Should consider making training free

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I don't want to tell you how to run your business but I would think that the more developers you have trained in using Concrete 5 the more popular the CMS would become and in turn more income is produced through Add-ons. themes - advertising etc. To me that would seem to be the bread and butter.

It just seems to me that putting a $95.00 price tag on training videos is shooting yourself in the foot. In the long run the easier it is for developers ( designers ) to adopt your system, the more income will arise from it. I think it may be one of those things that because you are so close to the project you can't see that not charging for training as a feasible alternative because the training income just looks like another cash flow source. I have tried lot's of different frameworks and languages and the ones that suck me in are usually the ones with the most documentation and training videos.

Jim

INTcommunications
 
VidalThemes replied on at Permalink Reply
VidalThemes
I think that largely depends, what hat you are wearing at the time, with my "Concrete5 User" hat on, your suggestion makes a lot of sense and would be great to see the core team producing training for free, BUT with my "business owner" hat on, it makes less sense, the time it takes for a core member to produce training has to be accounted for somewhere, while Matt or Andrew are running a training course, that means they are not working on the next version of Concrete5 slowing down development, Concrete5 is a business after all, and they, like any other business have to produce meaningful income.

The price of training has been substantially reduced recently, and the thing to remember is, companies that appear to be offering something for free, rarely are, there is usually a pay off somewhere, so maybe charging for training is a slightly more honest way of doing things.

I am in no way connected to the core team, but as a small business owner this is my perspective.
frz replied on at Permalink Reply
frz
Most of the content from training is up on YouTube if you look around.


​Generally I agree, training shluld be as
Free as possible  


Sent from Mailbox for iPhone
INTcommunications replied on at Permalink Reply
INTcommunications
I have run several businesses and the ends do justify the means. More developers - more designers - means more business. This is not from an C5 user perspective. I am of course presuming that the core makes money by opening up the marketplace to developers for add-ons and themes. This kind of commission based income is one of the best kinds - A developer creates an add-on or a theme - C5 sells it and they get their cut. This will open up more time for them to develop new versions of Concrete. It is a proven business model. The hardest part of that business model is to get people to want to make Add-ons or Themes to sell. This is where the training could pay off if it encourages more developers to use Concrete5. I am a busy Designer myself and have developed hundreds of Coldfusion scripts. I just recently started to develop in PHP.

The point that I am getting to is that the more comfortable I get with the building in Concrete5, the more I will use it with my clients sites.I have hundreds of current clients, most of which are using CMS systems that I coded from scratch. My reluctance to switching them all over to a system like Concrete5 is that it very easy for me to customize each CMS for different things that are needed.

If I build a site for a client with Concrete 5 and then the client wants a shopping cart on their site, I would then evaluate the time and effort it would take to hard code that in. In most cases I would probably look at the Add-ons to see if one would suffice. If I purchase the Add-on then the core team makes money along with whom ever developed the add-on. If I am not using Concrete5 then that sale won't happen.

In business if you can get all the business for razor blades you don't need to make money on the razor.

Jim
mkly replied on at Permalink Reply
mkly
Unless I've really lost track of what goes on around here, those are training sessions lead by an instructor on particular topics. Not just training videos.

There are some training videos available here at no cost.

http://www.concrete5.org/documentation/recorded-trainings/...

And there are also seperate paid training sessions lead by a member of the concrete5 core team.

http://www.concrete5.org/marketplace/training/...

I wonder if these is some confusion there on that.

And if you want some great free 1 to 1 help, the IRC channel (#concrete5 on irc.freenode.net) is usually really helpful.

Best Wishes,
Mike