How do you increase the price of a product without scaring away customers?
In my 4 or 5 years of working at startups, I’ve noticed that people always have a problem when they are told about changes:
– free version jumped to a trial with a subscription or lifetime purchase
– subscription and lifetime purchase prices increased
People who have already experienced a certain price (or free access) are very reluctant to pay more when they know they were paying less.
New people are more likely to jump to the newer (higher) price.
But older users usually start complaining:
– on support
– in comments under posts on social networks
– in public forums where ratings are given
How do you communicate the increase in the original price?
(e.g. do you add features to justify it, or what is your crisis communication plan that limits your churn rate and negative sentiment)
Replies
We rushed features to justify price increase. Mid-task coding agent lost context and rebuilt existing helper function two files away under new name. So we shipped duplicate code just to rationalize higher tier. Lost far more trust than the price change itself)
vibecoder.date
You raise it for new customers if you can keep your margins high enough.
This turns current customers into evangelists.
for one time purchase ios apps its a bit easier since people who already bought keep it forever. apple also lets you keep current subscribers on the old price which takes most of the sting out