This DLGuard review presents one web-masters experience of using this download sales tool to administer an ebook business. The software can be used for any type of digital product (besides PDF ebooks) as in principal providing a download hyper-link to a customer works irrespective of the file type.

I was recommended DLGuard in 2008 when I was writing ebooks and looking for a way to sell them online from my own web server. By using my own web server I knew it would be possible to build a mailing list of loyal customers as I published more ebooks.

DLGuard software is a set of scripts that can be installed on most servers to provide shopping cart/checkout pages and functionality on your website. The business logic can integrate with Paypal, Worldpay and several others for processing the payment.

It is after the sale where DLGuard begins to automate your ebook business. It auto-replies to successful customers an email with a unique and secure download link to their purchase. The security is critical as there is always the danger of the link being shared maliciously. DLGuard secures the link by putting a time limit on the link’s validity and capping the amount of times the link can be used.

Integrating DLGuard into your site consists of installing the scripts and adding your products to the inventory database. Most users will wish to also customize the web pages/forms for the checkout (to more closely resemble their website’s design) and the product’s scripts are designed with this form of customization in mind.

As an entry level tool for managing download sales DLGuard is a secure application that is easy to install and have making sales promptly. It is however competing with the large online ebook sales websites which do have the potential of larger sales. Where DLGuard beats the online services though is in providing you with your own customer tracking database so if you are serious about publishing ebooks and have a website with good traffic volumes then you will benefit from being able to build your own customer mailing list.