A couple of months ago, I made a new AIS which was supposed to take 19pages (a project of 45n5), and monetise it by selling a few templates and a detailed eBook showing how to take a typical HTML page, and templatise it to work with the 19pages system.

There are also some bonuses (a bunch of extra templates for buyers to try their new found skills and a desktop based tool for populating content onto a 19pages set-up).

Well, I never really pushed it (I made 1 post about it in a forum, along with a Squidoo lens). The comments received from that 1 post were pretty negative about the 19pages system - I pretty much agreed - I don't believe in the 19pages product - so I am about to pull it off the market.

What I am going to do is send the eBook to my subscribers and give them reselling rights - whether they make any money off it remains to be seen. I'll probably pull the 3 already made templates off the product, and make up the bonuses by adding another 3 templates (hence anyone buying the product still gets "19 templates").

I don't get many failures but this one has been dire. Thankfully I spent less than a handful of hours to set it up, so all is not lost.

I'm kind of annoyed at myself, as I did things all wrong in this instance. I didn't check out the marketplace to see if there would be any buyers - hence, I did not know the market and consequently failed to sell any product.

There is always a silver lining

I span the eBook as shown in a previous post, and have sold multiple copies of the new version (for smarticle site builder) - so far producing well over $1000 worth of income. Top down, chrome spinnin' baby.

What have I learned?

Well, I already know that it's possible to monetise a free product, just look at what I've done with osCommerce. However, I think to make "good" money, the free product needs to be used by a lot of people.

In this respect, 19pages just doesn't cut the mustard. It could be that in a years time, 19pages will be the premier site builder around - but I've already given this AIS 10 weeks and made nothing, which is enough time for me change the whole ethos of this particular AIS.

You won't hit 'em if you don't swing at 'em

I suppose I really shouldn't have bothered with this AIS at all. It was all wrong from the start - I didn't do my research, I just jumped in without preparation.

That said, 19pages *could* have become an instant hit, just like "smarticle", "hypervre" and other such site builders. And, if you don't at least give these things a go, you definitely won't make any money, or in other words;

You won't hit 'em if you don't swing at 'em.
Babe Ruth I think.

Ho hum. I suppose I might sell resell rights to anyone who is interested, get in touch => oscshops AT gmail DOT com