cool too, people love videos

Also, I've read that cross-linking your sites helps bump up your google score, so linking back to stefaniksoftware.com might help out too.

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Ron Paul, Hope for America

Ha! Believe me, I used to be the anti-table pure CSS guy at my work, until we got so many complaints from customers, no matter how much testing we did. IE 6 vs 7, quirks mode vs standard, IE box model vs FF box model, Safari(!), IE 5 on the mac? Sorry you're screwed. With all the CSS hacks and tricks, it's just not worth in my opinion.

Haven't initiated a massive marketing effort yet. I was still cleaning up things on the site last weekend. Haven't submitted to any download sites. I know some of them cost money, and from what I've read its not worth it. I do have a list of blogs and tech sites I wanted to try submitting to. I've posted in forums threads that discuss this exact mouse problem (they are the first results in a google search), and I've gotten referrals from those.

The real key for niche products is showing up in the google search, which I'm moving up in. Don't have a PageRank yet. Was hoping to start an adwords campaign this weekend, but didn't have the time.

My thinking is because the cost of the application is so low and I'm not sure how much higher I could make it, there's not much of a profit margin to work with, so my advertising has to be real cheap. I once I move up in the search rankings, searches will probably be my main source of customers.

If I find some success with this, I may create a more expensive "Pro" version that would add some more Stupid Mouse Tricks and any good customer suggestions. I'd love to be able to make the speed switch automatically when you use a different pointing device.

Good ideas. I like the flash video idea.

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"In the morning if my face is a little puffy I'll put on an ice pack while doing stomach crunches."

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IE 5 on the mac?

Easily the biggest pain in the ass ever. (at least it was when I worked at cayen)

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Do it for the Lobster

Just sold my first copy this morning, and another one this afternoon!

So I've essentially recovered my monthly operating costs. Time to put some effort and money into marketing.

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"In the morning if my face is a little puffy I'll put on an ice pack while doing stomach crunches."

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So I've essentially recovered my monthly operating costs. Time to put some effort and money into marketing.

Congrats mate! That's awesome.

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Do it for the Lobster

Quote by stevo

Just sold my first copy this morning, and another one this afternoon! So I've essentially recovered my monthly operating costs. Time to put some effort and money into marketing.

Rock on man! Any idea where the buyers came from? And have you heard back from either of them (or any of them if you've sold more copies since)?

Also, how are you spending $20 a month? Not on hosting I hope!

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Ron Paul, Hope for America

No, hosting is not close to $20. I got a year of hosting at dreamhost for $10/month. Unlimited domains, so I'll be using that account for future projects. So far I love it, I'll probably renew for longer and cheaper.

And currently I'm using e-junkie to process the orders (through google checkout). This is only because it is the only thing I can find that will call a webservice URL to generate a license key on the fly during checkout, and handles emailing the key, and it was dead simple to get setup. It is a flat $5/month, unlimited transactions. Their admin interface could be better, and I'd like more customization, but it works. If I had the time I could write my own checkout system that uses the google checkout API. If I did, that might be a product itself worth trying to sell. There are lots of options out there for setting up shopping carts and stores for physical products, but not a lot for digital products.

Google checkout takes $0.20 + 2% per transaction, so that's about $0.40.

And then I spent about $15 on stock icons for the website, which was well worth it.

No spending on advertising yet.

First 2 sales were from Indiana and California, another sale yesterday from England, so I'm officially international. I'm actually thinking about how I could run an effective foreign marketing effort, with the weak dollar, $10 is only like $6 to them.

And I am getting a nice chunk of visitors from western europe. I'm using google analytics to monitor everything, which is really slick and a lot better than it was a year ago.

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"In the morning if my face is a little puffy I'll put on an ice pack while doing stomach crunches."