Digital Goods Delivery (DGD) has come full circle with the release of SPBAS v1.3. In this post we will discuss the three core components of the SPBAS Digital Goods Delivery system. I’ll also show you an example of how it all comes together and is presented to the customer at the end of this post.
Media Sets
SPBAS enables you to add multiple (sub)categories so you can organize your media. Media is simply another name for the downloads that you offer to your customers. A media set is nothing more than a group of (sub)categories and media.
Media sets are added to products as assets. When a product is ordered the media set is issued giving the customer download access to all media in the set. Customers must login to access downloads.
Download Controls
A download control is assigned to a product as an asset which is issued automatically on purchase or manually after purchase, your choice. The only purpose of a download control is to limit access to downloads in media sets. Download controls can be set to expire in minutes, hours, days, months or years from the time of being issued. Once expired, depending on your settings, a download control will disable access to downloads or limit access to downloads. With limited access, no files added after the download control expires are accessible.
If no download controls are assigned to a product the customer will enjoy unlimited access to downloads.
Renewal Products
It’s standard practice in the software business to offer customers an initial upgrade & support period with the purchase of a perpetual (owned) license. The initial upgrade & support period usually expires in six months or one year. After the initial period expires, access to downloads & support is up for renewal. Six month renewals are generally priced at 20% of the perpetual cost with one year renewals at 40%. Renewals are important because they pay for ongoing development and continued support of the product. This is especially true for niche products with small overall markets.
To create a renewal product go to Admin -> Products -> Add New and choose the status of “Renewal”.
Renewal products have many of the same features as standard products, with a few exceptions:
- Renewal products are assigned to other standard products.
- Renewal products can only be ordered through the customer area “My Packages” section.
- The option to order a renewal product only shows up if the standard product had a download control assigned.
- If the download control is active then the option to purchase the Renewal product does not show up. It only shows up after the download control has expired.
Putting It All Together
Use the Getting Started module in the admin area of your SPBAS installation to begin (Admin -> Home -> Getting Started). This guide will walk you through each step of getting started with SPBAS which includes the setup of products, renewal products, media sets and download controls.
