If I had a million dollars (to grow Logos Bible Software)...

I'm working on strategic planning for Logos. With Logos 4 shipped it's time (for me) to start thinking about what's next.

(Yes, our team is diligently working on the improvements we all want for Logos 4: parity on the Mac, printing, missing add-ins, etc. My planning isn't slowing that down -- it's figuring out what we'll be working on once those things are done.)

I've love to have your input on the process.

One of the exercises I've used at planning retreats in the past is to have everyone make a plan for investing $1 million: what would be the best use of a $1 million investment at Logos, and have the greatest return?

For example (and for cost reference)... this might enable:

Keyboarding the entire Patrologia Graeca
Hiring 10 more software developers for one year
Hiring 15 new sales representatives for one year
Mailing $50 to every seminary student in north america (20,000) to entice them to watch our introductory video
Building Logos compatible editions of 300 public domain books and giving them away to get people on our platform
Mailing $2 to every pastor in north america (500,000) to entice them to watch our introductory video

What's your idea?

And what if was $10 million?

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Comments

Dan Sheppard

What's your idea?

And what if was $10 million?

Bob-

Do I get to KEEP any of it? I had to ask.

The reason I originally purchased Logos Software, was that the company I was previously with, had insufficient resources available to me.

From many posts I have read, I see that there are tons of Arminians and Calvinists, who purchase your software. But being Missouri Synod Lutheran, I was happy to find so many things available to me, which came from Concordia Publishing.

To keep this brief, I would like to see the access to more LCMS (Lutheran Church Missouri Synod) resources. There are a lot of scholars and seminarians,who have written lots of material. I see a few selections here and there, but by no means, at the level that I see of say, Calvin.

Of your suggestions above, the only one that appeals to me, is hiring SOME LEVEL of software developers, since that seems to be where your bread and butter lies. I would think that your Customer Service dept is always a good place for reinforcement.

Since you have ventured into iPhone, I suggest some more support in getting the apps working and fully functional.

I would also like to see more selection of artwork we could use in Bible study handouts, etc. I am doing one on the Book of Daniel and find the artwork a bit skimpy, even on the Internet.

Thanks for a fine product. I am impressed with the "Word Puzzle" feature. If nothing else, it is great fun to watch the letters buzzing around. Perhaps when I retire.....

Dan Sheppard

John Fidel

Hi Bob,

I guess the term grow Logos Bible Software means different things to different people. Looking at your list my comments are as follows:

1. Interesting, but with a limited market would not grow Logos.

2. This would provide a faster path to 5.0, but is the vision for 5.0 already firm so the new developers would provide a product that could be sold in the year they were employed?

3. Sales reps would grow Logos market if they were productive and efficient in their marketing.

4. Giving 50 to every seminary student would be a really bad idea, just to watch an introductory video. Spend the money on 3 above and provide aggressive academic discounts with the diference.

5. Public domain books are available for free already and is probably not Logos market, although a few free books would be cool for your existing customers.

6. Same as 4 above.

My ideas will have to come later, my wife is calling me....

NetworkGeek

Good question and thanks for asking us Bob!

I will keep reading and maybe post another thought and/or maybe someone else's ideas will spur another idea of my own, but here's what I think about now for longer term:

I am not sure how much you have invested in this, but to me what really makes Logos the product go is resources. They drive the revenue, the upgrades, and fund the advances in the engine I suspect. Yet it seems to be the most labor intensive part of the whole business. There are resources that are "under contract" that have been 3 years or more and are still not out. That's a large backlog of revenue!

I suspect this is a very time consuming labor-intensive effort to take a resource and make an eResource out of it, and technology has a difficult time scanning/recognizing some texts. What if, just like there was a major "next generation" of Logos that will last it the next 5-10 years in fundamental architecture, there was a comparable "next gen" upgrade to how you prepare resources to reduce the labor, hence reducing errors, hence reducing cost? This would be a multi-year effort - advanced AI for recognizing text, new tagging that is much more comprehensive, maybe spending money with someone like Google to get into truly advanced search engine advancements (maybe paying them for some of their code if you haven't already) to aid in the research process for the best ways to "tag everything" for the future? It would also have next-gen tagging (see below for more on that), better technologies to do less indexing and generate less data on the user computer.

This next gen vision would also include next generation tagging of text - because future features will need to be able to answer questions and relate resources in new ways, especially if you want to bring new markets of users to the product. For example, one day, with WPF as the base so you could design very sophisticated graphical software, could a casual user ("my grandmom") who has bibles and tons of devotionals in their system because its cheaper to do, just paint graphically a query to classify statement in my devotional library about a given Bible story where the system tells me stuff like a quick summary of the theology of the article based on words and word phrases that the system set up?

All the existing resources would need to be redone in the new technology as well.

While I think this is well beyond the $1 million and is surely a multi-year vision, think of this - what if everything under contract in prepub right now could be published within 3 months of today, with minimal labor cost thanks to some new software? How much acceleration of revenue does that bring into this year?

J.R. Miller

Not knowing all the market data and technical issues in play, I would prioritize the following.

1. Mac developers to get L4mac up to complete parity ASAP.

2. Marketing with direct representatives to Mac community.

3. Creating marketing opportunities in Christian high schools (users of the future), colleges, and Bible Schools). Based on my learning style, asking folks to watch a video about Logos 4 is less effective (I think) than sending reps to do a direct demo, but I have no stats to back up my perception.

4. Website improvements to ensure pre-pubs and all orders can be downloaded with L4 and no more requirements to ship. Also integrating POS options for locked books into the L4 UI.

5. Hire part time web developer/moderator just for the Forum ( and wiki) which is a large part of the Logos support strategy and needs some attention.

Blessings

Dave Cotner

I would reinvest it in my current employees. Training, retreats, seminars, upgraded heath benefits, retirement plans, or anything to movitate and encourage them. You will never maintain a great product without great, trained, and content employees (and their families). Their investment back into the company will not be able to be measured in dollars and cents.

Blessings,

Dave

SteveF

What's your idea?

Although no one "paid" me to watch a video, a Christian Book Store owner did give me a "free" sampler. (He paid for it). Back then (15 years ago?) Logos 1?, 2? was not too much more than a concordance program. In addition a fellow seminary student recommended it in a very winsome NON pressurized way.

To keep any recent momentum gained from Logos 4 perhaps it would be good to:

A. expand customer service (to deal with 'shell-shocked' former L3'ers) &

B. add extra programmers (to get the " former" features implemented ASAP.)

OR Use the $1 , 10 or ? millions to answer the 2 main responses I meet in trying to attract folks to Logos:

1. It is too confusing (I realize Logos 4 was an attempt to deal with this)

2. It is too expensive. ( I finally settled on Logos in spite of that - after checking out most of the competition - because of its HUGH library of search-able resources).

Thanks for asking.

Steve

ps. And yes, I realize that NONE of this is "cutting edge."

Jim VanSchoonhoven

Well, I believe once you have Logos 4 complete, you will have the best educational program ever built to study the scriptures, but people do not see the need for it, or they do not know the product is out there and what is possible.

I believe your efforts need to be on going out to the body of Christ and teaching them how they can study the scripture on a level they had never even dreamed was possible. Offer to send out well trained part time or full time trainers, to come to their fellowships and introduce them to electronic bible study. Show them a whole new level of training can be done in the local fellowships, if pastors, elders and others can be shown how they can go deeper into God's word than ever before, and that everyone can do it.

Part of the draw back for most folks is they have no idea how Logos can help them to study the bible and number two they have no idea why programs cost so much. You can over come these things by helping them to see the value of Logos 4 and also by taking steps that would allow some one a cheap way to build their library even while they have a very limited cash flow, or while they are learning the value of Logos 4.

You could do this by providing easy to use PBB programs on low end products which will allow anyone that want to, to start building their own public domain books for their program.

I am willing to spend 1000's of dollars on Logos because I have learned to see the value of the program. I have seen this value by using it!!! I have a very good free program called the Word, with nearly 1000 resources in it, but I am willing to pay your company 1000's of dollars on top of that because I have learned how much more your program can provide to me in my studies.

This came about because I have seen how much more your program can do, but also because of the value of your many copyrighted resources that I can not use in my free program.

Allowing people to start out building their own public domain books will encourage them to use your system and once that gets going, a person becomes willing to pay the price for bigger and bigger packages of copyrighted books.

Call it what ever you want but you need to go out and reach people and show them a need for your product and how to use it, from then on they will see the need for more and more resources.

In Christ,

Jim

Terry Poperszky

but people do not see the need for it, or they do not know the product is out there and what is possible.

I believe your efforts need to be on going out to the body of Christ and teaching them how they can study the scripture on a level they had never even dreamed was possible. Offer to send out well trained part time or full time trainers, to come to their fellowships and introduce them to electronic bible study. Show them a whole new level of training can be done in the local fellowships, if pastors, elders and others can be shown how they can go deeper into God's word than ever before, and that everyone can do it.

AMEN! Preach it Brother!

Sorry, got carried away, but this is exactly where my heart is. The way to grow Logos Software is to grow the market. People need to have a hunger for God's Word before Logos is anything more than another gadget sitting on the shelf. How many Bibles are sold, how many are actually read. I have upgraded my package twice in the last two months, yet my Logos sat untouched on my computer for the previous year. Why did I upgrade now? I have rediscovered my love affair with God's Word.

Mark Smith

what would be the best use of a $1 million investment at Logos, and have the greatest return?

