Green Software Marketing - online demos are better for the environment, and can be cheaper too

Happy Earth Day!  I hope everyone has taken a little time out of their day to to figure out what they can do in their lives to help the environment and our planet.  Even the smallest efforts can have a major impact.  If we evaluate our business practices for green alternatives, we can have an even larger impact than with our personal green decisions.

A lot of people equate green with expensive.  Organic foods are more expensive, certified green products are more expensive, hybrid cars are more expensive than the traditional gas guzzlers.  In the current economic climate, people who may be inclined to lean green feel that green may be a luxury and give up on environmentally-friendly practices and products.

What I'd like to touch on today is the fact that online demos are more green than traditional demos.  Specifically I'd like to point to trial CDs as compared to downloads and hosted online demos.

Trial CDs
Not many people consider the environmental impact of CD production.  During production of the actual CD petroleum plastics and metals are used to create the CD.  During packaging, plastics, paper and industrial inks are used in large quantities.  Petroleum is often used in the production of these plastics.  The use of paper in packaging contributes to deforestation.  Commercial printing inks often contain volatile chemicals that can harm the environment.  Very few CD manufacturers have green production processes, and if you must provide a CD trial, you can ask if the manufacturers use green practices in their manufacturing processes.  All of these CDs must also be delivered; depending on the service used CDs are delivered via ship, plane or truck - adding to the carbon footprint.

Online Demos
The green benefit of demos delivered online, such as downloads or TestDrive online demos, is that the same resources are used to provide demos to thousands of potential customers.  Online delivery ensures that nothing needs to be manufactured or shipped.  With no physical trial, no CDs or packaging will end up in landfills.  Depending on how your downloads or online demos are hosted, the hardware and infrastructure can be extremely energy efficient.


With a hosted online demo, your software is virtualized so that it's available online at all times and can be reused for all potential customers.  The same hardware can be used for multiple software companies and multiple end users since isolation is used to prevent users from viewing each other.  This type of demo lends itself to efficiency since the hardware is shared and used to its capacity. 

Online demos tend to be less expensive than Trial CDs, in-person demos or even downloads.  In an earlier blog post, I covered how online demos haven been proven to cost less and generate more revenue than both CDs and downloads.  So not only can you be a little more green in your marketing efforts, but you can also save money - accomplishing both tangible and intangible goals.

Many people think that being green is a gimmick or don't take it seriously.  But in 2009 especially, I have seen an increasing amount of conversation in the news, on Twitter, in blogs and amongst the people I know about the environment.  We continue to see more evidence of global warming and oil shortages, hybrid vehicles have been well publicized lately and we continue to send satellites to space that monitor our environment.  I think being green is becoming less a fad and will be embraced more by the public.  The more companies are not only perceived to be green, but are actually backing up their green claims, the more they will be accepted and respected by the public.

Evaluating the way you provide software demos and how it affects the environment may be a small factor in the grand scheme of things, but we all have to start somewhere, right?

What do you think, would replacing your physical software demos with online demos make sense for your company?