Folks. For SaaS products, is it fair to advertise a product as "free", if the product has a vey low level free plan for small projects, but otherwise offers a 2 week free trial. Let's say it's a CMS. I am talking about you coming to the site and seeing those call-to-action buttons. If they say "Free CMS" vs. "Free trial" - are you OK with that?
What is 'low level'? It depends on what the product is and what tier of bullshit it implies.<p>For example: "Free photo editor" but the free plan does not allow saving.<p>"Free CMS" but you can only have one page and no ability to edit CSS.<p>In these cases it's not free or freemium, that's utter BS.<p>99% of the time it's a no
That sounds like trickery to me. If I were a potential consumer of that product, I would feel very put off by its deceptive marketing and most likely not partake in the service. It's 2020, SaaS products have been around for a reasonable amount of time, and for the most part, consumers are savvier than they have ever been. In my experience, no one wants to jump through hoops or given a song and dance to try a product. Give your audience the right information upfront. Be open, honest, and accurate.<p>Additionally, "free" is not always a good thing. It can often make a product or offering sounds cheap. I think it's custom (and nice) to offer a free trial period, especially when you don't even have to put in your credit card. It's a great way to show off the product, customer service, and value. Even offering a free trial at a low entry fee is becoming standard -- take a look at Ahrefs, $7 for seven days.<p>Good luck.
Look at Spotify for how freemium works<p>Freemium basically implies you can use 80% of the product but some juicy functionality is in the other 20%.<p>For example:<p>An image to pdf generator, but it can also do OCR. The free product has lasting value, but the premium option adds to it.<p>A trail is free but not freemium since it has no lasting impact.<p>I would instead use wording like:
- try it
- try now
- try it now<p>This still works as an call to action but does not decieve the user
I think it doesn't help you (as an entrepreneur) or the customer if you aren't forthright, <i>especially</i> in your initial communications, which are setting up their first impression of your product and your company.<p>When I was working on AdGrok, which did Google AdWords campaign management, the <i>very first thing</i> that would save <i>thousands</i> per month is to add the negative keyword "free" to their ad campaign: People searching for "free $whateverYourProductDoes" are not going to be easy to convert to paid, and are likely skewed towards subsequently toxic customers.<p>There are many "freemium" products that hide the limitations of their free offering, which may result in higher initial conversions, but no one feels good when they're "tricked" into using a product.<p>Clearly enumerate what's the value-add of paying for the thing, and make sure there's actual value to that value-add.<p>Also: it's (possibly) PR-worthy when you make previously-paid features be free. It's flame-worthy when you push previously-free features behind a paywall. Consider being conservative with your free tier due to this imbalance.<p>(I'm wrestling with what's going to be in the "free" versus "plus" tier for PhotoStructure right now!).