Bob,

What is Logos in business for? (What's your business?)

What is your vision for the impact Logos as a company and a product will have, given the resources to accomplish the vision? Who is it having that impact on? How is that being accomplished?

What is the return on investment that you'd most like to see? That you think the Lord would most like to see?

What is the single most important thing you would like to accomplish in this business?

Can't tell you how to spend money wisely (even a dollar) unless I know what you are trying to do.

Jeremy

Keyboarding the entire Patrologia Graeca

This and the entire Loeb classical library.

DominicM

First: fill the holes in your package base:

You need a introductory level product like the old $9.99 one nelson used to do, with say ASV,KJV, a couple of comentaries, strongs and a bible dictionary, which we can give away ad-nausium, and from tiny acorn mighty oaks grow..

and a second product somewhere around the $100 mark, I have people that want to use Logos 4 but the current base packages at $200 are too expensive for them.

secondly, dont waste your money producing a myriad of PD stuff, give us enhanced PBB tools to do it ourselves, you'll get a much broader depth/range of literature

thirdly, your money has to go into honoring God, being the best you can be (striving for excellence) which includes becoming/securing your position as market leader in both PC/Mac environment, and also leading the way for everyone else to follow.

fourthly, maybe put 5-7% of your book budget aside to develop those titles which should be in electronic form, but arent financially viable under normal circumstances.

Ward Walker

Hiring 15 new sales representatives for one year

Building Logos compatible editions of 300 public domain books and giving them away to get people on our platform

If you can't cut the base collections' current prices, then significantly expanding the bundled-in books would be very nice. I realize that when PBB's come to v4 we'll already have many of these--but perhaps not to the degree of sophistication a "logos" resource would bring.

Last year, I lobbied a Lifeway editor to publish his portfolio via Logos, but was unsuccessful. Adding company reps to woo major publishers who aren't fully on board yet would be nice/explain community pricing/pre-pub development financial models.

AudioVisual media is a mostly untapped area for v4, yet it is increasing in leaps/bounds elsewhere--I'm especially impressed with some search engine's ability to search video clips for words. I have some T-N logos 3 resources that came with videos and audio files, but they've not integrated into v4 (at least yet). It would be very nice to be able to purchase (for example) Adrian Rogers' mp3 sermons via Logos and be able to include their contents in searches.

Finally, your retrospective elsewhere on electronic publishing was very interesting...but I'd still like to see a future where I could add my wife as a logos-differentiated co-user (without a full re-purchase of all resources). Similarly, it would be nice to have a financial model for installing v4 (or later) in a church library for multi-user use.

Tom Reynolds

Other than buying kraft dinner [:)] I would suggest that...

In terms of reaping big immediate rewards from your current
market area I would suggest producing 300 public domain resources and then selling
those resources to existing users for say $200. You’re going to sell say 4000
copies at that price = $800,000. Your cost so far is $200,000 plus operating
expenses. You create a lot of excitement and then you take that money and send
copies of L4 to every pastor and seminary student in the country, including say
100 selected resources plus LEB and maybe something else so they can really see
how the program works (interlinear, etc.). You include information about
obtaining another 200 resources for $200 (the same price as current users paid
for the whole lot) and of course you encourage them to buy an L4 package.
Assuming that you could hit all 520,000 people you would spend $1.53 each on
DVD and postage costs and have spent your 1 million. If even only 1/10 of one
percent upgraded only to the additional 200 resources you would recoup your 1
million and you would have 5000 new customers.

If it was 10 million I would suggest that you licence/develop more foreign language Bibles and other resources. You have room
to grow in the western world but long-term growth will come through overseas
sales. MS/SAP/IBM are making a bundle selling software to Indians, Chinese, Europeans,
etc (even taking piracy into account). I think you should look at providing
access to every language over x-amount of world population. You can see a list
by popularity on Wikipedia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of_native_speakers.
It would make it better for missionaries and also people of those backgrounds who
have moved to North America. I know you have made inroads with Spanish and I
can only assume that hasn’t been very profitable by the lack of resources
appearing. Consider another language (that has no competitors) and seek to
become the go-to software for scholars and pastors in that language.

Stein Dahl

Hello Bob,

I like some of the ideas and suggestions others have made. Here are the ones that stand out to me:

Add software developers & code writers for development (on both the Windows & Mac sides)

This will help in getting the Logos product fully ready & stable & "out there" - available for purchase.

The idea of giving away a "free" sampler (a very basic Logos 4 with
just a few resources) - a platform from which people can either build a
resource library (one piece at a time) or an upgrade path to one of the
main base packages. Make it available in the Christian bookstores, for
example & on the Logos website.

This would go a long way in developing a very good "word of mouth" reputation for Logos.

Use the $1 - or - 10 million to answer some of the main concerns my friends at church always bring up when I try to tell them
about Logos:
- 1. It is too confusing / complicated
- 2. It is too expensive
- 3. People do
  not see the need for it, or they don't understand what the software is fully capable of.

These are major hurdles for Logos, it seems to me - and hence my suggestions below:

Direct these newly hired software developers to make Logos 4 easier to use for new users:

In order to make Logos 4 less confusing for the new user,
without dumbing down the product, just create a few default (&
un-deleteable) layouts that - by default - come up when you run some of
the major features; like the Passage Guide, Exegetical Guide, Bible
Word Study, etc., so that any new user can easily use the major
features of Logos 4 without a bunch of major configuring.

You know,
like the default layout that automatically comes up when you type in a
passage or topic on the home page. There could even be a few default (but very basic) "collections" that are preset in the base packages.

Or maybe the whole program could have some preset settings for different types of users. For instance, there could be a mode for new users with default layouts and settings just for new users. There could be a mode for intermediate users and one for advanced users, each with its own default layouts & settings for the major features. One check box for each in the program settings to turn on or off these settings.

Of course there would have to be the option to turn off
all of these default layouts and settings - so that more/most advanced users (i.e.; Power Users) can still customize to their hearts desire.

Let's face it, Logos 3 and 4 are
complicated to use. But that's actually a very good thing. After all,
the more things you want a software to be able to do, the more
complicated it becomes to use it, and this baby can do a lot!

But this - "it's too complicated" - issue could easily be "side stepped" (again, without dumbing down the product) by creating these default settings for new, intermediate, and more advanced users.

And making Logos 4 easier to "get into" (using these settings) would boost your bottom line because more people would buy and use it - which in turn would lead to sales of individual resources, also boosting the bottom line.

Try (either through sales and/or specials etc.) to see what the effect for
Logos would be if you charged less for individual resources and base
packages.

I bet you might be surprised to find out that many
more people would be interested in purchasing your product and you
might just make more money because your target demographic has changed
from a relatively small one (basically Seminary students and pastors, etc) to a huge one (anyone in the Church with a serious desire to study).

Just my thoughts on the issue.

sdahlinghwa

PS: I also think that TomReynolds (above) has some excellent and serious ideas.

Stephen

I think there are several areas that would help Logos as a company and program. I work with one of the command and control systems DOD uses. One of the biggest ways we see our user base increase is when we do training and people understand the capabilities of our software. One way that might help is have regional training teams that conduct 1 day seminars on Saturdays. i know Morris Proctor does seminars for Logos, but the are usually 2 days during the week and the cost is also a factor. Something like 1 day introductory seminars at a very low cost (to offset venue fees) would help. You could also produce a free version since your not really charging for it but the resources.

You could include some basic resources like the ones with the iPhone app. This would contribute to a wider user base. they may not all purchase the packages but iy you has 1,000 people buy 3 smaller commentaries and 2 bibles that would be more sales, they would be small but you would be looking at larger numbers.

I would also like to see the PBB for Mac and also the ability to PDF files to my Logos library and an eBook reader. I prefer to have one place to go for all my resources. The same way i use iTunes for all my media.

An area you could expand to outside of Biblical works would be education. I haven't heard of any eResource programs for education. if you created something similar to Logos for education with all the digital resources and the ability to search those resources. imagine the students all having the entire schools library on there computers and being able to search it.

I would also like to see more Charismatic/Pentecostal/Spirit Filled Resources.

Alain Maashe

I would like to see Logos improve its search engine (i.e. use a customizable
version of the Wolfram Alpha engine) where one could ask full sentence
questions in plain English (i.e. who is Jesus?) and get an answer that is not
just a collection of link with Jesus as the main topic. If the question is
poorly phrased or ambiguous for the program, a list of options could be given
to clarify the query. The answer to the query will also give the sources and related
topic and info

This should be in a way easier to implement than for what a
general search engine has to do since it is limited to the field of religious
studies and more importantly to the resources Logos possesses that could be
tagged accordingly.

It would be helpful to a lot of new users that are intimidated by
the current setup and could improve the usefulness of resources that currently
lack a good index (i.e. the Theological Journal Library). One should also be
able to customize these searches by collection and so on

I would also like to see the ability for Logos to completely
replace my print books, especially when it comes to reading a book cover to
cover. This might include the need to make it compatible with popular e-reader
or next-gen tablet/slate PCs. But I would like to see an e- reader that is
multi-platform (i.e. could also run on Android or Linux) and rivals the
experience that one has with reading a print book for an extended period of
time (or at least with reading from an e-reader like the Kindle).

This might need more than money, but I would like to get electronic
books as the same time the print version is published and see Logos expands its
offerings when it comes to books that are not part of a series (less profitable
I know, but needed if Logos really intends to replace print libraries). I would
like to be able to go entirely digital.

