What he doesn't get is that we own SoFo products because we DID check out the competition first. SoFo was better.
Record sales for V4...I agree with Rextilleon, his story doesn't cut it.

M

Every user has an opinion, and every reseller has a profit margin and then an opinion,, more and more great software out there, and Vegas is one of the better ones------in my opinion

Well I definitely agree that the interface for Vegas blows everyone else away. However, I believe that SoFo needs to make some modifications to the way they present their products.

First thing would be to do away with Sound Forge as a standalone product and integrate the features into Vegas and ACID. I've written SoFo in the past to suggest this idea. All the other multitrack editors such as Cool Edit, Sonar, (pick a brand) have WAV form editing built to where it integrates with the undo feature and temporary file management. As it is now in Vegas, you have to save the file in Sound Forge before Vegas can use whatever changes were made. It would be better to have this done with Temp files untill you were certain you wanted to save the changes permenantly.

Also, it seems to me that products like noise reduction need to be included. Once again, Cool Edit, Sonar (I think), and most other brands have some advanced noise reduction alredy in the main package.

In my opinion Sonic Foundry does have some of the best software out there. But most of the features that everyone else includes in the base package, SoFo has as a separate purchase. When you combine all the packages together to make everyone equal, SoFo ends up with a higher price. Quite a bit higher. The one huge benefit that SoFo has are the video capabilities. And that's the reason I'm sticking with SoFo.

But, in the audio only world, no one cares about paying $400 more for video capabilites. I think if they keep ignoring the features of the competition (not wanting to give up the cash flow) they are going to start loosing position in all the audio production facilities across the nation. Which will in effect cause them to loose cash flow anyway.

JBJones

If you listened to the last live chat SoFo had about their future plans the have all but abondened the retail channel and we only sell themselves. In my opinion a very foolish mistake. Why don't they? You'd have to ask them. Again, likely due to SoFo's ongoing money crunch.

When you sell to the retail channel they expect (make that demand) a wholesale price and there are all kinds of deals which lower the price still more. It boils down to would you rather sell 10 copies of Vegas at $500.00 or sell 100 copies at $225 or so. Obviously if you do the math, its obvious what you should do. I suspect SoFo doesn't cut retailers much of a margin. If not, they they won't carry the product.

Its like with the big food store chains. There is a constant battle for shelf space and position. If you're a big name like General Mills or Procter and Gamble you can sell at wholesale at a lower price and still make a nice profit and squeeze out the wannabe be companies, even if they have a better product.

So too with the software biz. It doesn't matter how good a product you got, if next to nobody knows you got it outside of word of mouth or reading about it in some little known trade magazine.

While you don't see top end video editing applications that often in retail stores, you do see Adobe products for example Photoshop. And surprise, they sell a ton of Photoshop, the full version and upgrades in places like BestBuy. Again, they can afford to sell at a deep discount. SoFo apparently can't.

Everyone knows video edting is getting hot. Everyone is doing it. There is a market and a lot of people would likely buy from the retail channel. Sadly, most people I strike up a conversaton with if I see them at some store like BestBuy or CompuUSA, and they are looking at that "P" product or that other "P" product that are commonly in the retail channel they haven't even heard of Vegas. Again, its hard to sell product if people interesting in what does don't even know there is something better. Sorry SoFo, if I were to grade you on marketing on a scale of 1 to 10, I'd be hard pressed to give you anything higher than a two.

Well it doesn't bother me that SoFo products can't be found in places like Best Buy, Circuit City, Borders, etc. Though that would be some powerful advertising.

But it does bother me when a dedicated audio or video company stops offering the product. Perhaps they are trying to go the route of Caligari's trueSpace or Maxon's Cinema 4D. Both of those are hard if not impossible to find in both web or brick and mortar stores.

I know I still get lots of catelogs which I like to browse through to see what new products are offered. The big names are always listed with product descriptions which make you want to buy the software. They even make me want to buy the software and I know Vegas is the best. It's going to be hard for SoFo to get new users/customers if they don't do a little more than word of mouth.

It doesn't matter how many magazine reviews you get (which are still few and far between) if you don't see the product listed in catelogs along side the others (like Final Cut and premiere) you start to wonder if it's really that good.

If SoFo is planning to drop focus on the Pro Audio market and focus on the Video market then it probably won't be quite as crucial. And this strategy of theirs may not kill them. For some reason the video market has mostly stayed web based. But the audio market still has some huge retail stores out there. If they still want the Pro Audio market they are going to have to do some things to compete. And one of those is get into the public's view.

JBJones

Don't forget,

When you look at the pricing point of software products (e.g. 10 copies at $500 or 20 copies at $250), don't forget the size of the user base has a huge impact on perceived quality, based on support (which sofo would currently be the gold standard :)

The investment required to maintain sofo's current level of support would most likely far outstrip their available cash, to maintain the same level of support for a much larger user group (which would likely include users that are even more inept than me [or is that I?] ;) Falling support standards would most likely decrease the "professional" user base and then you have a product that does not have a viable niche :( "The Rock and the Hard Place." We'll keep our fingers crossed for sofo !!

Funny enough, Best Buy is where I first saw Vegas. Albeit, it was Vegas Video 2. I remember looking at the box, noticing how cool the timeline was designed, especially the audio. But at the time, I didn't take it seriously. Besides, I think there was something about Vegas 2 that was lacking, I just can't remember it. So I bought Premiere at Best Buy, in a Pinnacle DV200 bundle.

Well, I have since sold the Premiere on Ebay, and now work exclusively on Vegas 3. Vegas is ever-so-slightly represented at Best Buy now, only as Video Explosion, which uses Video Factory as it's NLE, just licensed to another company. There's actually a glut of NLE's at Best Buy and other places. Pinnacle Studio, Video Explosion, VideoWave, Dazzle. Vegas wouldn't really stand out even if it was there.

Additionally, Pinnacle OWNS the shelves at Best Buy. The bums.

I checked

www.zzounds.com

, too. Asked them for multiple package pricing on Vegas, Vegas + DVDA, and full Sound Forge 6.0. I don't think they have it, judging from the "clearance" look of their selection of SoFo products. None-the-less, if they do have it, and the price is right, we are buying, again.

On the other hand, if they don't have them, I hope I annoyed the heck out of them. Told them we wouldn't consider any substitutes. Thirty-Two copies of anything amounts to a fair amout of money. Serves them right@!

;)

Thats funny, I think I will order 200 copies for a huge computer center I am opening up to train disadvantaged kids in video editing---LOL

Well sir, we don't sell Sonic Foundry, inferior product but could I interest you in Pinnacle---LOL

Please, please no more mention of Pinnacle. I get physically ill just thinking of the hundreds of hours and dollars I spent trying to make the software work. VV4 on the otherhand required a $15 Siig card off ebay.. I have not made a bad dvd yet.