Which AV to sell?

J

joblo37pam

2[H]4U
Joined
Jun 28, 2002
Messages
2,211
I've been selling the retail and OEM versions of NOD32 in my shop for about 4 years now because it is a great product, and I could buy them in volume at Newegg at a good enough price to make a decent margin on them at MSRP. Newegg isn't giving volume discounts on them anymore, so I need to look for another option.

I contacted ESET when I opened about becoming a direct reseller, but at the time the best they would offer me is 10% off with my volume, which didn't come close to what I was paying at Newegg. I have tried contacting them again because even 10% is better than what I'm getting now, but I can't get them to return an email/phone call.

My customers have really liked NOD32, so I don't really want to switch, but if it's not paying the bills I don't have much choice.

I was just wondering what the rest of you shop owners are selling/recommending for consumer and home users?
 
Last edited:
YeOldeStoneCat and marley1 are NOD32 resellers and frequent this place. Maybe one of them could set you up with a sales rep?

We throw MSE on the machines that totally lack an AV and for those that want to pay for one, we have a bulk of NOD32 at the moment. When that runs out, I'm not sure where will turn, but I'm subscribed to see what kind of resolution you reach. I looked into reselling for ESET but I couldn't guarantee a price bracket each month (we primarily do service contracts so new AV purchases aren't all that prevalent other than walk-ins).
 
kevinzak said:
YeOldeStoneCat and marley1 are NOD32 resellers and frequent this place. Maybe one of them could set you up with a sales rep?
Click to expand...

I work with YeOlde for all of my ESET business/server licenses, but he doesn't do the retail/OEM packages.
 
My recommendation would be to alter your business model so as to not rely on anti-virus resale as a significant revenue stream.

The reason for this is that there are many free options out there people can choose from now and that "viruses" aren't the threat they used to be. There are also UTM-style appliances that now can perform anti-virus at the WAN edge via layer 7 inspection from many vendors which will also be eating away at that revenue.

I'd be shifting to reselling UTM-style appliances and their update subscriptions (there's more money in that anyway) and just recommend MSE. Either that or just go with what you know and except the relatively crummy margins.
 
When did I say that my business model relied on selling antivirus? It's actually a very VERY small part of what we do, but that doesn't mean that it should be ignored. And in no way do the margins have to be 'crummy'. With the right Newegg volume discount, we were making almost 50% on the software. There are very few other consumer-level IT products that will get that kind of margin.

Most home users don't want anything to do with extra 'boxes' like a UTM devices, especially if they take any management/maintenance. They just want the computer they have to work with little to no interaction from them.

Many also have gotten sceptical of anything offered 'free' like MSE/AVG/etc., regardless of the quality of the product. That may change in the future, but as of now, most people coming through my door want me to give them the best AV software they can buy.

Malware is actually at the highest point I have seen in a long time, far from on the decline.
 
mattjw916 said:
I'd be shifting to reselling UTM-style appliances and their update subscriptions (there's more money in that anyway) and just recommend MSE. Either that or just go with what you know and except the relatively crummy margins.
Click to expand...

I partially agree with this. All businesses should be protected with a hardware-based anti-malware/URL filter at the edge. However, you can't recommend that your business clients use MSE since it is licensed for personal and home-based business use only.

You should be making your money on service anyway, just make enough on the AV software sale to cover your time. Bill the client for installs/upgrades/maintenance of the application and get your "markup" that way.
 
Captain Colonoscopy said:
I partially agree with this. All businesses should be protected with a hardware-based anti-malware/URL filter at the edge. However, you can't recommend that your business clients use MSE since it is licensed for personal and home-based business use only.

You should be making your money on service anyway, just make enough on the AV software sale to cover your time. Bill the client for installs/upgrades/maintenance of the application and get your "markup" that way.
Click to expand...

I agree with this for business customers, but that isn't the focus of this thread. I will edit the OP to clarify
 
MSE since it is licensed for personal and home-based business use only.
Click to expand...
Good info, I didn't know that. I'm not a "server guy" so I don't really keep up on that stuff anymore.
 
PM me your contact info (I'm sure I have it somewhere at the office, but just to get it back in my face again)...I'll have my rep get someone in touch with you..since if I recall you're not eastern region.

As for what I use for home users....I've moved to MSE, it has time and time again proven itself to me, even compared to NOD32 v4.2. Better than NOD? Eh....but....for home users, it's hassle free. No having to renew it, client doesn't have to worry again. I'm sure most people that work with computers notice that...home users often just "forget" about the license renewals. So the permanence of MSE, not having to renew, and pretty darned good performance, combined with a very simple interface....all those factors add up to "It's a great product for home users". I've seen it do well with the recent trends in rogues to be totally proud to recommend it to home users.