Alain

J. Morris

--Resource Acquisition

--Program Optimization

--Missionary Supplemental Software Program (making it easier and more cost effective for Logos to be used in overseas mission endeavors)

Edwin Bowden

First: fill the holes in your package base:

You need a introductory level product like the old $9.99 one nelson used to do, with say ASV,KJV, a couple of comentaries, strongs and a bible dictionary, which we can give away ad-nausium, and from tiny acorn mighty oaks grow..

and a second product somewhere around the $100 mark, I have people that want to use Logos 4 but the current base packages at $200 are too expensive for them.

secondly, dont waste your money producing a myriad of PD stuff, give us enhanced PBB tools to do it ourselves, you'll get a much broader depth/range of literature

thirdly, your money has to go into honoring God, being the best you can be (striving for excellence) which includes becoming/securing your position as market leader in both PC/Mac environment, and also leading the way for everyone else to follow.

fourthly, maybe put 5-7% of your book budget aside to develop those titles which should be in electronic form, but arent financially viable under normal circumstances.

I agree with these concepts.

But, I would also suggest that Logos will probably always be primarily a tool for power users. They have the needs that Logos is able to supply and are willing to budget their resources to purchase them.

Although cheap starter packages will be one way of getting new customers started, I am not sure how many people will really invest the time to learn and use the power Logos provides. I think $100 probably represents a real commitment level to learn to use Bible study software.

Keep the quality of product uppermost.

The launch of L4 had too many hiccups.

MJ. Smith

I would concentrate on expanding your base:

More of the early works of the church of interest to scholars across all denominations - Patrologia Graeca would be one example but Syriac, Amharic, pseudopigraphic works also count. The more professors who use Logos, the more students will use Logos.
I would balance that thrust out with public domain books at low cost that appeal to your core users - evangelicals
I would add solid support for lectionary-based study especially for sermon development to keep students who were introduced to Logos for languages using Logos when they go out as pastors. I would not, however, go into competition with denominational websites or software. I would link to "The Text This Week"
I would develop an array of Bible study template guides usable by "Mr. Joe Blow" and develop a very minimal package - Bibles, bible dictionary, maps - to introduce the serious home Bible study person to Logos ... and hope to get them hooked on adding resources.
I would explore the possibility of Logos purchasing "library access" to subscription journal sites and selling licenses to Logos' users at a reduced cost.

Jeremy White

One of the biggest trends in software over the past few
years has been the efforts different companies have expended to open up at
least a portion of their systems to allow the development of a third party
marketplace for add-in products. This
has developed to the point that one of the metrics being used to judge how good
a new smart phone is how many apps are available for it in its corresponding “app
store”.

For Logos, the most obvious way this could occur is by
creating a commercial level of PBB and create a marketplace in which they could
be sold. This potentially increases the
number of people promoting the Logos platform (come and buy my book – oh by the
way you need to download Logos to read it) and a corresponding level of new
users to market your premium titles to. It also increases the number of titles
available on the platform to increase the chances there might be at least one
book that a person deems interesting enough to download. Logos can derive revenue
both from the initial PBB creator license as well as a commission on each
individual sale, as well as the additional cross sell opportunities. For
instance, let’s say a person wanted to market a study guide / series or something
like that. It is likely the original content references a number of strategic
titles which Logos has already developed. By allowing the writer to bundle
those additional titles (at a price of course) that adds value to that “product”
as well as increasing the value of the sale to Logos.

I realize there are
issues such as possible copyright infringement issues, quality control, etc but
nothing that I can think of that couldn’t be overcome through a judicious mix of
policy enforcement and limiting of liabilities. For something like this to
work, it would need to be possible for the free Logos download to be able to
display these commercial level PBBs (at least – if not even lower levels of the
PBB license).

Dan Sheppard

Bob-

Based upon reading the other responses, I would like to amend mine.

I think that acquiring the resources must be a tough one. But if you could do it more quickly, that would be a benefit and increase your revenue stream sooner.

Also, if you could get the existing publishers to respond more quickly in releasing their product to iPhone for example, that would be good PR for those that jumped on board early on.

I am still waiting on Concordia Publishing to release the rest of my Lutheran resources. I do not know what throwing money at that problem can actually do.

Jeremy White

Another thought - and this is my last one unless you engage me as a consultant [;)] - if you're looking for a way to market to seminary / bible school students - why not call as many institutions as you care to and get them to tell you the books students are expected to get and then offer them as a bundle / at a discount or some other value added proposition. I know the last time I was doing seminary study one of the first things I did once a found out what texts had been set for the course was to see whether they were available in Libronix format.

I guess what this approach leads to is a much more mix and match approach to bundling. Instead of the fairly inflexible Gold, Platinum, Portfolio, etc system where the titles are already prescribed - why not say x dollars buys you n credits (this way you can give a discount for larger upfront commitments) and then let the individual decide how they want to distribute those credits.

This way you avoid some of the "I don't want Catholic, or Arminian, or Piper or _______ resources in my library" angst.

BTW, I would agree with the need for a much more inexpensive entry level product as earlier suggested - I don't know how large the power user market potential may be but it would seem that any growth potential is going to found in "the long tail" (hence the more titles that are available the better the hit rate) and the more casual user where you're effectively competing with the likes of e-sword and other low cost to no cost options.

Russ Quinn

There have been a lot of really good marketing suggestions offered on this thread so far.

Two of the better ones in my opinion:

Cheaper entry packages - I'd probably aim at free, $29.99, $50, and $99 packages
Work with Professors at Bible colleges and seminaries to provide bundles that are reduced for their classes

In terms of investment, I think that Jeremy is spot on with his recommendation of a Resource Store where people can cheaply publish their own works (for profit or non-profit if they choose). Perhaps Logos could even partner with or do something like Lifeway's self publishing http://www.CrossBooks.com/ to produce the most cost effective small runs of printed books that are published.

I would also expand the store beyond self published original works and allow individuals to publish public domain works that they have taken the time to tag as Logos resources.

This might mean expanding the capabilities of the PBB tool to include the ability to OCR and tag PDF files.

I think their could be a lot of synergy with all of the full copies of public domain books now available on sites like Google books and archive.org by opening up these capabilities to users and incentivizing them with a store to sell tagged books.

I'm sure there are legal issues and quality control issues but that is a direction I would think might have some potential for future growth.

Mike Childs

I believe Logos' future market is grown best through young pastors. Seminary is the place to target. I would put together a package of resources targeted for these students. I would include enough resources to be of real value, but not too much. I would want to give them the real taste of what Logos can do. I would include just a couple books out of some of the major commentaries collections, such as NIC.

I would put together different packages for different seminaries, taking into account the theology of each. For example there would be different resources for Wesleyan, Reformed, Baptist, Presbyterian, or Pentecostal schools.

I would make these packages available to every seminary student for about $30. All could afford that and a small fee insures interest. I might then give them a discount on some type of upgrade.

I would also try to develop relationships with seminary professors. I would seek their advice on future resources that would benefit their students.

Get these students using Logos early in their careers and they will be customers for life. They will soon have too much invested to consider any other Bible Study Software.

Blair Laird

I would buy the rights for the bible software glo and figure out how to incorporate it into logos. My wife seems to like that product. It is no scholars tool by no means, but it is entertaining for her with all the cool media.

So depending on how much buying the rights for glo costs

1. 10 more programmers just for the windows version... ???

2. Wouldn't need sells reps... it would sell itself [:D] Ultimate learning mixed with fun... ( Glogos)

3. Could invest alot into marketing... Getting to more seminaries etc..

Bohuslav Wojnar

If it was 10 million I would suggest that you licence/develop more foreign language Bibles and other resources. You have room
to grow in the western world but long-term growth will come through overseas
sales. MS/SAP/IBM are making a bundle selling software to Indians, Chinese, Europeans,
etc (even taking piracy into account). I think you should look at providing
access to every language over x-amount of world population. You can see a list
by popularity on Wikipedia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of_native_speakers.
It would make it better for missionaries and also people of those backgrounds who
have moved to North America. I know you have made inroads with Spanish and I
can only assume that hasn’t been very profitable by the lack of resources
appearing. Consider another language (that has no competitors) and seek to
become the go-to software for scholars and pastors in that language.

I agree with multilingual, international Logos suggestion. Not only to get all the Bibles of all languages possible, but to make it possible to have localized Interface. I remember time when Microsoft did that move and that had been a decisive factor making MS Office #1 office application.

I like also a PBB improved version idea because it would help to get some books in the local languages working in Logos, that would never get the enough commercial attention from Logos.

Another thing I would suggest very much would be much more sophisticated book reading environment (including the voice reading), working on all platforms (iPhone, newly coming Tablets, etc.)

Onell McCarthy

Bob if i had the million dollars to spend first i would have onsite training class so as to educate people about the full potential of the software. We have people are enthuastic about the software but do not know how to use it for years. More interactive learning videos to help with learning process including sermon preparations. More affordadable books meet the budget

Stephen Paynter

There have been some great replies so far ...

I particularly agree with the ideas of ....

1) Filling in the base product range, especially at the low end (although there is also a "need" between Platinum and Portfolio).

2) Providing more public-domain free resources (either user-generated, or Logos generated)

3) Working to bring all newly published Christian books into Logos at the same time as the print version, at least from the main publishers ... ideally, by the publishers themselves, else Logos will be snowed under.

4) Treating your workers well

I would also add ...

Giving some of the academic publishers such good deals that they can't refuse to let you put their journals, etc, in Logos format. Especially CUP!

