@mwalla, hugely helpful; thank you! What this means for the bigger picture we’re still thinking about but you personally are in luck because, at least while we’re rolling all this out and still uncertain about it all, we’re very happy to give 50% off discounts to people who contribute meaningfully to the community, as you’re doing now. Email support@beeminder.com and we’ll hook you up!
In general our gamble is that $4/mo is a no-brainer for people even a little serious and then $16/mo for real power user stuff could feel cheap if compared to the kinds of things Beeminder can and does replace, like gym memberships, life coaches, academic coaches, working in coffeeshops, etc etc. People spend a lot in time, hassle, and money to set up their environment to be conducive to maximal productivity and Beeminder often elegantly obviates such things. So, our thinking goes, by the time you’re at the power user stage, the value is pretty huge.
Answers to other things I know off the top of my head for now:
- Recommended reading if you’re ever feeling weaselly: Combatting Cheating and Weasel Heart-To-Heart
- Data on pledges starting at $0 vs $5 was confusing until recently though that should be answerable with a simple query for recent goals. Only 28 people currently have the fancy plan that lets you jump to arbitrary pledge levels.
- Commitment contract business model stuff: see our list of competitors (feel free to start a forum thread about this too!)
- Pledge revenue is something like 85% of total revenue now and hit a plateau in the last couple of years. Some pie charts in this old post and see also the infamous “Mildly Panicked” forum thread from the beginning of 2016 for background on us deciding we needed to increase subscription revenue.
Thanks again for the great questions and feedback!