ForumsQuestionsNew subscription prices - what do you think?
New subscription prices - what do you think?
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Purveyor |
Posted by aaron.c.salls:
We decided to share this because historically, it was focused investment in Tasks that made Toodledo valuable to you, and that investment had waned over time. No more. We are getting back to the core of what makes Toodledo great and refocusing our efforts around task management. This implies that the non-Task components of Toodledo (Outlines, Lists, Habits and maybe even Notes) will be discontinued.Take a look at the current features for each subscription level and compare it with the recently-announced changes. No mention of Outlines, Lists and Habits in the new subscriptions. Edited to add: I see that AA expressed similar concerns in this post: https://www.toodledo.com/forums/1/25931/-117315/read.html#jump This message was edited Oct 18, 2018. |
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frogboy |
I think the potential loss of habits, notes, outlines, lists as a big mistake. Why not keep them as the full organising suite?
The cut in task history to 1 year, that’s bad. Even free ToDoist has no limit. File upload? Why not linking to files in cloud providers ie Dropbox, Evernote so no seperate storage required. If you do add storage will it work over WebDAV? Is it encrypted? Why not keep it as it is and just improve the features that are there? The pricing is going to loose people. TODoist is $29 a year, and is a polished product..... |
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smatics |
Posted by Chardar Fuxus:
What a bunch of babies. Seriously $90 a year? You're complaining about that? What did you spend on starbucks, sodas, beer, wine last year? How about other BS you don't really need? Go look at your bank or CC statement. I'm pretty sure you can come up with a few more bucks to pay for this service. Having been a dedicated IQTELL user for many years, I could tell you if this place were shutting down, you would be begging to pay more money to keep it open. If you wanna leave, do so. I made this some time ago when IQTELL was shutting down the first time. 100's of people help me put this list together. Toodledo is one of the, if not BEST task managers out there. So yeah, you're gonna have to start paying for it. If you feel that ToodleDo is worth $90 per year, then good for you. Everyone puts a different value on the tools they use. Funny that you mention IQTELL - I was also a very early user of that service, and thought it could potentially be the ultimate productivity tool. I had a similar reaction to what is happening here when IQTELL announced their way too high pricing (in my opinion) for the service when it came out of beta. I thought a better strategy for them would have been to offer a reasonable plan that would increase the number of users and allow them to build a successful business. Instead, they had the arrogance to assume that all of their beta users would absorb a cost that was way more than the market would bear. A couple of years later, they unceremoniously shut down. Obviously, their strategy was flawed, and I see that same level of arrogance here, and I suspect this will bring about the same end result. |
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swilson_1324076645 |
I've used TD for as long as I can remember (at least 10-12 years) and use it to manage most aspects of my life. I have numerous elaborate repeating and tracking lists setup that I've developed over many years. The previous TD owner told me at one point a few years ago that I was one of the more active users in terms of sheer volume of tasks and tasks archived. For me, transitioning to a new system is not an appealing option.
