Comment by guynamedloren | Hacker News Reader

Comment by guynamedloren | Hacker News Reader

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mootothemax - thanks so much for this series. I loved the first post and was anxiously awaiting this one. It met and exceeded my expectations, packed with great advice and insight. That being said - the language seemed a bit rushed at times. Please run through it and fix grammatical errors - just a nit-picky thing :)

Oh, and I have a few quick questions on gaining initial users. Other than mass-mailing bloggers and submitting to twitter directories, what have you done to bring traffic to your site? Also, I'm interested to know unique visitors vs. free users vs. paid users, as I'm sure many others here are wondering as well. Do all free trials end up converting to paid users? Also, how have you handled existing customers when experimenting with price changes? Do you keep them on the plan that they signed up with, or do you apply the price changes to ALL customers? Please share with us!

Thanks for your thanks! :-)

Other than mass-mailing bloggers and submitting to twitter directories, what have you done to bring traffic to your site?

That's been about the limit of it - attempting to get relevant users visiting the site, as there's no point in getting millions of visitors who have no interest in Twitter tools :-)

Also, I'm interested to know unique visitors vs. free users vs. paid users, as I'm sure many others here are wondering as well.

Hrm, I'll have a think about that and maybe write a small post about it :)

Also, how have you handled existing customers when experimenting with price changes?

Probably the wrong way. Customers stay on the plan they're on, so the lucky subscribers who are on $20/year stay on $20/year until they cancel their subscription.

I had two customers complain when they were paying $9.99/month and they say the new $19.99/year price. I explained that I was experimenting with pricing, that it was likely to change in future, but if it didn't then I'd be happy to offer them the new rate. It turns out that they've also done well now, so I think in the end everyone's happy :)

Have you considered reaching out specifically to small businesses who are doing Twitter marketing? Maybe even within your city or state could be a good start.

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