

Ask HN: Sandbox mode for a SaaS? - nyddle

I&#x27;m building a SaaS service, very early stages (rough MVP) and planning to set up a sandbox.mysaas.com where users can play with the service under a preset &quot;Test User&quot; account without registration.<p>Is it a good idea from a business perspective or am I just missing on potential customers&#x27; emails?
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codegeek
I run a SAAS product and I have learned that it is OK to ask for their email
if someone is really serious about using your app. Yes give them the test
access to sandbox, demo whatever but at least get their information in return
so you can follow up with them for feedback as well. Remember, it is not just
about getting people to pay.

Here is what I will do. Give them access to a sandbox but let them create
their own userid for it if possible using their email etc. This way, you now
know how many actual users are trying your app.

This will also reduce the number of non-serious users as well. Yes this may
cause some users to not try the app but in my experience, any user who does
not give you at least their email to try your app is very unlikely to become a
paying customer.

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skrish
It is a huge opportunity to capture email id of serious users.

You could think of intent to explore sandbox as a slightly advanced stage in
engagement with potential customer. The top of the funnel could just be a
visitor who downloads a fact sheet about your space or just download pricing
sheet from your website (mapbox does it nicely without being intrusive). And
they don't spam. That is one good way to populate top of the funnel.

The sandbox access is another stage in your funnel. I am assuming you would
like more folks to try your sandbox, without friction or as less friction as
possible without giving too much information.

1\. You could just let them play in a generic sandbox site without even email
/ registration and then subtly ask them to register and reserve the site, if
they would like to come back.

This is like Stripe. Classy and confident that your product is loved and folks
will register.

2\. You could ask only for email id and allow them to get to a separate
sandbox site. They could name the site later if they like it. You know that
only those who complete registration process are more likely serious users to
engage later with smart follow-ups. Those who bounce off & abandon are more
likely not interested in your product. This is what we do at Chargebee - our
product is serious in nature (shameless plug: we do billing with REST API on
top of Stripe, Braintree & other gateways with all kinds of payment methods
including card) .

3\. If you are a 2 member team and only want to focus on very few serious
users, then having a card upfront for trial acts as entry barrier. This allows
only serious users to get in but with better conversions. I think you are not
inclined and very few SaaS services do this. (aweber.com has a paid $1 trial
as well).

You should definitely test one or more of these options. But to start with a
simple sandbox to explore product is definitely a good way to measure
engagement, see where they click & explore product. And then derive insights
based on that.

Then you could iterate to see if having email id for registration as a filter
helps bring in serious users.

In our case we implemented #2. In our first iteration we asked for email, site
name & password and when we removed site name & pwd fields we doubled
conversions for trial as well as paying customers. We are not testing how
simplifying the registration / account claimed would impact conversion.

P.S: When I say engage smartly, I am assuming we are all talking about non-
spammy, subtle but showing enough intent to earn a serious trial user's
business, like we all prefer to be treated. :)

Thoughts?

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benologist
Overall it just sounds like a distraction that will delay your MVP launching:

\- dummy data may not be of any value or interest to users

\- you will have to promote the demo for anyone to hear about it

\- if you are still months from launch there will be limited retention, zero
if it's not functional or enticing

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detaro
I'd make the sandbox for registered users only (but possibly allow for
testing-only accounts without billing information that can be easily upgraded
to actual plans)

