nathanburke

Thanks so much. Can't wait to check it out!

My other question: Are you purposely staying vague with your categories? When I go to add a business, there are no category selectors, though it feels like there should be (could just be me).

Hope this helps.

http://mashable.com http://centernetworks.com http://scalableintimacy.com/ http://chrisbrogan.com http://xconomy.com http://dondodge.typepad.com/

1. What percentage of free users convert to paid users? Looking at a TechCrunch article that covered Jott, they say:

In August voice-to-text service Jott moved out of beta and added a premium feature for $4/month. Since then, the company says, about 30% of Jott’s active users have opted for the premium, no-ads version of the service.

30% seems really, really high to me, but I could be way off. But even if 30% of the free users upgraded, that leaves 70% that are gone completely. That’s 70% of the people that have heard about you, come to your site, and actually signed up to use your service.

2. What is the cost of keeping free members? Like I mentioned above, most startups would kill to keep their users, especially when they have a premium version to offer. With such a captive audience already using the product, there are great opportunities to plug the full version in every communication.

3. Are there competitors ready to take your free users? When you get rid of your free users (especially if they are frequent users of your service), they’re likely to look for another service to replace you. What if there are other services that would welcome your subscribers?

4. How will startups attract new users without a free version? Without a free version to hook new users, how do you sell users on paying for the service? A 30 or 60 day trial? If that’s the case, what’s the point of getting rid of the free users? Is it solely the ability to charge them after 30 or 60 days? Is it the simple shift from a) users that are freely using the service without offering up their credit cards

to

b) users that are using the service, but have their credit card on file, so if they forget to cancel, or think the service is ok, you can charge them

I’m not knocking the strategy. It certainly has a higher probability of making some cash, but free trial vs. freemium upgrade certainly feel like very different animals. One motivates me to check it out and bail immediately, looking for flaws and reasons to stop payment. The other makes me actually try something out at no cost, and if I feel that the service is useful, I’ll pay for it by making the choice myself.

5. Will the cost of your service be enough to be profitable? Finally, the big question: even with a high conversion rate, is the subscription charge enough to make sufficient profit without some ad component?

http://marketingstartups.com/2008/12/15/10-tips-on-attacking...

If you find it useful, pls let me know and I'll submit it to HN. I don't want to be the guy that submits everything he writes.

I posted the article and by the time I got home, my bandwith limit was reached. Sorry about that.