That said, while I can live with moving to the individual plan at 4.99/month I'm sad to see these new developments mostly in terms of attracting new users. I just can't see someone looking at TD with the new pricing levels and choosing it over the countless alternatives at much lower (or FREE) price points. Ultimately, with disgruntled current users leaving in droves and little hope for new users coming in I'm afraid this may spell the eventual end of TD. Hopefully there will be some serious "re-thinking" of these decisions, before it's too late if it isn't already too late. |
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Purveyor |
Posted by smatics:
Funny that you mention IQTELL - I was also a very early user of that service, and thought it could potentially be the ultimate productivity tool. I had a similar reaction to what is happening here when IQTELL announced their way too high pricing (in my opinion) for the service when it came out of beta. I thought a better strategy for them would have been to offer a reasonable plan that would increase the number of users and allow them to build a successful business. Instead, they had the arrogance to assume that all of their beta users would absorb a cost that was way more than the market would bear. A couple of years later, they unceremoniously shut down. Obviously, their strategy was flawed, and I see that same level of arrogance here, and I suspect this will bring about the same end result. Interesting article: Why I went from IQTell to Todoist.There's an opportunity for Toodledo to do what IQTell attempted. Something worth paying for. This message was edited Oct 18, 2018. |
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Purveyor |
Posted by swilson_1324076645:
Hopefully there will be some serious "re-thinking" of these decisions, before it's too late if it isn't already too late. I think that the pricing will be revised to include something like the current Silver subscription for $25 to $30 per year, and perhaps $50 to $60 for the top tier, along with a reduced feature set for the free plan. It would be nice gesture if current paying subscribers could continue their service for one more year at the current price.This would lead to a significant gain in revenue: more money from current subscribers and some additional income from those free users who are now willing to pay 8 cents a day for some features that make their lives easier. Based just on price (and some actual feature improvements in the next few months), there should be relatively few users jumping ship. The problem is dealing with the negative feelings (disappointment, anger, lack of trust) towards the new owners. Not only will it result in lost subscribers, it will interfere with "spreading the word" about how great Toodledo is. This message was edited Oct 18, 2018. |
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dismukemail |
Posted by Chardar Fuxus:
Toodledo is one of the, if not BEST task managers out there. So yeah, you're gonna have to start paying for it. But best... to whom and for what purpose? I suspect that most Toodledo users do not take full advantage of all of its features either because they have no need for them or aren't fully aware of their potential benefits. But they use Toodledo because it was what they stumbled across and have gotten used to. If it works and is affordable - why go through the hassle of changing? But to the degree that a user does not take full advantage of all that Toodledo has to offer - the easier would be for them to find a less expensive or even free replacement. I use only a fraction of the advanced features that are available to me through the multiple services and software programs I get though my Microsoft Office 365 Personal subscription. But if Microsoft decided to raise my subscription cost up by 300 percent on grounds of all of the wonderful and powerful things one can do with those features - I would cancel my subscription and either go back to an open source alternative or try out Google's rival offerings and my guess is so would the rest of their customer base. There is a reason why Microsoft recently changed the .Personal subscription to allow me to install the software on more than one PC and expanded the number of people who can share their Home subscription - and it wasn't that they were trying to be kind or charitable. They did it because it will encourage more people to subscribe verses use free offerings elsewhere. There are some people who absolutely NEED the advanced features offered in Office in order for their business to run - and, if necessary, they would probably pay $100 per month for it. But for every $100 per month customer they kept, they would easily lose far more than the 16 $6 per month subscribers needed to bring in the same amount - and they would suddenly make it lucrative for a competitor to spend the money to bring their product up to speed with Office. Microsoft realizes that it makes more money by having lots and lots of casual Office users as paying customers than a small number of power users who are willing to pay a very high price. I am sure that there are people who will gladly pay $60/$90 to keep Toodledo. But in order for them to do so they will need to keep/add one user for every $20/$30 customer they run off - and that is just to keep their revenue where it is currently at. |
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dismukemail |
Posted by frogboy:
I think the potential loss of habits, notes, outlines, lists as a big mistake. Why not keep them as the full organising suite? Why not keep it as it is and just improve the features that are there? I think it would be a huge mistake to get rid of those features. Why would someone want to kill off features that differentiate one from one's competitors. One of the things that charmed me when I gave Toodledo a try was how it integrated goals with tasks. The idea made so much sense. And the habits feature was also something that made Toodledo stand out. I have used it on and off since I became a subscriber and value having access to it. I used notes and outlines for awhile but found that One Note was more useful to me for my specific purposes. But I am sure that there are others who find it convenient to have all of that in one place. I can understand not wanting to invest resources in further development of such features. But don't get rid of them especially when one is raising rates 300 percent. Keeping one's access to such features might be the make or break in terms of some people's willingness to pay a higher price. If you are going to try charging more than the market rate one has to have as many differentiating features as one can to justify the higher rate. |
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Charlie5 |
I'm sorry. My previous comment was immature and nonproductive. My apologies.
