When the maths doesn't work

I've just been offered an interesting little project. A chap who has authored a small software application which does one very technical task which might, in principle, be of use to certain people with a professional or keen amateur interest in a certain area.

Well, it's a niche product. It's good, I would think... but it's not selling. And the chap thinks that if I rewrite his site for him, it might sell better. And indeed it might.

But my concern, which I've set out for him, is that the numbers just may not work. His product might just be of interest to such a small number of people, and so few of them will find their way to its landing page however well we market it, that the best writing in the world won't make a huge difference.

Maybe he's selling 10 units a month now. And maybe we can increase that to 20 or 30 by rewriting. (That's a 100-200% improvement.) But even if we do, will it really make that much difference for him?

Sometimes you have to acknowledge that a good product may not actually have much of a market. And the best time to do this is before you throw too much resource at giving it life.