Expanding to include more general knowledge and fiction (Encyclopedia Britannica, or equivalent) - sermons sometimes require all kinds of knowledge and quotations.

Making sure Logos is available / usable on the latest electronic readers

Trying to bring down the cost of resources.

Personally, I'm not sure advertising is the way to spend your money ... In the computing world, the C programming language and Unix did so well because it was essentially given away free to universities ... so all students learnt it ... and then C was bundled with all operating systems / computers, so that the first compiler that was written for a new computer was always a C compiler. In the same way, getting a good free Logos library out to "everyone" is a better sales technique than training days or paying people to watch videos - especially if the plan is to take over the world!

Hope my ill-informed ideas spark some better-informed ones of your own!

Allen Browne

Suggestions:

1. PBBs:
Make it easy (and inexpensive) for users to create and distribute free/public domain books in Logos 4 format. This is low cost and low risk for you, and the more titles available the more desirable the product.

2. Encourage advocates:
You have on-line forums and MVPs: are there other ways to support and encourage those who promote the product for you because they believe in it? Perhaps local user groups (e.g. meeting in seminaries to discuss how they use Logos, what resources, what for, …)

3. Awareness:
Offer a copy of Logos Bible Software to someone on the teaching team of each large church and seminary that’s not using it yet, including those outside the US. Follow up with a call a month later to see how they’re using it, or explain it if they haven’t (e.g. Explain this Screen under F1.)

4. Manuals:
Let us buy the manuals and training resources as e-books (by download.) Again, this is an inexpensive way to empower users to get the most from the product.

5. Quality:
I can't comment on whether you need more developers/testers, but you have some pretty knowledgeable users to satisfy, so somewhere in that million dollars there will be a quality maintenance component to ensure the existing users happy and promoting the product.

Particularly now that Logos is no longer in the bookshops, awareness is a big issue.

HTH

David Drew

What's your idea?

Start developing a version for the Apple Tablet. That thing is going to be somewhat popular. You obviously can't start programming, but you can start thinking about the UI.

John Fidel

OK Bob,

My suggestions for the "If I had...."

Focus: awareness of product, usefulness of product, availability of product to those that cannot afford it.

1. Free live training on Logos 4 around the country. Two classes: the first would be for those interested in Logos along with the basic setup. The second would be for more advanced features. People would need to register, but the classes would be free.

2. Provide significant discounts for the purchase of base packages or upgrades at these training sessions.

3. Develop a financial support program for both missionaries and students that is based upon need. Fund it each year as an endowment and allow others to contribute to it.

4. Expand marketing and sales department in a productive way.

Robert Pavich

Well...there is a reason I'm not a large business owner...I'm not market savvy...

But my observation is this:

Logos appeals to a certain type of person:

The bible geekoid, and the bible geekoid who is in seminary.

Of all of the people who attend either my church or any church I'm familiar with locally, which would be about 500 people or so...

I'm one of 4 who use Logos.

Why?

I think that Logos is marketed to geeks...it's very powerful and so the average person asks:

"What would I do with that? I have my strongs and my Adam Clarke commentary...why do I need that complicated bit of software?"

There is a mainstream nitche that's not tapped into...the average church goer.

I"m not sure if it's that they just don't care enough because they think that just listening to the pastor and then reading a devotional is enough each week, or they just aren't aware OF WHY they'd want this tool!

How about a campaign? Sell the idea to churches to have a "logos seminar' to show what can be done for the average church goer...and then show how affordable it is....

I wish I knew WHY it's only geeks....

Mike Childs

I agree that the Loeb classical library would be a great addition to Logos.

Hi Bob,

Thanks for asking us. As the leading Bible software vendor in the world, I would like to see Logos use your resources to tackle really big challenges and problems (BHAG's). So here are my biggest frustrations as a Bible software user:

1) The need to keep using multiple Bible programs. Can Logos use your position of influence and leadership to come up with a business and technical solution for the various major Bible software to work more seamlessly, and lessen the need for users to invest in overlapping resources from different Bible software vendors?

2) There are still many significant Bible resources not available in e-format. Can Logos work with more publishers who are not currently not publishing electronically or doing so for very few of their available resources? I'm really at a point that I don't want to buy physical books anymore (except for the occasional casual reader). My ideal is whenever a new Bible-related work is published (Bibles, study Bibles, commentaries, dictionaries, scholarly resources), it will be published simultaneously in paper and electronic formats. Amazon is starting to do that with many new books available simultaneously in Kindle format. Would like to see that happen with Bible-related works.

3) [This might be controversial.] I see the current desktop software model becoming obsolete within this decade or sooner. Regardless of whether "cloud software" will become ubiquitous soon, I think the current L4 model of frequent downloads and client-side indexing should be (optionally) replaced by simply logging on to a website and running my Logos software from within a browser. Then I don't need to worry about huge downloads and long indexing, and I still get Google-like (or better) response times, and any software improvements are automatically released on your server side. For those who are in parts of the world where there is not reliable or constant internet access, the offline model should still be an option.

On the marketing side, I see the chain of influence going this way: Seminary professors => Seminary students => become Pastors => Ministry leaders => Congregation. So I would invest in marketing to the seminary crowd as the movers and shakers of the Christian ecosystem. Shipping free CD's to pastors and others might simply be thrown away (remember the AOL free disks?). To market to the pastoral and ministry leaders, I would invest in a team of people who would go to different churches and set up Bible software demo tables and Q&A/troubleshooting clinics (e.g. during churches' Sunday School promotion day or Christian Ed Sunday etc). For the masses, with the (almost complete) demise of Christian bookstores (at least in my part of the USA), you may want to consider making an entry level package available through Walmart, Target, Sam's Club, Costco, BJ's, Best Buy, etc.

On the global side, I agree with previous comments that Logos as the market leader should consider doing more to serve the worldwide church by a) making Bible tools available to missionaries, and b) making a big push for international Bible versions and resources.

Peter

Jason DeMoe

Demo, demo, demo, demo, demo, demo.

I don't own Logos yet but I will be purchasing this week. I've been to the site several times and looked around but I haven't yet found a place where I can demo the software of have it demoed for me. I am choosing to purchase the software because a friend of mine uses it and says it's really good. I'd love to see it myself - in real life - before I purchase it.

When our company was considering subscribing to Salesforce.com as a CRM tool we signed up for a webinar and watched someone at Salesforce.com demo the product live. Almost every piece of software we have purchased since, we have signed up for the webinar demo first.

Go to pastor conferences, rent a booth at the expo hall and demo it. Go to WFX and other similar conferences and do the same thing. Go to seminaries and demonstrate the product on campus in cafeterias and book stores. Demonstrate the product regularly on your own website with opt-in webinars.

Collect contact info on everyone you demo the product for and have your sales team follow up. If a lead goes cold, offer a limited time discount.

James Hudson

If you have a million/10 million to spend, you should

1. Scour forums for the most requested features

(Hint - NOTES has popped up again and again and again and again and again for about the last 5 years for both Libronix 3 and Logos 4) and give the users what they want (Hint: NOTES are deemed by your users (if not you) to be so important that users have even created a Wiki page suggesting alternatives - if you created a word-processor, OneNote alternative built in - just think of the forum traffic you would stop! - even this forum provides better options than notes in Logos!!)

********************************************************************************************************************

** If you have happy users they are your best PR people **

** - word of mouth / reviews probably bring as much income as direct advertising without the direct cost. **

*******************************************************************************************************************

2. Provide free packages for seminaries , libraries etc so that everyone is so accustomed to using Logos 4 that Logos becomes synonymous with Computer Bible Study - and that , to them, there is no other option (Think about why Internet Explorer dominates the browser market)

3. Similarly provide cheap base packages to all Christian book shops in US, UK, Europe, Australia etc

4. Make it your goal for every Bible-believer (your target market?) to have heard of Logos, know what it is AND key features ("Oh that's the one with loads of books, it's instant search, super quick loading, very cheap, great note-taking ability, staff responsive to suggestions etc") and not to have ANY negative reviews!

PS I don't think encouraging people to watch an introductory video is as effective as giving people a free base package to install (and thus have on their systems) and use!

Norman Low

Change the way Biblical languages are taught for the majority of seminary students. Given the fact that most students will not keep up with the languages as professional scholars, further develop the approach that Heiser is working on with his video series. Most people would prefer to know how to use the tools rather than to memorize so much information. I'm sure there are people out there who can develop this approach and pilot it for much less than a million dollars.

From a business perspective, this will build up a user base far more effectively than any marketing that you can do. You can in essence, build up a portfolio of products much has Zondervan has done with their language publications.

David Drew

3) [This might be controversial.] I see the current desktop software model becoming obsolete within this decade or sooner. Regardless of whether "cloud software" will become ubiquitous soon, I think the current L4 model of frequent downloads and client-side indexing should be (optionally) replaced by simply logging on to a website and running my Logos software from within a browser. Then I don't need to worry about huge downloads and long indexing, and I still get Google-like (or better) response times, and any software improvements are automatically released on your server side. For those who are in parts of the world where there is not reliable or constant internet access, the offline model should still be an option.

I second this, and for a different reason that Peter suggests: It opens up a secondary line of income for Logos - The 'subscription' model. Instead of paying thousands of dollars to get the Portfolio Package, why not have a subscription whereby you can pay $X per month? For a lot of income-starved students and pastors, this may be an excellent way to get access to a large library. Being able to select between a one-off (purchasing) or an ongoing (subscription) charge would be useful to many, and the subscription can help others trial Logos, decide if they want to make the purchase. It should open up the customer base of Logos greatly. I'd also happily pay an amount every month to sponsor a poor pastor or student's access to the service.

