Paying Users are Your Nicest Users
Posted by Micah on August 13, 2012 | Business, Recent | 19 brave citizens responded! |
When I finally flipped the switch to add paid subscriptions to Obsidian Portal, I was terrified of the coming support nightmare. I reasoned that if people were angry and demanding when it was free, they would be infinitely more angry and demanding after they had paid. Instead, what I quickly learned was that the paying subscribers were vastly more polite, understanding, and patient than the free users.
My customers don’t pay me in order to buy the right to yell at me. Most of them don’t care at all who I am. They pay money because my service addresses a pain point in their lives. They’re so happy at how well it addresses the pain point that they gladly get out their wallets and fork over payment. If there’s an interruption in the service, they aren’t interested in pointing fingers and assigning blame. They just want the service back. If service interruptions or bugs are the norm, they may get angry, but the point is that they don’t get extra angry just because they paid.
On the flip side, many free users don’t seem to feel any need to hold back their criticism just because they haven’t paid a dime. The most brutal savaging we ever had came via Twitter from a user who was having trouble logging in. He had no patience, no understanding, and took his complaints straight to the Twitterverse instead of contacting us directly. Nowhere in his litany of hatred did he say, “Oh well, I’m not paying anything for it, so I guess I should just shut up.” His rage, and his willingness to express it, had absolutely nothing to do with how much he had paid.
Now, I’m not suggesting that you treat your paying users poorly or take them for granted. What I am suggesting is that you relax any fear you have about being beholden to them because they paid you. Asking for payment does not fundamentally change your relationship with your users. Some will love you, others won’t. But, there’s a good chance that the ones who love you will match up to the ones paying you.
I think this is an over generalization. For markets that are niches – yes, paying users are the nicest users. However, for markets that are necessities (and which also tend to be crowded with competition) such as ISPs, backup, and messaging or anything B2B – the paying users are the most demanding.
On one side the spectrum, you’ve got appreciative users who share the vision for something great. On the other side, you have users who demand more based on general expectation and competition.
As time goes on and as competition in niche markets increase (unlikely in some markets), paying users demand more.
I used to work at a B2B company (after working at internal, B2C, and other types of companies). Our paying users were the nicest users I’ve ever had, by far.
My guess is it was because they worked at a bigger company, and it was less painful for them to deal with our bureaucracy than their bureaucracy.
But who knows.
Agreed. And to add to that, the more someone pays for your product the less hand-holding you’ll need to do. So if you have a ton of users paying $3/month, you can expect more headaches than if you were charging $39.99/month. Willing to pay more often means they’re more savvy about the product you are offering and how to use it.
They pay you because they see that pain point, and they see the value. The people who use the service/product for free have no vested interest or desire to use your product/service, and believe that you still have to convince them. Its pretty screwed up, but people are weird.
For about 18 months I had a $1 app on Apple’s Mac app store. I tried the free pricing, $1, and $2 tiers. Recently my dev membership lapsed, and it was just a side project, so I’ve let it die for a bit. I proved I could create a useful app and sell it, albeit for very little. That was satisfying enough.
I noticed the exact same behaviour. I get 4-5* reviews when charging money, 2-3* reviews when free. This is a common thread with indie developers. You’ll find similar posts on many blogs. People are rude and whiny for free products, but assume inherent value in something paid for. Something that is free seems to lose value. Rather than being a good deal, it’s seen as a worse product, and open to criticism.
Did you notice any difference in feedback or ratings between the $1 and $2 price points?
Makes sense.
Paying is an investment. Obviously, when you have invested in something, you want it to work. If it doesn’t work, you employ the best method to get it sorted: politeness.
The public outrage over service outages is just venting, they’re not trying to “get something done”.
Two things that immediately come to mind:
1. Everyone is a potential free user, the kids with no money, the rich, the poor, everyone.
2. People who use free services and products often assume the reason it is free is because it’s popular and you’re making a sustainable living out of ad’s or something they can’t see, for that reason they use their discontent and issues with the product to hold you hostage and vocally make a fuss about it. Paying customers instead know how you make money but are not as vocal about their issues and are not that confrontational across email etc…. why? because THEY’RE paying you money, which means they very much appreciate and potentially even NEED your product, the ball in this instance is likely in your court.
Just my two cents, Kevin above also has a very good point. This is far from conclusive or indicative of all consumers across all industries.
Thanks for the thought provoking post.
Jarvis
This free/paid divide makes think of a massage (best one I’ve ever had) that I once got at a hippie market. The guy who gave the massage didn’t charge for it, but he was quite insistent in his terminology: It wasn’t a “free” massage. It was “a massage he didn’t charge for”.
I think by saying that he was recognising what’s evident here – that with “free” things people feel that their creator no longer matters or has any right to expect anything. By refusing to use the word “free” he was keeping ownership of the process and making it clear that he was choosing to do something for me. “Free” is like a stack of giveaway local-event magazines sitting outside a shop in the rain.
Smart guy. Great masseur too.
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
It’s nice to know that this has been your experience. It’s possible that paying users have generally become paying users only after more careful evaluation of a product, and hence are already pretty satisfied users. That would explain some of the niceness.
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
[...] 感谢array的投递 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
It was a pleasure meeting you at Gen Con! Interesting article/ovservations. I wouldn’t have thought about that but it makes sense that those that are willing to pay put more value in the service than those that dont.
Have a great week!
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]
[...] 近日，国外网站The Agile League刊载了一篇标题为《Paying Users are Your Nicest Users》的文章，直译过来就是《付费用户才是最好的用户》。文中指出了免费用户和付费用户之间巨大的行为差异，引发了小编的思考，特撰此文表达下个人愚见。 [...]