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Comment by cperciva | Hacker News Reader

You might want to adjust the pricing tiers. With $19/$79/$399 per month tiers, I have to guess that most people will start by trying the lowest tier; but that's limited to 2k visitors.

If you're doing an A/B test with 2k visitors and you've got an "A" conversion rate of 1%, you need to see a 60% improvement (16 conversions vs. 10) in order to have statistical significance. That's a huge improvement, and I doubt many people will be that lucky.

You'll probably be better off setting the limit for the lowest tier at 10k (and adjusting the others upwards too); that should dramatically increase the number of new users who find your service useful and stick around.

EDIT: Or another option would be to have a "free 10,000 visitors" trial rather than a "free 30 days" trial.

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All our plans start with a 30-day free trial so anyone can start with Silver or Gold plan and at the end of the trial period switch plans.

We also offer 100% Money Back Satisfaction Guarantee so if at the end of any month you aren't satisfied for any reason (including not reaching statistical significance), we'd be happy to offer you a full refund for the month.

All our plans start with a 30-day free trial so anyone can start with Silver or Gold plan and at the end of the trial period switch plans.

True, but that doesn't help people who don't get that much traffic within a 30 day period.

Offering refunds is great, but it's even better if they're not needed. :-)

Offering refunds is great, but it's even better if they're not needed. :-)

Certainly agree! :)

Why not just collect their credit card, but don't bill them initially so that the barrier to entry is low, then notify that they'll be charged at the end of the month. If they're pleased with the service, they'll probably ignore the email.

Requiring the user to remember to cancel or downgrade seems potentially sneaky.

That's actually how it works right now. We ask for your credit card initially but you don't get billed until 30 days later.

If you intend to keep things this way, then don't call it a Money Back Guarantee. Instead, be really clear that users have a trial, and billing is in arrears. Something like:

  YOUR CREDIT CARD WILL NOT BE CHARGED!
  
  We collect credit card numbers during signup to
  prevent fraud. But we won't take a cent until your free
  thirty day trial is complete.

  The trial is obligation-free; just visit our easy-to-use
  cancellation page during the first thirty days and you'll
  never be charged.

Consumers know that guarantees and rebates are intentionally painful to collect. They feel more confident and empowered when you don't have their money yet.

One caveat: I've seen successful trials that are a week or two long. At thirty days (and with users who aren't very committed), you might have an issue with users forgetting about the forthcoming charge, and then getting angry when it shows up on their bill next month.

You can alleviate a little of that with an email on day 25~27.

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