Library.logos.com is an excellent start, making it into a 'cloud' version of v4 would make it spectacular.

Tes

May the Lord bless you MJ. Smith to mention the Amharic bible ,I have been asking for logos to include in their Format now it is its second year, if you search here also for Amharic bible suggestion ,you will find it mentioned,I have even sent e-mail to Mr Bob last week .I am looking forward for this bible to be included in their Format .

Kevin A. Purcell

I've been thinking about this since I noticed the post and it had only one or two responses. I wanted to jump in but honestly couldn't come up with anything. I thought about it.

What I would like to see someone do ... and you have the resources to do it ... is create a digital Bible study institute. Sort of like a Bible college but focusing on how to study in the modern age. Don't know if a million would be enough. But this would be an online college or institute that would train people to do Bible study with their computers using something like Logos. You would have courses in language study, hermeneutics, preaching, theology, history, just like a traditional school, but all of it would be focused on using your software to get at the info isntead of traditional methods. And it would be all done via online interactive software like go to meeting or something else.

The point is that most brick and mortar schools don't really get this world like you do. You could partner with some of the best minds in the various areas, but pull them into digital format.

If that is too ambitious, how about a video series online that teaches someone how to preach a sermon using digital resources. Kind of like the one you are already doing for language study, only in the preaching realm.

Blair Laird

Well...there is a reason I'm not a large business owner...I'm not market savvy...

But my observation is this:

Logos appeals to a certain type of person:

The bible geekoid, and the bible geekoid who is in seminary.

Of all of the people who attend either my church or any church I'm familiar with locally, which would be about 500 people or so...

I'm one of 4 who use Logos.

Why?

I think that Logos is marketed to geeks...it's very powerful and so the average person asks:

"What would I do with that? I have my strongs and my Adam Clarke commentary...why do I need that complicated bit of software?"

There is a mainstream nitche that's not tapped into...the average church goer.

I"m not sure if it's that they just don't care enough because they think that just listening to the pastor and then reading a devotional is enough each week, or they just aren't aware OF WHY they'd want this tool!

How about a campaign? Sell the idea to churches to have a "logos seminar' to show what can be done for the average church goer...and then show how affordable it is....

I wish I knew WHY it's only geeks....

You know if we put both of our ideas together we have a winning situation

TCBlack

what would be the best use of a $1 million investment at Logos, and have the greatest return?

Since you're assuming Mac Parity and all are up to date I'll move past that: I have three options. You pick one you like.

China I do not know your market saturation, but given the global market trends I would suggest developing Chinese resources, bibles etc. Of course we're talking about a closed nation generally, but none-the-less at least looking towards China makes sense.
Marketing. That means sales reps, as well (as was suggested earlier) more corporate liaisons to woo publishers to seek after Logos for their digital editions.
Starter Pack. You mention building 300 PD books to give away. Don't. As Dominic Stated, "give us enhanced PBB tools to do it ourselves". If we get the PBB tools, and you put a reading key in that starter pack I suspect you won't have to worry about developing any PD books again.

You also mention giving things away, I don't think you need to give anything away. If you want to give away a pack like the 9.95 pack you sold a few years ago, you'd still have a minimum ROI. But the lowest level Logos package is still high - it comes with a lot of significant buy in. So Let us develop some PD books which have broad appeal but you develop a starter pack around the $50-$75 level with a PBB key. You know the numbers for book costs there, but that would be IMHO the key to partner with marketing with. There's a mental break-over that suggests a $49.95 package beats out a $50 package and a $75 package kind of stands on it's own. I'd head for the $49.95 myself, in fact I'd buy and gift that one more than once if I could. It would be very hard for me to afford many gifts at the higher price point, and I just can't do it at the current price points. (But I want to).

And what if was $10 million?

You get to do all three.

Jacob Hantla

I've been thinking about this for a few days...so here's my answer aim for the populous:

I would throw a few developers at the mobile market (iPhone, apple rumored tablet, readers for various phones, & a kindle-web-browser-friendly version). This time is pivotal in the format wars for e-readers. I think that it is of utmost importance to Logos to establish itself as a viable option in mobile readers for Christians. Notes & highlights are minimums for comptetition in this field.
Hire publisher-relations individuals and throw some money at marketing to publishers (i.e. have every Crossway release simultaneously released in Logos). New releases (both popular and academic) should be published simultaneously with Logos (or bundled or discount code in book, but probably a separate purchase would make the most sense to publishers). As Kindle (and the competition) strive to be an option for those looking to purchase hot and new releases, Logos would be an inherently better choice for Christian books (if for nothing other than the Bible hyperlinks and hovering
Integrated purchasing: Most people that I know who own a Logos base package have never purchased other resources. This is tragic; they don't know what they're missing. But I think that Logos is to blame on this. The purchasing of books is so separate from the software itself that it is far from intuitive. iTunes proved how lucrative and effective integrating purchasing can be. Apps, music, movies, etc are easily purchased and immediately available.Kin Kindle successfully copied this method. Imagine the Logos 4, iPhone app, library.logos, and other native readers integrated with the online store. Click, confirm, read...immediate drastic increase in sales volume, revenue, and customer base.

Establishing Logos as both an academic and popular Christian digital library system, will then expose a very wide number of people to Logos (like the iPhone app has) who may never even have considered purchasing Bible study software. This will likely lead to more library purchases.

Can you do all that for under a million? I think so.

Luke

I think in addition to the passage and exegetical gude, you should add a third eisegetical guide.

Just think of the sermon possibilities.

Just kidding. I couldn't resist. [:)]

Michael Sullivan

How about a draw for all those who have purchased, crossgraded or upgraded to LOGOS 4 the give away prize being some "Portfolio" editions of the software. (If the person has that edition, maybe a cash prize could be awarded).

I also like this idea: Building Logos compatible editions of 300 public domain books and giving them away to get people on our platform

Jon

4. Website improvements to ensure pre-pubs and all orders can be downloaded with L4 and no more requirements to ship. Also integrating POS options for locked books into the L4 UI.

5. Hire part time web developer/moderator just for the Forum ( and wiki) which is a large part of the Logos support strategy and needs some attention.

I think it would be worth spending the entire $1 million (or more) to completely redevelop your websites. The way I see it, your website is your shopfront and at present it is functional but ugly - 'busy-ness', colour coordination, font selection and consistency, lack of graphics.

When purchasing bible software I'm sure people take into account all sorts of factors - and hopefully fully explore the capabilities of the program - but first impressions are very important! To be sure it could be a whole lot worse (gramcord.org) but it could also be a lot better! The marketing material like the videos is very slick and well done, I think the website needs the same treatment. As a sort of thought experiment; put your feet in the shoes of Jo Lay-Christian -a very large market- go to logos.com and the website for the very recently released program aimed at this market.. what do you think? On the one hand some of the web based stuff Logos is doing (library.logos.com, cloud syncing) is cutting edge and revolutionary.... ... but some money needs to go into the design side of things too [:)]

As well as the aesthetic improvements, I think it would be worth investigating web-based mechanisms like formal bug reporting, support systems that allow for submitting support tickets online (depending on how you currently manage your customer support it could have some follow through cost savings), a better forum platform.

That's my 2 cents...

Timothy Ha

Hello, Bob. It's great that you asked this question. You said twice about North America in your post, although you mentioned Patrologia Graeca once :-)

Please try to expand Logos to China (as tcblack said here) and also to Russian speaking countries. As far as I can say about Russia, there is money for purchasing Logos-based resources and you can try to connect with publishers and seminaries here to produce a base set of Russian texts.

We already have (in Russian language) several Russian Bibles, Calvin's Institutes, New Bible Commentary, Matthew Henry's, Strongs, Grudem's Systematic Theology, Charles Spurgeon's, Martyn Lloyd-Jones', John Piper's books (I just mention the books from English Logos). We also have tons of Russian-Orthodox resources already digitized. Don't you want to go to Russia again? (I heard you were here several years ago).

Rene Atchley

I must say that I haven't used my Logos in a doctoral program for about 3 years and only came back to it because the competition dont have the journal base (i.e. Galaxie products). From my perspective more marketing, free programs, more cutting edge bells and whistles, more pressure to upgrade to packages with thousands of items I dont need, and public domain items that everyone has won't get me to open up my pocket book anymore. The only reason to use this product for me is a) ease of use to find info. for my D. Min, b) library with enough relevant resources to assist in the writing process, c) stable program, and d) a sense that the company wants more from me than another sale. I appreciate the resources that I can get from Logos but I don't nee/want an advanced vision on a cutting edge interface.....just one that works.

Bohuslav Wojnar

I've been thinking about this since I noticed the post and it had only one or two responses. I wanted to jump in but honestly couldn't come up with anything. I thought about it.

What I would like to see someone do ... and you have the resources to do it ... is create a digital Bible study institute. Sort of like a Bible college but focusing on how to study in the modern age. Don't know if a million would be enough. But this would be an online college or institute that would train people to do Bible study with their computers using something like Logos. You would have courses in language study, hermeneutics, preaching, theology, history, just like a traditional school, but all of it would be focused on using your software to get at the info isntead of traditional methods. And it would be all done via online interactive software like go to meeting or something else.

