It's finally out there - now all I have to do is sit back, relax, and watch the millions roll-in.
OK, now that the brief fantasy ended..it's time to sit back, work hard on promoting it, improve on key features that current beta users are asking for, and make it a nifty, small, affordable but truly handy time management software.
What can I say -- please tell your friends, co-workers, managers, barbers, and everyone else you see! :)
Sunday, 31 May 2009
Sunday, 10 May 2009
Public beta now available
So, one small step for man but a giant leap for workwolfkind. The beta is now public - go to http://www.workwolf.com/buy/try-painless-time-tracker.html and give it a try! Your feedback is very welcome.
I'm hoping to get the paid version out by end of the month.
I'm hoping to get the paid version out by end of the month.
Friday, 8 May 2009
little things...big time
My 1.0 version is almost ready. I mean, it's pretty much ready. I've had a couple of awesome beta testers who used it, gave great feedback, and are using it for a couple of weeks already. It's been stable, and I've so far not had to release any updates - which augurs well for a desktop product.
All I need to complete now is a half-decent reliable installer that doesn't overwrite the existing database (ouch!) on update/install etc. and I haven't been able to take that one step and get it out to the wild wild web.
But I promise..just a couple more days. But you always wonder how little things sometimes...take big time!
All I need to complete now is a half-decent reliable installer that doesn't overwrite the existing database (ouch!) on update/install etc. and I haven't been able to take that one step and get it out to the wild wild web.
But I promise..just a couple more days. But you always wonder how little things sometimes...take big time!
Wednesday, 22 April 2009
The power of managing time
We've all heard about 'time is money', which is true in a variety of ways. But think of it in simple terms, let's say you make about 60,000$ while being employed (or perhaps on your own little business 5 days a week)
If you somehow figured to reduce your wasted minutes by 24 minutes a day, you would actually earn about 3,000$ more in the year. That's a simplistic view of how saving time translates immediately to money - but the reality is the ability to better manage our work time, analyze it and improve upon it can create big changes in terms of how you are perceived at workplace, or how you can manage your business by allocating time to where it matters.
Time management is often made to seem like this huge complex concept where you have to track everything you do and kill yourself in the details. In reality, a lot of people do just fine with little adjustments as long as they have a reasonably good view of their work habits. Theoretically, you can say "I know how I spend my day!" but in practice, just seeing a set of numbers or a simple graph can throw surprising results on your work habits. Just tuning it a bit can yield interesting results - for e.g what happens if you turn off outlook email notifications? Try that a few days - and check email only once every 45 minutes. You will probably create yourself a 'free' time of about 20 minutes a day from just that. Then there are other techniques...which is for next time!
If you somehow figured to reduce your wasted minutes by 24 minutes a day, you would actually earn about 3,000$ more in the year. That's a simplistic view of how saving time translates immediately to money - but the reality is the ability to better manage our work time, analyze it and improve upon it can create big changes in terms of how you are perceived at workplace, or how you can manage your business by allocating time to where it matters.
Time management is often made to seem like this huge complex concept where you have to track everything you do and kill yourself in the details. In reality, a lot of people do just fine with little adjustments as long as they have a reasonably good view of their work habits. Theoretically, you can say "I know how I spend my day!" but in practice, just seeing a set of numbers or a simple graph can throw surprising results on your work habits. Just tuning it a bit can yield interesting results - for e.g what happens if you turn off outlook email notifications? Try that a few days - and check email only once every 45 minutes. You will probably create yourself a 'free' time of about 20 minutes a day from just that. Then there are other techniques...which is for next time!
Wednesday, 8 April 2009
Why another time management software? aren't there enough of them?
if you were ever to tell someone 'I'm creating another time management / time tracker software' you'd probably get a dirty look.
"What? Aren't there enough out there?"
Search Google for time tracking software and you'll get hundreds. So the question is, why even create one? That's a question I've asked myself. I then developed it because I think there is always space for something that has benefits that no other software provides. This post isn't going into an advertising lecture - but just that the fact that there exists competition doesn't mean you shouldn't get in. Ultimately it's about differentiation - does my software have benefits that users value?
It's also a mistake in these cases to think of sizing the market - sort of saying if there are X desktops with Windows XP and Vista and Y% of those buy my software, I will be a millionaire! It doesn't quite work that way. My focus will be to see what specific benefits and features of my software users seek - Analytics are a good way to figure that out. That's a starting point.
The good news is that even before my software goes commercial and my site is actually advertised (by different means), it's actually coming on the top search results for specific queries. That means my SEO isn't too bad. I've also had some users email me asking when it will be released - and that also indicates there are benefits that some users value.
To me, that's good enough to keep going.
Coming: How easy is it to create a simple software like a time tracker? not so easy...I discovered!
"What? Aren't there enough out there?"
Search Google for time tracking software and you'll get hundreds. So the question is, why even create one? That's a question I've asked myself. I then developed it because I think there is always space for something that has benefits that no other software provides. This post isn't going into an advertising lecture - but just that the fact that there exists competition doesn't mean you shouldn't get in. Ultimately it's about differentiation - does my software have benefits that users value?
It's also a mistake in these cases to think of sizing the market - sort of saying if there are X desktops with Windows XP and Vista and Y% of those buy my software, I will be a millionaire! It doesn't quite work that way. My focus will be to see what specific benefits and features of my software users seek - Analytics are a good way to figure that out. That's a starting point.
The good news is that even before my software goes commercial and my site is actually advertised (by different means), it's actually coming on the top search results for specific queries. That means my SEO isn't too bad. I've also had some users email me asking when it will be released - and that also indicates there are benefits that some users value.
To me, that's good enough to keep going.
Coming: How easy is it to create a simple software like a time tracker? not so easy...I discovered!
Sunday, 5 April 2009
The first post
As WorkWolf nears its launch date, I thought it fit to finally get a blog up and ready. This isn't going to be one of those 'I did that and I did this', but more focused on the product itself.
If you stumbled here by mistake - at least give a shot to http://www.workwolf.com!
If you stumbled here by mistake - at least give a shot to http://www.workwolf.com!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
feeds
Posts
All Comments