How to promote the Pandora?


Drop the price and it will sell itself. I know so many interested people and as soon as they hear or read the price the lose all interest.

Heh, exactly what lower price do you think will bring in more profits?


The original preorder price turned out to be too low to cover costs. Producing and shipping the remaining preorders is funded by profits from new units and upgrades. If you drop the price of new units and upgrades to production cost, no remaining preorders get shipped.


Currently you can get a pandora for 280€. https://www.dragonbox.de/en/main-consoles-and-upgrades/93-pandora-classic-1.html That is already too cheap, imo.
 
Actually, you can't get a pandora for 280€. Atleast as new from dragonbox.de that is - "Availability:


This product is no longer in stock". Or currently atleast... those will propably be available only if there are old PCBs to refurb...
 
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Would it be possible to send review units to small-ish sites like www.technobuffalo.com that get more "general consumer" traffic. It would be nice if the Pandora was thought of more as a consumer device than its current "dev" notion
 
I wouldn't mind helping out, but I think even Ithic ought to offer SOMETHING to the people doing the reselling...if only a free upgrade, or a free SD card or SOMETHING....


I like Link, he is very helpful, but I don't know a lot of people who work for free while someone else actually makes money...


I mean, a labor of love is one thing...but I couldn't see doing it and getting absolutely NOTHING while someone else DOES.
 
Maybe ED should start a commission based sales program, community can be the resellers.

ithic.com is already doing that except he is doing it commission-free
Was doing it commission free. On ReBirth units, I barely make anything to cover expenses and costs incurred while doing business. Now that I can sell 1GHz units, I'm actually able to further invest into the business and inventory.
 
Marketing it as a game machine pits it directly against a pile of competitors at half the price (or less).


How about something to attract new and untapped audiences to features and tasks that you can not do with any other device that fits in your pocket.


1. Cable/DSL wifi installers.


Setting up a new router with custom software. I did this using my Pandora, a USB to 10/100 Ethernet adapter and a new ASUS RT-N66U router. I downloaded the Tomato version of DD-WRT, connected into the router, set it for update and loaded the hot-rodded OS onto it. Then I made all of the needed settings and tested wired AND wireless connectivity. Then I SSH'd into the servers to check that they were all getting connected properly. Every cable & phone company that installs home networking routers needs to equip their installer fleet with one of these. No other device would allow them to do all of this then put the 'configure and test computer' into a slot in their tool belt and move on to the next install.


2. Photo Journalists.


SSHFS into a server from a free internet connection (hotel bar, coffee shop, etc) to back up/save content. Seems mind numbing boring - unless you're a photo journalist and want to make sure you have a secured copy of the day's work before stepping on a plane to the next gig - while using a device that fits nicely in your camera bag. No need to lug a laptop along anymore just to submit content. Did I mention that pretty much all professional and high end consumer cameras have settled on SD as primary media?


3. Systems Administrators.


So - you're on call for systems administration. That normally means that you're hauling a laptop around even if you just stop down to the store for diapers and beer. Remote admin using a cell phone is beyond frustrating - needs a keyboard and mouse. The Pandora connected to your Bluetooth tether or phone-hot-spot can let you remote in, fix the issue and move on without searching for a desk to set the laptop up on, logging in, etc... Instead of a laptop bag or a murse, slip the Pandora in your inside coat pocket, your phone in your pants pocket and go.


All 3 of those are business applications. I am not aware of any device currently being sold that can do them better than the Pandora. Think of the Cable/DSL installer example. If it were sold to a major company as 'standard gear' for their installers and service personnel, a single sale or contract could be more units than all of what has been produced so far.


Yes, it's great for games. However, there are lots of devices that play games. How many devices fit in a tool belt that can configure, test, back-up and re-image a router on-site?


I'm not saying to ignore the gamer crowd - they're why the controls work so well. But if you actually managed to get this thing into a few B2B shows in the right industries...? Hmm - maybe?
 