The point is that most brick and mortar schools don't really get this world like you do. You could partner with some of the best minds in the various areas, but pull them into digital format.

If that is too ambitious, how about a video series online that teaches someone how to preach a sermon using digital resources. Kind of like the one you are already doing for language study, only in the preaching realm.

It's very interesting idea. Having long time experience with the Global University, I can say there is a market for that. But it would take Logos to an entirely different area of operation. The only advantage would be the resources you already have in your Logos Library. I am not sure that's enough.

Michael Sullivan

One more addition my "raffle" idea. For marketing, you could offer a draw for free Logos 4 BDAG/HALOT bundles and/or AYBD bundles to those who not only have purchased, upgraded and/or cross graded, but to those who have simply tried Logos 4. These resources are valuable (although I still do not own them myself due to some dental bills in the near future).

My thinking is this - even if the person who wins is a person who tried the product and returned it (thus "no purchase is necessary to win these items") they would be more likely to invest in a base pacckage having won one of those valuable resources.

Giving away iPods and Bible is a nice service, but I think draws to products like the BDAG/HALOT or AYBD might connect people better with the Logos system. And for those who win and have those products already, you can offer, not cash, but a similarily valued product from you vaste library.

Just an idea.

Rev. D.

If I were King of the Forest, I'd suggest the following:

1. Hire more Customer Service Representatives so you could extend your operating hours

2. Hire more programmers/developers enabling you to make upgrades to products quicker

3. Expand the platforms where we can access and use our Logos library (i.e. Kindle, Nook, Apple Tablet)

4. Diversify the type of authors/materials that can we can purchase and add to our library (i.e. Liberation Theology)

5. Create an on-line environment specifically for Logos Ambassadors so they can communicate with each other and share ideas

6. Create a free manual to use with the base products in a PDF format people can download and print, if they desire

7. Host an annual Logos user meeting where we could get free training, review upcoming product releases and get more detailed training that what is possible in a video

8. Sponsor and facilitate the creation of more effective regional user groups

9. Produce better marketing materials that illustrate the benefits of Logos for lay and clergy

10. Hire additional technical staff so Logos could offer 24 hours technical assistance

11. Offer more specials on products throughout the year

12. Market the product more to those in the Mac world

Bill Armstrong

1. I would use the 1mm dollars to stabilize the Logos 4 software package.

2. Hire technical/customer service staff 24/7 to accomplish goal #1.

3. Expand the mobility capability of the Logos 4 software package via kindle, nook, palm-pre, Apple's new products.

4. Fix my little problem on case 50988. Perpetual downloads/updates.

5. Offer customer-selected bundles equal to the current packages you are offering now. Let the customer choose what they want. You will need to modify your website to accomplish this.

6. Improve the bible chapter and look-up feature. User selected book and chapter menu. See Sword Searcher 5.5 to view the ease of use. It makes going to chapters and verses easy without typing. This does could be a virtual pull down menu.

Lynden O. Williams

Bob here are my suggestions:

1. Presently Amazon allows anyone to upload their work for the Kindle and receive 35% of the cost of the book sold. Logos can do the same. In this way more people will be promoting the software, which they will have to download.

2. Christianiy is growing at amore rapid pace outside of North America. My denomination (Seventh-day Adventist) is expected to tripple its present membership by 2020. We have 17million members worldwide, and most of them are outside of North America, which has approximately 1 million members. Work with Adventist Publishing houses, to release more of their content in the format for the software.

3. I echo what was said above "have smaller starter packages", 10 - 20 dollars, with more of the books loaded on the HDD locked. Upon searching for info on a topic/text, the individual can then see what else is there to be purchased. The option to have a Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced inteface will go a long way in expanding your market of new users.

4. For those without high speed internet access, ship discs to bookstores with the software already loaded at a minimal cost. When the user is ready to upload, they can either purchase the newer resources online, go to the bookstore for a new Cd at a small cost.

5. Give sales reps like Jared access to Skype, and a microphone so they can take calls from international customers. Put their user names on the web (format to prevent spam) so they can be reached even by those with bad or slow internet access.

6. Reintroduce the "Live Person" on the web. It can be handy for international customers. Have some sort of voice feture for those who do not/cannot type fast enough.

Thats my two cents worth.

William

What's your idea?

I will now put in my $1.00 (inflation you know).

I can not recommend highly enough to get the average church goer involved in this software. A few things would be needed. First, a lower end package...$49.95 sounds really good to me. Second, Webinars or "use" video's. The idea of a "college" for bible study in the 21st century is great. As was stated, that might be too much now. Concerning the webinars or videos, make some very basic (free). Introductory (low cost) and one or two levels above. The next need is for current and new customers combined. Look at the price point of the resources outside the base packages. It seems the overall cost of these resources could be lower.

This is not me ( I wish it was). Hire a consulting actuary for risk models of business. I assume you have data that this actuary could design some tests and obtain further information. Current academic users are buying product as follows. What if we lowered cost? If we see a bigger base of buyers (mr. or mrs. church goer) what happens to sales of additional resources? Selling more at a lower price generally would make more money.

Finally, put a real slow down on "new" resources. Task all possible to work on getting everything up to date. There are lots of missing features of L4. There is lots of in development stuff for excessive lengths of time. (Hebrew pronunciation)

Roger Feenstra

Make sure your product works, make it affordable, keep a handle on your expenses. That's how you grow a company.

James Gillespie

I'd pre-install Logos on optimized netbooks and sell them. Could you imagine how excited a seminary student would be to recieve one of those as a gift? Churches could pick them up for missionaries. Plus what about older pastors or technologically impaired people who would love the software but are scared to death over installing it. I was told by customer service that Logos 4 would not run on my netbook. Yeah, whatever....it works awesome! Technology is going portable and Netbooks are getting more powerful. It would also be great for people who already have a license with Logos to buy one from the site with their libraries pre-installed. Catch the wave Bob!

Sam Shaw

It sounds like you have some great ideas, like expanding your product's appeal to a greater audience ("Keyboarding the entire Patrologia Graeca") and more advertising.

While I would love your business to grow, I also really like hearing that you're interested in hiring more software developers. I just hope that whoever you hire has a passion for developing extremely user-friendly software. One of the most important pieces of wisdom that should be stressed to any software developer that's developing a GUI is to "Use concrete
metaphors and make them plain, so that users have a set of expectations
to apply to computer environments." (Apple Human Interface Guidelines) I'm sure you've heard it before, but I don't think easy operability can be stressed enough.

And thank you for your passion that lets us take advantage of such a great product!

P.S. In case you felt like the quote wasn't very helpful, an example of a metaphor for software such as Logos would be to create a sort of Library viewing option (it is library management software, after all) that would display collections of books in virtual bookshelves (like BestCommentaries.com does).

Frank Sauer

I know one thing that could potentially be very attractive to many people who could be future purchasers of Logos.

1- While Logos offers many packages, the one common thread I have heard when sharing the packages with Bible College students is that there are so many resources that are not going to be used. Many would like just one or two good Original Language resources and all the Bibles, Commentaries and Church History related materials as a great Student starter package.

Currently a lot of the top Church History items are in the high priced packages, same with many commentaries and I've heard a lot about the redundancy of sermon/preaching resources as well as OL resources. These are resources that the common response is that would be things purchased after they get deeper into Bible College or starting in ministry.

Personally I can see some of this in my own decisions on to upgrade or not to upgrade. Early Church Fathers which is a great resource for a student and all believers is not available until you get to Silver. Most students and common users do not have a church budget for books/software, thus making this above realistic investment at the time.

Is there a package that can be created that would eliminate a lot of the "fluff" resources and give less resource but all basics built on bibles/commentaries/history/apologetics type resources???

Investing the money in this kind of package could open the door to a lot more people who look at the other resources like OL and Sermon/Preaching as fluff or above their needs, some even scared off by it...

Fred Greco

4. Website improvements to ensure pre-pubs and all orders can be downloaded with L4 and no more requirements to ship. Also integrating POS options for locked books into the L4 UI.

5. Hire part time web developer/moderator just for the Forum ( and wiki) which is a large part of the Logos support strategy and needs some attention.

I think it would be worth spending the entire $1 million (or more) to completely redevelop your websites. The way I see it, your website is your shopfront and at present it is functional but ugly - 'busy-ness', colour coordination, font selection and consistency, lack of graphics.

When purchasing bible software I'm sure people take into account all sorts of factors - and hopefully fully explore the capabilities of the program - but first impressions are very important! To be sure it could be a whole lot worse (gramcord.org) but it could also be a lot better! The marketing material like the videos is very slick and well done, I think the website needs the same treatment. As a sort of thought experiment; put your feet in the shoes of Jo Lay-Christian -a very large market- go to logos.com and the website for the very recently released program aimed at this market.. what do you think? On the one hand some of the web based stuff Logos is doing (library.logos.com, cloud syncing) is cutting edge and revolutionary.... ... but some money needs to go into the design side of things too

As well as the aesthetic improvements, I think it would be worth investigating web-based mechanisms like formal bug reporting, support systems that allow for submitting support tickets online (depending on how you currently manage your customer support it could have some follow through cost savings), a better forum platform.

That's my 2 cents...

I also think that a better web presence would be worth an investment. The website is currently not on a par with the program.

