"Selling" a product database

Hi

I want to add a load of product images to Zen cart and then sell the database content that ive entered into it.

Im just wondering if this is allowed? I own the pictures and the text content for product description which is the bit im actually selling a license for - and ill distribute that content seperately in the package i sell but I also want to put the content in a database which can be imported into zen cart.

So i can provide a link to zencart site for them to download zen cart, and i provide the database which they can drop ontop of it along with the content for the images folder.

Please let me know if this is allowed?

Also id like to make a preconfigured zen cart with various contributions installed and distribute that somehow. Can I do it?

THanks

I would say as I was told, it is ill advised. You will then be responsible for their support, upgrades, updates and liability for security and such. If they come here for support they will likely be met with information to contact you that packaged solutions are not supported.

~Melanie

mprough:

I would say as I was told, it is ill advised. You will then be responsible for their support, upgrades, updates and liability for security and such. If they come here for support they will likely be met with information to contact you that packaged solutions are not supported.

~Melanie

I want to get other people selling my products and make it easy for them. I suppose I could just give them the populated database and instructions to download and install zen cart with fantastico and then dump my database on top. I could have all the images loading remotely from a CDN by find and replace in the database and put the CDN url in there for each image - i suppose?

Why not use one of the affiliate programs ?

What do you mean?

You can certainly sell the service of installing zen cart with all of your modifications. And you can structure the contract any way you want: you install and give x hours of support, they are responsible for updating/upgrading/ensuring best practices for security, or you are, or some other deal. It's entirely up to you, personally I would only sell the installation service on their server and give x amount of support time with more support time blocks being extra. And you can have the db all set up and ready for them to roll.

Or, you can sell just a spreadsheet and image folder. The spreadsheet can be done in the Easy Populate format for easy import into zen cart. But, with a spreadsheet and image folder you are not limiting your customers to using only zen cart. They may have a different cart that they already use and are familiar with, or might want a cart that is easier to maintain than zen cart which requires a lot of file checking if the mods have changed any core files. This would open up your potential customer base and put you in a better position to sell/license more and make more money.

i guess that might be the way forward then but id rather just sell the database, but it think thats not allowed.

creamcrackers:

What do you mean?

If the goal is to allow others to sell your products, there are various software packages that will let you designate those people as affiliates. For example, see JROX here: http://www.zen-cart.com/content.php?15-Business-Services-Providers

creamcrackers:

i guess that might be the way forward then but id rather just sell the database, but it think thats not allowed.

I would sell a spreadsheet file with the Easy Populate columns, which are all of the relevant fields from the products table, and a folder with the images in subfolders as you would have them on zen cart. That way, anyone using any cart can use this info to sell your products. The database files are specific to zen cart, I don't think there is any issue selling the data files, like a db backup file that a zen cart user can import into their db. But the spreadsheet is the better option, IMO, since anyone can use it with any cart.

Doing the affiliate thing means you still host the site and sell the products, other people put links to individual products on their sites which direct to your site, you sell the product to the customer, the affiliate gets a % fee for directing the traffic to your site. A very different scenario to setting someone up to sell your products. We use the free affiliate mod and it works well, I did have to correct some bugs and do some formatting but it serves my purpose which is fairly limited.

Ah no its nothing like that its very specialised

There's nothing legally stopping you from "selling" a copy of your store's database.

But you should really consider the fact that if you're going to push someone into using a certain piece of software which you have customized for specialty reasons, then you should be planning to provide the technical support for it too.

Example: if you're forcing a certain addon into a prepackaged Zen Cart site which you force your customer to use, then THEY won't have any clue that they're using NONSTANDARD software and that their problem might not be with "Zen Cart" at all, but rather with a certain addon ... and they won't have any idea that they need to mention that addon or specifically ask for help in relation to that addon. And then it takes the volunteers here numerous posts to drag the information out of them, and take them all the way back to square one of explaining what an addon is vs what is core Zen Cart functionality, before it's possible to even help them sort out their problem. And if their problem is something wrong in their hosting environment it may still be necessary to get them to install a fresh clean uncustomized copy of Zen Cart to specifically isolate cause/effect of a problem, etc. And it goes round and round.
And it ends up leaving them with a "first impression" of Zen Cart being complicated and maybe even unfriendly ..... all because they came in with certain expectations of "well, I'm using Zen Cart so all those volunteers at Zen Cart should know exactly what my problem is" ... when they're really using some hybrid which they can't even describe fully.
So, the short of this comment is: Be sure that YOU plan to offer FRONTLINE support to them, being their first point of contact for help with any problems they encounter, and for training them on how it all works together.

And be sure to teach them about PCI Compliance and their role in self-certifying all the addons you prepackaged in the bundle you sold them. Cuz technically they're responsible for everything after unzipping the official PA-DSS Certified Zen Cart release zip. And if you insulated them from that step then they need to be looking to you for complete details of all that you've done with it and auditing that you did it in a secure fashion. It would be fair for them to expect you to co-sign their PCI self-assessments.

Something to consider anyway.

The idea of an importable set of just products+categories from a CSV and a zip of image files ... becomes quite attractive when one considers the factors above.
You could help them set up the suggested addons and your custom template by providing some step-by-step documentation and tools to make it easy for them to set up and customize their own store to work well for your specific niche. And still offer support if they need it.