Downloads as a serious business tool.

[SJ77]

I am really getting into using downloads to try and operate an actual business. As I do so, I will try to provide feedback as it comes up.

First thing, it seems there is tons of opportunity to improve the metrics and reporting available in downloads. I will just stick to this one thing for now. (as there are other opportunities for improvement I can bring up later in a different post)

The income graph, is something I like. However, I have some suggestions.

• Change the word income to "Sales"
• Expand the graph to track 3 things
  • Sales
  • Volume
  • Profit

Being able to track those 3 metrics would be incredibly helpful. Sales is nice but it doesn't account for the accrual the developers "contributors" are collecting in their account. This is where if we could deduct that amount, we could get a good estimation of our actual profit. (at least prior to PayPal fees etc.)

Also the volume metric would be great to see a count of how many purchases are actually made independent of price. Then if we have a marketing campaign out in the market, and sales are increasing, we would be able to see if our marketing efforts are driving more purchases or if it's just a matter of prices going up in our marketplace.

Adding these metrics would make downloads much more robust and able to be used more effectively as a serious business tool.

Thank you