And I understand the difficult hard costs involved in help and customer service. Logos has built up an incredible cadre of users who are happy to help new customers. Leverage that. To be blunt: the current forum is horrible for serious help. The search function is very inferior, and the lack of multiple fora makes it almost impossible to find anything. After I run a couple of (usually useless) searches, I simply (re)post my question. How much could vBulletin cost? It is (for example) far more robust, and searchable. You could even further leverage user base help by giving credits for4 new material for time spent on the forum answering questions.

I would continue to expand to base markets. While an individual resource might be excellent (and I might clamor for it), what will it actually mean in terms of new business? I would LOVE Patrologica Graeca or Loebs, but really, how many users is that going to bring? Are gobs of Classicists (if that many even exist, speaking as a former one) going to buy Logos instead of use Perseus? I think not. So maybe a better way to link into Perseus via the web (at less cost) is better. Would you really want to focus the company's future on doing everything to bring Mac platform up to speed? It might be nice, but it is still 2-5% of the computer market in the US, and almost zero in emerging markets (China, India).

No way would I pay anyone to watch a video. If you really want seminary distribution, give a significant discount to a seminary student who sends you a new customer. Same for profs and pastors.

By the way, Bob, I like that you are thinking about this. It only make sense to step away from the current tasks to look to the future.

Is there a package that can be created that would eliminate a lot of the "fluff" resources and give less resource but all basics built on bibles/commentaries/history/apologetics type resources???

How about an alternative pricing mechanism -- in addition to predefined packages like we have now, allow for an "a la carte" discount e.g. when you purchase > $x of resources OR > y number of resources at original price, you get a certain % of discount.

Peter

David Buckham

My two cents would be a $50 base package or a massively free package that includes several public domain books, even if the public domain books are already available as a paid resource through Logos. This makes Logos more of a workable demo. You may not be able to do "x" with this book (like you could if you had the full version) but you can do "y".

I live in a rural area. I am an ambassador for Logos. I get hit with the I use the other software because it is free or it is cheaper.

Maybe Logos could do something completely non-Logos software related with a million dollars? Give a matching donation (with Logos users) to an important cause or causes.

Print a Logos Cook-off Cook book...maybe use some Logos user recipes (or at least give us an extra Bible Study Magazine edition with all the recipes).

all about Christ,
David Buckham

Stephen

From reading everyone else's post made me do some thinking:

1. The ideas of a bible study institute I really like. I don't have the time or money to go to seminary. Most of the learning I have to do is either done on my own or online. I've taken several online classes and really enjoyed them. I am waiting for the videos for using Logos to study greek and hebrew to be completed. If you could also produce videos/classes on different topics like Inductive bible study/bible study methods would be great. I would also like to see some on sermon preparation. There are many of us preaching that have not had the opportunity to get formal education in these areas and would welcome any help we can get. I would rather learn how to use Logos to accomplish this as that's where most of my resources and don't want to learn inductive bible study and then try to figure out how to do that in Logos, learning at the same time would be great.

2. Create a user generated content area for sharing sermons/notes/lessons ect. There are many websites for sermons/templates for ppt ect. If Logos had an area where users could share content they generate then we could help each other (much like this forum). make it with the ability to share notes/outlines ect right from Logos and then be able to search the user generated content from within Logos.

Stephen

Oh yea, I think someone already mentioned it but create a book store much like Apple's app store for the iPhone. This would allow user to create/write books using PBB (once it works with Logos 4) and the submit them and have them sold in the book store. You could do a split much like apple does with developers. While this might now be a great revenue generator it would cause people to get Logos just to get the book store ability. Apple's main use for the App store is to get people to buy iPhone/iPod touch. As more users started using Logos that would mean more potential customers for Logos created books.

Churches could also use it to create digital versions of lesson plans/study/books for their members. You could then start subscriptions (i.e. Bible Study magazine) for periodicals or Churches could have a small subscription fee to get digital copies of sermon notes/lesson plans for their services. Again, while this in itself might not be a great revenue generator it would get more people using Logos. Especially if you have a very basic base package (6 bibles, 5 basic commentaries, strongs) with a very minimal number of resources. The average believer doesn't necessarily use a lot of the resources you have. price point about $25.00. If they wanted more resources they could purchase them. With the additional basic users it would create a larger audience for the Bible study institute/video lessons. As they began to use Logos more they would want to know how do I study the bible with logos? inductive bible study. Lesson preparation for home cell groups/Sunday school teachers. Practical application of doing word studies with Logos. All the lesson would need some practical application and lesson assignments. Walk them through building a bible study on prayer from start to finish and them have them build another study on their own (assignment). You could eventually grow this into an online school. I'd love to go to one of Morris Proctor's seminars but they can be limited. the closest one to me is about 4 hours away. It's also during the week and at a critical time at work where I can't take the time off. This means I a have to wait 6 months to a year to where it would be close enough and cost effective for me to attend. I know he has the videos of the seminars but I don't really want videos of a seminar. I'd rather have structured lessons.

MJ. Smith

Create a user generated content area for sharing sermons/notes/lessons ect.

Do you know that sermons are already sharable and that there have been indications that more user-generated content will be sharable? In the past some as been shared in the files forum. StillTruth provides a common download site but there have been previous suggestions that this fuction be taken over by Logos. You are not alone in your wishes.

Stephen DeKuyper

I know I am repeating, but here they are anyway:

- Have a strategic team to research and stay on top of alternative and new delivery methods - IPhone, Kindle, Linux, Apple Tablet, Blackberry, smartphones etc. I think the Mac roll out is going far too slow and seems to have been an afterthought.

- Deliver via online subscription service. Great for those who may not have the internal computing or network (ie download) capacity, those who want to easily access from different computers (work, home, travel) or those who just prefer cloud computing and the advantages that come with it. Gives the ability to "rent" resources instead of having to commit to them. Offer a 30-day free online trial. Great way to test drive.

- Different package options including a lower end package. Not everyone needs 1,000 resources to do their study. It can make it very daunting for some. I realize there are already a number of packages, but I found it overwhelming/confusing to try to figure out which ones.

- Offer lower-cost packages/sponsorship for qualified students, seminaries and missionaries. Could be under "bulk" licensing.

- Expand non-English resources - Chinese, Russian etc.

- I would like to have my seminary text books in Logos so I can use them for the course and then for future reference.

- Create a good note taking and lesson and sermon preparation module. Many are studying the Bible to use it in their work/ministry, so give them the tools to do so efficiently.

- Consider other multi-media that would also be useful for pastors of small churches, church-planters, missionaries or traveling teachers
who could use an all-in-one resource to create all of their bulletins, handouts, presentation materials, worship etc. I realize that these are at the core of Logos, but I am sure many Logos customers could use them.

Tim Deahl

Mostly, I appreciate your direct contact with the user! I have been with Logos since the earliest floppies became available--and I enjoy demonstrating its capabilities for others and recommending it. I haven't felt like the promo videos do much for the non-user. What they ask for is less expensive (and in reality, less expansive) packages: "I just want to be able to read and search the Bible and a few basic tools." discounted offers or upgrades work wonders, at least they have for me as well as for those in my Logos circle.

I appreciate the voluminous list of resources (and of course want more), but even a few hundred books becomes rather overwhelming. Focus on making it as affordable as possible and for attracting new users, basic. Thanks for the greatest product on the market.

Simon

In my opinion the best way to attract new users, is to have a basic package that is free, so users can see what they get when they buy a package. Just include some public domain resources, that are also in other bible-studie-software packages that you can download from the internet for free (like E-Sword). So include at least:

KJV (and in each language at least one public domain bible translation)
A public domain Greek and Hebrew text
Strongs dictionary
Some free images / timelines / etc (just a few, so users can get an idea, with the message "you get plenty more when you buy one of our packages)
Maybe a small public domain bible dictionary and a small commentary, so users can get an idea of how those work in Logos

I think it wouldn't cost you a million bucks to offer, but I believe it will attract a lot of new buyers.

Another idea is, to create an "upgrade adviser". Just a long list with all the books that are included in all the packages. Let the user select (with a checkbox) the books he want to buy, and let the "upgrade adviser" calculate the worth of the books when bought seperate, and advise the best fitting package.

Kevin Becker

I would,

Expand Logos' presence on the forums. Hire an ombudsman who's responsibility is to quickly react to customers on the forum. This person would also be able to attend planning meetings to help represent the pulse of the customer base. (I'm not saying Logos doesn't do this wonderfully already, but as your company grows it will probably get harder and harder.)
Make a free package (as suggested elsewhere on this thread) to remove the "I can get it free elsewhere" mentality of the lay market
Come out with a $20 to $50 package of quality, under copyright works that can be used to make a case for paying for higher quality information and transition into the existing packages.
Expand marketing to professors, create tools that can be used to get primary texts into Logos with a collaborative processes to get the cost of said text down. The work gets started by volunteers (professors and other interested parties) and gets finished/quality checked by Logos.

Jacob Hantla

Oh yea, I think someone already mentioned it but create a book store much like Apple's app store for the iPhone.

That was me. iPhone apps are so popular because they are easy to get. iTunes music/videos/etc are so often purchased because doing so is seemless and pretty darn close to thoughtless.

Logos purchasing on the other hand is far from this. Make purchasing out of L4 and out of the iPhone app a more integrated experience. For students, simply put the academic pricing in there. There should be no need to call customer support to purchase books. I hate calling in, but I often have to, simply to take advantage of the academic discount. This is a waste of my time (leading me sometimes to just not buy the book due to inconvenience) and certainly a much more expensive waste of your time.It takes academic sales 5-15 minutes for me to purchase a single book (often <$50). You can't be making money on that deal. Spend a little to generate sales and make customer service all that more unnecessary. As I've said before, I know a number of people who own Logos base package but have never purchsed another book because they didn't know how or couldn't figure it out. Missing out on a huge revenue stream.

