Comment by sr3d | Hacker News Reader

Comment by sr3d | Hacker News Reader

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My thinking is that a wedding on average is planned 6 months in advanced. So at $12.79/month (this is the pricing point I have in mind), the total will be $76.74 per user. Of course it doesn't make sense for users to pay after their wedding is over. My plan is to "freeze" the account if once user decided to stop paying, however, I'd still let users to login and visit their account page, they just can't make any changes (37Signals actually force you to pay to get back in once you stop the billing, which isn't very nice). And there will be a 14-day trial (instead of 30 as it said on the site at the moment), but I'll run A/B test on the trial time to see which one is better. 30 days maybe too long and I wouldn't get paid fast enough to survive.

But I can totally see that user will want to go with a prepaid package, say 3-month pass at $30 ($8.37 saved) and they don't have to worry about getting charged accidentally after this 3-month period is over. Or a 6-month package for $50, which is even more savings.

I still pretty open about the pricing at the moment, but I know I want to go with a price of $12.79/month (and this number is inline with the response from my survey). A/B split tests will probably tell me which direction to go in terms of the different pricing packages.

TheKnot.com monetize with advertising and affiliation, and in my opinion, despised being a really rich site, their user experience isn't as great. People who took my survey confirmed this, and a few people replied as "hated it" for having too much ads. Since I want to focus on delivering a solid app, I think having a price tag on the site will help me focus more on building quality software, rather than squeezing ads money out of the traffic.

And thanks for the feedback! I really appreciate it.

Can you provide some of the reasoning that led you to the $12.79 amount. That is a rather odd amount, but it seems like you have a reason for it and I'm curious as to what it is.

I agree it sucks to get locked out when your trail runs out. I think your idea of locked down afterwards is a better idea.

Hi Exline,

I always wanted to have a number between $10 and $15 so that it's more like a casual price that won't make people cringe to fork out their money. In my survey (http://marrily.com/survey), $10 - $15 is also the range that people are willing to pay as well.

A few response said they want to a price in the $5 - $10 rang, however, this price is too low, and in my opinion, it would affect user's perception of the application. They would think "you get what you pay for". Having a low $7.99 or $6.99 will probably hurt the app more than helping with cheaper price/higher volume. Based on my own experience (I was a paid customer to 37Signals basecamp for the longest time), at the end of the day, the difference between $7.99 and $12.79 isn't that much. I was willing to pay 37Signals $12 as much as I would if they priced it at $5.00. However, it's a huge difference in terms of revenue (a 37.5% loss in potential revenue).

I read somewhere that prices that end in 9, .99, and .79 work best. The Appstore probably an amazing demonstration of this: 99c apps do sell, and so do $9.99 apps for the iPad. However, I want to go with a price that works and not as as common. So I pick .79. And I'm superstitious as well, 13 is a bad number, so I don't want $13.79 (furthermore, (1+3+7+9) mod 10 = 0, not sure if it's good or bad here). $14.79 is a bit high (I probably have to do A/B split tests once the site got more tractions to test this price point though), while $11.79 is a bit on the low side. $12.79 is the perfect number.

However, all these come from a guy who has never sold anything in his life. So don't count on my words. I'm still in the experimenting phase, but I'd love to share my results afterward.

Cheers!

Edit: For 13.79, the sum of all the numbers mod 10 is 0, in baccarat, that's the worst hand you can possibly have. So definitely not $13.79 for the price.

Thanks for details. I know about ending with .99 but had not heard of .79 but it falls under the same rules. Even though I know this, as a consumer I don't like it so I charge an even $25.

I think the difference between basecamp and your app is B2B vs B2C. I happily pay for things that help my business grow. I'm more hesitant to pay for things as a consumer. RIO is easer to justify to business. But that said, I think there is enough pain in the wedding planning processes that you can find the right price point.

I think you should just charge $99 as a one-time fee and forget about the monthly payment options. Just make the service worth it, that's all.

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