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dismukemail |
Posted by Purveyor:
The problem is dealing with the negative feelings (anger, disappointment, lack of trust) towards the new owners. Not only will it result in lost subscribers, it will interfere with "spreading the word" about how great Toodledo is. This reminds me of what happened to JC Penney. They brought in some alleged wonder guy who had previously created the Apple stores to replicate their success at JC Penney. Except that JC Penny was completely different than Apple and served a completely different market. He was correct in that the chain needed to modernize and bring in a younger demographic - and he did a few good things in that direction. But the man was openly contemptuous of JC Penney's existing customer base - he barely stopped sort of publicly mocking them as being a bunch of un-hip frumps and fuddy-duddies and changed the chain's merchandise accordingly. If someone actually tried to run off the chain's customer base and kill its cash flow they couldn't have done a better job than he did. Bringing in new customers takes time and money - and they needed the money from the existing customers to make it happen. He almost killed the company before he was finally replaced leaving the company scrambling and desperate to win back the customers that were driven off. The company continues to struggle because of it - and that new customer base with an allegedly better demographic has yet to emerge. The new owners of Toodledo are not rude to and do not demean their customer base the way that the bozo at JC Penney did. To their credit, they have been respectful and engaging. But my fear is this will have the same impact on their cash flow and viability as what happened at JC Penney. |
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pawelkaleta |
New owners claim they listen to the users' feedback so... ;-)
Link This message was edited Oct 19, 2018. |
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Charlie5 |
Here is a survey I sent out to IQTELL users before it shut down. 90% of those users were willing to pay over over $60/ year.
Based on the survey they would have had: 63% retention at $180/yr 39% retention at $240/yr  If these same stats ring true with this platform, they stand to substantially increase their revenues while decreasing their low pay/no pay customers which decreases the variable expenses attached to each of those users. |
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smatics |
Posted by Chardar Fuxus:
Here is a survey I sent out to IQTELL users before it shut down. 90% of those users were willing to pay over over $60/ year. Based on the survey they would have had: 63% retention at $180/yr 39% retention at $240/yr If these same stats ring true with this platform, they stand to substantially increase their revenues while decreasing their low pay/no pay customers which decreases the variable expenses attached to each of those users. So, to dive into your survey a little bit: - I think by and large, this survey explains the demise of IQTell perfectly. I suspect that at the end there were probably only a few hundred people who really cared about a very niche productivity platform that had an extremely steep learning curve. If all 126 people in your survey had been willing to pay $500 per year (which, to be honest, is ridiculous, but I'll play along) then you are talking about $63,000 dollars. Hell, let's quadruple that and make it $252,000. That barely pays for 2 competent engineers. - Apps like ToodleDo, IQTell, etc. absolutely need to find a way to achieve a mass of users, and this is a very difficult balance of determining the feature to price ratio that is acceptable in the market, and then making sure you are competitive with better know competitors, while bringing in enough revenue to pay the bills. Todoist, apparently, had 5 million users in 2015. I doubt ToodleDo has anywhere near that number of free or paid users. - You are saying that ToodleDo is trying to purge themselves of free or low pay users. If they do that, then they'll be left with maybe a few thousand users, and then close like IQTell did, because that won't be enough to keep the lights on. |
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pawelkaleta |
Maybe worth to add that "willing to pay" in a survey doesn't necessarily lead to "decision to pay" in reality.