Some "savvy" home users may be wary of "free" AV products...but...we as consultants, our vote should carry some weight with them. I say "Look, I work with this stuff day in and day out, and some evenings even..and Microsoft hit a home run with this product". I tell them use it myself...it's on all my home computers, my wifes 2 computers, my kids computers, and...I get all my Eset licenses for FREE...so what does that statement tell them?

Making money on stand alone Eset licenses for home users? It's not worth our time for billing and managing the balance on that credit card. That's why we really stick with just EAVB and XMON licenses.

BTW, did my first a.. new Eset 4.2 w/XMON install today...they're making a pretty slick package out of that with the latest RAS/RAC. ;)
 
I use MSE myself on my laptop, but NOD at the office. It will definitely be on the shortlist if I decide to ditch NOD.

I've spent a good share of time trying to steer my customers away from free AV. Granted, that was before MSE was even offered publicly, but I still don't like the idea of contradicting myself and recommending a free product. The loss in revenue wouldn't be very appealing, either. I could always charge for the install (I don't with NOD32), but I'm not a big fan of charging for free stuff.

There may not be any better options out there, and that's fine. I'm just making sure I'm not missing something.
 
Simple you can't make money off Nod any more.

We use to buy 100 packs of Nod from Newegg for 19.99. ESET cracked down on this, its 10% off no matter what your reseller is for the home. Meaning you get it for about 33 bucks, and can only make that 10-17 buck profit. Sucks but thats what they did.

The business you can still make money on it. You can contact nsgroup-inc and go through them for a reseller.

I just purchased a sheet of 100 keys so will be waiting then thinking of going to a different provider as well.

Maybe Kaspersky depning on the cost.
 
YeOlde - yeah i have been pushing out ESET 4.2 to all the clients, working fine.
 
I still haven't had any luck picking something out. I guess I've just been foolishly optimistic that volume pricing would be reinstated at Newegg, but it doesn't seem to be happening any time soon.

Anyone come up with a new idea?
 
I make good money removing all these AV security suites from Customers PCs. They are fed up with them. They much prefer the less noisy free options such as MSE.

I had a rep from Bullguard try to push their product to my customers. I told them I tended to unistall their product rather than install it. Give him his dues he listened to my points.

Kaspersky is particularly awful in pinging up alarming messages that joe user has no clue of understanding. They dont want that.
 
daglesj said:
I make good money removing all these AV security suites from Customers PCs. They are fed up with them. They much prefer the less noisy free options such as MSE.

I had a rep from Bullguard try to push their product to my customers. I told them I tended to unistall their product rather than install it. Give him his dues he listened to my points.

Kaspersky is particularly awful in pinging up alarming messages that joe user has no clue of understanding. They dont want that.
Click to expand...

Most of these reasons are why I have recommended NOD/ESET. Most customers forget it's there until renewal time. Only about 30% of my customers can legally use MSE without breaking EULA, and another 30% use a server managed AV. That leaves 40ish% that I need to find something else for.
 
Well I just removed Kaspersky 2009 from another customer who had been getting lockups etc.

Kaspersky had swelled to nearly 10GB on the HDD!!!!!

Nice work!
 
BackupExec or just use SBS backup if it's a Small Business Server. I also like VizionCore vRanger if they have VMware environments.
 
I am a reseller of the following backup solutions:
Mozy Pro and Affiliate for Mozy Home
Intronis - moving all my clients
Whatever other software they need

If you are looking for recurring revenue, online backup is great. We use SBS Backup with jobs as well but put them on online for very important stuff.
 
As the above posters have said, MSE is a great product to give to your customers. They may even appreciate that you're trying to save them money and giving them a much easier to use application in the end (Not saying ESET isn't easy to use).

However, maybe you can still make money...just charge for the installation of the MSE application? Some people say don't charge to install free software, but service is service... and if people value your work they will have no problems paying you for it.
 
The only downside I find to MSE is the initial time it takes for the first update. Can take ages. It's really quick after that.
 
daglesj said:
The only downside I find to MSE is the initial time it takes for the first update. Can take ages. It's really quick after that.
Click to expand...

I've also noticed when installing MSE for family that the initial update seems to take an extraordinarily long time. I found the manual definitions update installer, and it is only about 50MB, which doesn't account for how slow the initial update is.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top