Good idea! However, companies like security and useually shy away from Open Source software when it comes to IT administration. Good thinking, though.
 
Good idea! However, companies like security and useually shy away from Open Source software when it comes to IT administration. Good thinking, though.

Actually, at the level of servers and the folks who administer them - Open Source isn't such an issue. The web runs on Linux - and so do many major corporations, regardless of what is on the desktop. SSH and HTTPS connections via Reminna, FileZilla and similar are regularly used. You might be shocked, but at a lot of companies it's the system admins themselves who pick the hardware they use to administer from. They're often the ones who understand what is/isn't secure, regardless of whether the software is open source or expensive.
 
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Maybe make the price for refurbished pandoras 249€ to make it more attractive to "the general public".

Send this guy a pandora. He doubled our playercount in Savage 2 with his video. A lot of people (1300K) are watching his channel and a lot of them are gamers. He has a wikipedia page too: http://www.youtube.com/user/HouseholdHacker/

And maybe this teeny youtube star (600K subscribers in UK): http://www.youtube.com/user/nerimon/
 
249€ to 280€ is not too much money (31€). You could cheat and increase the shipping costs a bit, if its not possible to lower the to 249€. The general public is not too clever. Less then 250€ is a good price for most. Just 30€ more is a "bad" price. I don't know why but a lot (or most) people work this way.

This way we could maybe sell a lot of destroyed and repaired pandoras (probably GC want some money for repairing them, but it would help to cut the preorder queue).
 
249€ to 280€ is not too much money (31€)
Yes it is, if you already got lots of debts because of some shitty company in goddamn Texas (and Craig?).

This way we could maybe sell a lot of destroyed and repaired pandoras (probably GC want some money for repairing them, but it would help to cut the preorder queue).
If I recall correctly: That is the main reason, why the price is so low already.


Once in a while there is a Pandora with some minor part not working for an even lower amount of money.
 
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I would calculate what is better. If I had lots of repaired Pandoras and can't sell them I would offer them for 249€. If I got a few repaired Pandoras and they sell well, I would sell them for 280€. I think this is a good idea.
 
249€ to 280€ is not too much money (31€). You could cheat and increase the shipping costs a bit, if its not possible to lower the to 249€. The general public is not too clever. Less then 250€ is a good price for most. Just 30€ more is a "bad" price. I don't know why but a lot (or most) people work this way.


This way we could maybe sell a lot of destroyed and repaired pandoras (probably GC want some money for repairing them, but it would help to cut the preorder queue).
Say ... what?


With what PROFIT? Profits are the only thing that Ed can divert to fund production of units to reduce the preorder/refund queue, and you are suggesting lowering the price to a point where little or no profit remains.


Production cost of a Rebirth unit is what, $400? (correct me if I am wrong). Are you counting the refurbished CC boards as costing nothing? We already know that the original preorder price (250€?) didn't cover production costs, so explain how 249€ leads to a profit for each refurbished OpenPandora sold.
 
With what PROFIT? Profits are the only thing that Ed can divert to fund production of units to reduce the preorder/refund queue, and you are suggesting lowering the price to a point where little or no profit remains.
This boards are allready paid afaik. So "just" the shipping costs and the repair costs (and the new case) must be paid. Not sure how much this is, but if there are hundreds of boards laying around and ED has problems to sell, maybe lower the price to 249€ if its possible. This will lead to more sales, combined with a good marketing campaign.
 
Personaly I think that Indiegames.com would be a good site to promote the Pandora.
 
This boards are allready paid afaik. So "just" the shipping costs and the repair costs (and the new case) must be paid.
The cases are not nothing (24E). Also you're not counting the LCD (85E), lcd cable (17E) and the battery (28E). It all adds up (154E). Also, proper PCB repair people dont work for cheap. Assembly is also work that needs to be paid., etc. So I'd say ED should try with 280 (or 279) and only cheapen it for slightly defective units or way later if needed and there is margin. 
 
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