Tes

your suggestion fits,my needs ,specialy in the case of the inductive study method.

Charlene

Bob,

Thanks so much for your continual interest in what we, your customers, think and want.

I love Logos and have used it fo many years and have gotten other people involved. I would have gotten more involved, but the cost is the major thing. You may have used "free" products in the past to get more users to your software, but how many of us knew about them? Somehow I missed it or otherwise would have been handing them out to friends and students. One major way to increase your customer base will be to have a cheaper beginner level product. I would suggest under $50. It doesn't have to have massive programs, but it would need to have quality. So include a Bible, such as the ESV or NAS95, a concordance, and a good commentary on the whole Bible. And include your latest map set. This would be enough for us to show others how easy it is to use software to do some serious Bible study.

Also I would suggest you use the money to get all the pre-pubs ready and shipped. Along these lines I would suggest you not offering more pre-pubs, until you catch up! I know, I can't believe I am saying this, as I love most of what you offer. BUT even though I have been a major supporter of Logos and Pre-pubs, presently it is becoming "too many" to choose from. Thus I am having to choose less, in order to "cover" what I have already ordered. You are spreading yourself too thin, and the customers are being overwhelmed with the massive Pre-pubs coming our way.

I would also suggest that you get PBB working for Logos 4 and then hire some faithful Logos users to get the "free domain" books available to the public in this format at a lower price and you spend your efforts with newer books.

Another way to develop your customer base is to make sure that the present customers understand how the program works. It is great that you offer the videos on the different aspects of the program, but many of us are visual learners and need a written manual to refer to; something that we could quickly look up a feature, without having to go online and try to find out the appropriate video or solution. I appreciate what Morris is providing through his manuals, but they are too expensive even apart from shipping. I would suggest that you spend money on developing manuals that can be downloaded as part of the program itself. Then as we (your long time customers) know how to use the program effectively, then we can get others involved. The best advertising has always been word of mouth.

And of couse continue opening up other venues of accessing your books, such as Kindle, etc.

And as previously mentioned, update your web site and forums. The forum is too difficult to find answers to problems that have been previously. The searches attempted often have nothing to do with the problem at hand. Thus another reason to have a downloaded manual, one that can be constantly updated, as new features are being added.

Thanks again, Bob, for all that you are doing. Your hard work is making a difference in many lives!

Josh Wilson

thanks for allowing us to be a part of this process!

the number one thing I'd do would be to invest it in developing Logos' mobile capabilities. Integration with the iPhone has been a great move for Logos. It is allowing the software to gain exposure with new people who otherwise would have never purchased the base package. This needs to be extended and expanded however. I fully agree with Jacob Hantla's remarks. Developing integration with some form of e-reader (which uses the digital ink and is less strenuous on the eyes) as well as development of apps for other non-Apple phones and devices is a must.

I also agree with all the comments about a lower introductory starting point. I personally started with gold, but have dozens of friends who are interested in Logos, but balk at the price. Better digital marketing through apps and improving the process of buying books as well as an inexpensive simplified basic platform would take the company to the next level.

One final thought although I don't believe this would be as helpful in attracting droves of new customers. Improvements the user friendliness of morphological and syntax searches would draw some of the accordance and Bible works crowd over and make the platform even more valuable for the rest of us as well.

Thanks in advance for continuing to improve the best Bible software on the planet!

James Hudson

Most of my friends and colleagues could be described as computer geeks (could whip up web sites in minutes writing raw HTML, work in programming or IT support, advise people, have long technical discussions with Microsoft staff, software purchasers with large budgets and generally spend many hours staying on top of their field) and they are mostly all Bible-believing Christians.

BUT most of them, technically savvy Christians, have never heard of Logos (or those that have are under the impression that it is expensive). I want to ask WHY is that?. They have all heard of e-sword and commonly talk about Quickverse (yes I know...), but don't have much of a clue of the existence or the unique selling points of Logos. WHY?

I wonder if you carried out a survey of every Church-goer to "Name some Bible Software and tell me some of it's features" where you think Logos would rank?

(PS I'm not suggesting you actually do this).

Do people even know about Logos? If not, why not?
If they do, WHAT do they know about it? How did they get these impressions?
How can you correct misconceptions?

Get Logos 4 out into every seminary, bible-school with free scholar's libraries (or equiv) to pastors, students. It's amazing the power of a Pastor's recommendation to his congregation!!

James

PS PLEEEEEEEASE update notes - there has just been posted YET another thread about the lamentable state of them! Perhaps then I can recommend Logos to my techie friends!

Friedrich

This topic piqued my iinterest from the start,, but i am have not been able to read thru it all yet.. forgive me if i am rehashing.

have beth moore or kay arthur do simulcast studies with logos software. tie it in to Bible Study magazine on going feature. Broadcast on you tube. Offer discounts to all entrants. if they complete course give them upgrade discounts to next level.

Just flinging a few ideas out there. my wife doesn't touch Logos. thinks it is too complicated or cerebral. but she loves those women. and study. that might be a bridge to many more logos users. make it simple, practical, and pleasing to the eye. I am telling you, think visually, too. it matters not to many tech people or academicians, but it sure does artistic people and women. persoonalize.

run bible studies interfaced with facebook. think how many moms are on that?

this is just brainstormin', folks.

Jim VanSchoonhoven

James Hudson, you make a point that I did not cover, when I made the jump from free resources like the Online bible, The Sword Project, and E-Sword, to Logos, I did not go directly to Logos, I went to many other products including the one you mentioned first, and part of the reason why did was, I did not know the difference in features offered by Logos, and in many cases the other brands had huge sales on packages that I could afford to buy and try out just to get the copyrighted resource. My first contact with Libronix did not come from buying a Logos package, but rather one of Nelson's eBible packages at a huge discount.

I still buy many other cheap packaged programs, because I want to see what they are offering and since I try to teach believers how to use bible software, I run into many different programs and I have to know what is going on in order to teach them about the software they are using.

Many people that have these other softwares have no idea how much difference there is between their program and Logos. They bought the program they had because of the lower price and to get copyrighted books or bibles. However even if there was a Logos program at the same price these people would still not have known there was a real difference and many would have bought what ever their friends had.

So education is still the answer to Logos selling bigger and better products.

I have ended up with Logos because I learned it was better through the school of hard knocks, I have also learned that in many cases when you compare the same level of package in the other brands to Logos, that Logos is the better buy, but for many that does not matter because the buy in price is to high and they don't know the difference in the software anyway. Hey they wouldn't put 899.00 down for Logos or another brand, they don't know the value in either.

i believe the way to reach and teach these people is through the local church rather than seminary. Focus on the guy they already know and count on, teach Him how to teach them to use these programs, teach Him the value in electronic bible study. Call Him Pastor or Elder, if you get his attention the rest of the body will hear about. Seminary and bible schools are also good natural markats, but I think you will miss something just going to them.

The whole body has to see the need to study the Word of God!

Dan I just saw some of your ideas they are great ideas!

In Christ,

Jim

Friedrich

i believe the way to reach and teach these people is through the local church rather than seminary. Focus on the guy they already know and count on, teach Him how to teach them to use these programs, teach Him the value in electronic bible study. Call Him Pastor or Elder, if you get his attention the rest of the body will hear about. Seminary and bible schools are also good natural markats, but I think you will miss something just going to them.

The whole body has to see the need to study the Word of God!

Dan I just saw some of your ideas they are great ideas!

In Christ,

Jim

i think the local church would be a key way to go. employing it for leader training.

i went to logos solely because of resources. series x. i thought they had a killer lineup, compared to what others had at that time. the softward was so-so, but i was enamored with the pop up and having alll thosee books on a machine.

but most people are not library hounds like me. They want a few good resources and a program that is easy to use. and they need aa reason to use it. they need to be shown it. for some of the guys in my church, having a quality dictionary or two, quality maps and illustrations/media, and being able to put it all on a (easily made) handout would help. combine handouts with something like lesson maker.

to boot, mmake the ipod/pad/portable reader really cool.. on another thread, theey talkeed of thee (sry, crapppy keyboard) cool reading interface. i think that would help your less than hardcore bible sstudents want to get into logos. partner with publisherrs, ggetting current ebooks. that could get people in thedoor.

Richard Koons

Ok here is my input as a senior .net developer currently a disabled vet probably a year or two away from entering back into the workforce. It pains me to say that I don't think adding loads of new developers will solve anything. It really relies on two areas architecture, and advisors that is where you can improve a bit in this market. What I would suggest is taking a look at your base packages and improve there in the area of ease of use etc.

I also think it would be wise to consider consulting with the various denominations and theological backgrounds to identify the best commentaries of each or might I say the most recommended from each come up with a strategy to bundle these in your base packages to improve the well roundness of each package ( I find that the main definciency with your product is not enough commentaries come with your base packages) Now for the positive your language ref material is super to say the least, historical background works awesome as well as your graphics illustrations maps charts these are excellent keep up the good work there now all you need is to concentrate on beefing up the theology portion and clear sailing ahead. Also target the average user not the just the seminary students or pastors there are a growing number on non denominational traditionalists out here kepp that in mind. Kudos for logos 4 gold I love it and won't dwell on the bugs because of self condemnation on my developed software (joking plus try as we might MS owns that dep)