

Should we even offer a freemium product? - speby
http://blog.polleverywhere.com/should-we-even-offer-a-free-product-for-educa

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patio11
My two cents:

1) Never, ever describe customer feedback as whining dramatics, especially
when it is whining dramatics. It is very easy to get teachers to see things as
Us vs. Them and you are -- make no mistake about this -- Them.

2) When reading comments from teachers about your pricing strategy I find it
is salutary to remind oneself that they don't teach for free, either. Again,
you don't have to say that out loud.

3) There are price-sensitive customers in every market. You don't have to sell
to them.

4) Teachers report spending $250 to $400 a year on educational supplies from
their own pockets. I would keep that in mind when contemplating pricing of
software/services aimed at them.

5) If you want to sell to school districts, you are going to have to learn how
to do Enterprise Sales. Trust me on this: $150 a year is not _nearly_ enough
to recoup the costs you'll incur doing this. (Just chasing POs through the 7+
step process to get them approved will cost you more than that in staff time.
When customers approach me about paying with a PO I give them a copy for free
-- it saves me money. Not even joking!)

~~~
pvg
And a small addition to point 1 - don't post your customers' emails in public.
Especially if you're going to describe them as whining dramatics. It's the
equivalent of announcing 'if you send me any feedback I dislike, I'll post it
on the net and make fun of you'.

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sachinag
This is an exceptionally honest and forthright look at the pros/cons of a
freemium model versus a simple free trial. I tip my hat to the Pollers for
being willing to express their conundrum in such clear language in a public
forum. Kudos.

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jasonkester
I'd make .edu a special case and give away a free subscription to any teacher
who asks for one.

In fact, that's _exactly_ what I did with Twiddla, and it has paid off
amazingly well in the form of ridiculously loyal, eternally grateful users and
tons of free press. Better still, every student in every classroom that uses
Twiddla today will eventually be wearing a suit and sitting in a conference
room while a bunch of other guy in suits struggle to make WebEx work _at all_
, and chances are he'll suggest this cool web meeting tool he used back in
school.

So if I were you guys, I'd re-do the math to see what it will cost to offer
free accounts, but _only_ to educational users. It was more than worth it for
us.

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axiom
I think the real lesson to take away from this is "stay the hell away from the
education market, especially primary/secondary schools." Seriously, it's a god
damn nightmare, and the fact that $50 plastic remote controls are the state of
the art in that market is just an indication of that.

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ryanhuff
You might consider allowing teachers at the same school to pool an account so
they can split the costs across multiple teachers. Teachers in the same grade
or subject often collaborate, and this might be a good way to incentivize
teachers to sell the product in their schools for you.

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vishaldpatel
Suggestion for the archive feature: -> Archive results for all. -> Only make
the latest results available for the free customers. When they pay for a
year's subscription, make the rest of the archive available.

I think flickr does this.

~~~
speby
This is actually the direction we're heading with PE. Thanks for the
independent validation on this strategy.

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swombat
While I have nothing against the sentiment/content in this post, I think the
structure leaves a lot to be desired. Why anger your readers if you're going
to give in anyway?

Far too confrontational, imho...

~~~
bradgessler
Actually this didn't anger our readers at all, the opposite in fact. Its very
easy for people to forget that there are people behind web companies that have
to eat, sleep under a roof, and occasionally blow some money on something fun
every once in a while like Skiing.

Teachers are very reasonable people, so we're being straight forward about the
situation and reminding them that we're not Google; we don't make money from
ads, we make money from building software applications.

It amazes me how people assume free products "monetized" by ads are the norm
when in fact it is a freakish anomaly for any business. Most companies run
like lemonade stands; you pay for water, lemons and sugar, mix it all up,
setup a stand, and sell it to a customer for an amount that covers your costs
and gives you reasonable profits to cover your risk.

~~~
speby
Agree. Based on some of the comments and re-tweets from educators themselves,
it is clear that they are reasonable. They just want to pinch pennies (And who
doesn't?). Unfortunately, there is a minimum level for us to charge that still
makes sense to even sell to them in the first place.

As a poster above mentioned earlier, just having to deal with a PO process
almost _automatically_ means you have to charge more just on that basis, as
dealing with the paper back and forth process, collecting on invoices, etc.,
adds up to a significant portion of the acquisition costs. Unfortunately, it
schools continue to insist on a purchase ordering model, they'll have to also
keep paying for it in all the services/products they consume.

In fact, if you want an interesting business opportunity, it could be to build
a product that helps schools/educational institutions buy shit more smartly!!!
Using credit cards and expense reimbursements from staff members rather than a
centralized purchase order/paper check system. Blech!

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dpatru
$129/year < $3/week = Not expensive for something that gets used.

