Pricing model changes for Web Export are coming up but I would like to give a chance for discussion. Also a brief road map.
Free tier - 14 day trial for premium then reverts to standard. Standard is free to export one artboard at a time. Auto export is disabled. Export to multiple artboards is disabled. No example projects except projects referred to in the documentation.
Model 1 - Paid subscription - $5 a month. Unlocks export multiple artboards. Unlocks auto export. Does not include example packs. No more $2 or $10 subscriptions.
Model 2 - One time payment - $99 per major version. $29 per major upgrade (from 3.0.0 to 4.0.0) and updates free (3.0.0 to 3.1.0). Includes example project packs free.
Model 3 - One time year subscription - $99 for all versions and examples for the year. You can keep using the version you have after that or renew for the next year.
Support - Free for forums or discord when available. $25 per specific support incident for a responsive timeframe.
Example packages - Example packages contain example and starter projects will be available for $25 a package. They are designed to describe and show features and include starter projects. For example. some show how the Additional Styles feature is used. A start project may show how to embed a YouTube video. They typically will include 12 projects with multiple artboards per project.
Road Map
More example / starter projects
Materialize part II and part III
WordPress part I, II, III
Constraints
Responsive layout
Apache Royale (JavaScript framework)
Repeat Grids
Repeat Grids
Repeat Grids
Repeat Grids
Templates
Unsemantic
FlexBox row and column Layout
Grids layout
CSS Variables
Styles support
Full rotation support (rotation is currently limited and not supported in some cases)
Hover support via states
Interactions support
States support
More Fonts support
Export stylesheet and JavaScript to subdirectories
Why not just do $99 for a year subscription to included all updates during that period? $29 for a major upgrade can get out of hand if your dropping 2 tor 4 updates a year.
That would work for me as well if it works for everyone else. I’ll add it to the list.
There’s a difference between updates and upgrades in some circles. The way I understand it an update is a point release where an upgrade is a version release.
3.0.0 to 3.0.1 is a update (or minor update/upgrade)
3.0.0 to 4.0.0 is an upgrade (or major update/upgrade)
Web Export was released approximately a year ago and it has had 3 major upgrades. I haven’t released so many major upgrades with any other product so a year price makes sense here.
Camtasia by TechSmith has a model like this. Their renew cost is about half the original price.
I guess some of this would depend on you, the Developer.
A scenario:
Say I buy a subscription for version 3.0 and all updates. But, say 2 months after I buy the 3.0, version 4.0 comes out. I don’t want to upgrade yet to 4.0, can I expect that you will be maintaining the 3.0 version I just bought?
And if I want to just stay with the free version for now, will updates and upgrades still work?
What we have now is the extension is effectively free* and some example projects are free including all updates and upgrades (*except personal, professional or enterprise subscriptions at $2, $5 and $10 or pay 10% royalty of your project at pay on your honor). I don’t have numbers on how well pay on your honor is working… I have usage count and there are many more users than subscribers.
The next step is to sell example packs at around $25 a pack (12 projects with total of about 30+ artboards). There is enough material for around 4 packs but maybe more.
XD has the Plugin Manager that presents plugins where you can install or uninstall or upgrade through them. We are all familiar with it. But it’s also acceptable to distribute plugins outside of the Plugin Manager. You can receive a plugin and double click on it and XD will ask if you want to install it. I’m planning to include Web Export xdx with the example projects.
It would be simpler to provide free updates / upgrades instead of paid updates either directly or through the Plugin Manager. If there was a subscription and there are bugs in one version that is fixed in the next they could be fixed in the earlier versions and if not I would do a free upgrade.
oh i did not even know the current version had subscriptions.
i like the testing period because it is important for many people to evaluate the product.
other plugins fail to do so and it is strange to pay for a product of questionable quality.
the standard tier seems fair with reasonable amount of locked features. i do not know if the testing period would even be required.
i myself do not see a substantial benefit in example projects. Since features should be explained in the documentation (with examples), the additional value of example projects is questionable for me.
Since you are following the free model with paid support (documentation, examples, training, etc…). why not open sourcing the project and get more contributors. and keep the support paid. I am speaking from a business management point of view. I am very interested in utilizing the tool inside my company and train our designers and developers to benefit from it.
In some subscriptions as long as you pay for the subscription you can use the product. If you don’t pay the subscription then you can no longer use the product.
In the scenario you’re describing you pay a subscription yearly but if you don’t pay the subscription price you can continue to use the products after the renewal date but going forward you no longer receive upgrades or updates.
Is there a name for this sales model? If not we should name it if it’s not already named.