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dismukemail |
Posted by smatics:
Todoist, apparently, had 5 million users in 2015. I doubt ToodleDo has anywhere near that number of free or paid users. This doesn't tell how many users each service has - but it does offer some basis for comparing their relative positions in the marketplace.. On Google Play the Todoist app is listed as having 10 million plus downloads and 158 thousand reviews. By comparison, the Toodledo app has 100 thousand plus downloads and 1,976 reviews. Plus there are IOS downloads which I don't have numbers for and there are PC only users which I doubt anybody has other than Toodledo. And, of course, not every download is still a user and not every user is active. I am one of the 10 million plus people who Google Play says downloaded Wunderlist and my old account with them was still active when I logged on last night for the first time in years. But I disliked Wunderlist and sought a replacement soon after I started using it - which is how I ended up here. And I still did not like Wunderlist when I checked it out again last night. So I am technically a Wunderlist user - but I am totally worthless to them. it is understandable why a service with a smaller customer base would need to bring in more revenue per user. It lacks the economies of scale that a larger competitor has. But a service with a smaller customer base can less afford a mass defection of customers which will end up making the economies of scale situation even worse. |
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dismukemail |
Posted by pawelkaleta:
Maybe worth to add that "willing to pay" in a survey doesn't necessarily lead to "decision to pay" in reality. The thing I am curious about the survey is how long it was conducted before that other service closed. If I had to make a decision on very short notice or pledge in order to keep the service from quickly shutting down I would most likely cough up a very steep rate increase. If that was the context of the survey - then of course people would be willing to pay more verses the prospect of scrambling for a replacement at the last minute. But in this case, I don't need to make a decision for another 101 days - which gives me time to see what else is out there. It is rarely a good idea to give your happy existing customers a reason to take a look at competitors - there is always the danger that they might find something they like better. |
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user50 |
We're comparing Toodledo's new pricing to competitors but I don't think the new owners have arrived at the new pricing by looking at competitor pricing.
My theory: A group of non-developers have acquired Toodledo and now they need one or more developers to do the real work. They're approaching Toodledo as a startup but Toodledo is a mature, and probably crufty, system. Some mature systems are hard to maintain and change in fundamental ways. If you want to make big changes you either modify the existing code or you start from scratch. Neither approach is easy especially across multiple platforms. However development is easier and cheaper if you dump some lesser-used functionality such as Habits, Outlines and other features missing from the new price list. The new owners probably have a quote of $X from contractors or recruiters and then they've divided $X by the number of existing subscribers to work out how much each of us will pay. This approach funds the new development but puts Toodledo out of kilter with the rest of the market. |
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SquidgyFishy |
Posted by SyneRyder:
For me, the main pricing irritation is that the Individual plan has only 1 year of task history. If it had unlimited task history, I could downgrade from Gold to Individual, and then it would only be a 2x price hike for me. I don't use Toodledo as a business & don't need the collaboration features or file uploads, but I do like the peace of mind of unlimited history (and being able to do statistics on that task history). This is my main concern also, the individual offer is "not too bad" (though todoist is cheaper, at least in the UK) but I'd really like to keep my task history for longer than a year, which i currently get on gold. |
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dismukemail |
Posted by Chardar Fuxus:
If these same stats ring true with this platform, they stand to substantially increase their revenues while decreasing their low pay/no pay customers which decreases the variable expenses attached to each of those users. But in this case those "low pay/no pay" customers constitute 100 percent of the user base and revenue stream. In some cases it might make sense for a company to ditch low paying customers - but only after it has a sustainable base of higher paying customers. Toodledo doesn't have high paying customers - they merely have a HOPE that a sufficient number of so-called "low pay/no pay" customers will convert into high pay customers. That sounds risky to me. Why not take things a bit slower and give existing users a reason to WANT to pay more while attracting new high pay users and, in the meanwhile, preserve the only revue stream the service currently has? If the low pay customers are truly not cost effective to service then they can be ditched with less consequence after a certain number of high paying customers have signed up. If your customer base is used to paying Walmart prices it is not reasonable to expect large numbers of them to be particularly keen to suddenly start paying Neiman-Marcus prices even if there are enhancements to the service. |
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aleding |
Posted by Chardar Fuxus:
Here is a survey I sent out to IQTELL users before it shut down. 90% of those users were willing to pay over over $60/ year. Based on the survey they would have had: 63% retention at $180/yr 39% retention at $240/yr If these same stats ring true with this platform, they stand to substantially increase their revenues while decreasing their low pay/no pay customers which decreases the variable expenses attached to each of those users. Ridiculously low survey domain - 126 responses??? Seriously??? This will sound harsh but there is no other way to put it...this is nowhere near credible information and therefore not a very reliable survey... That said, outside of possibly the enterprise market, common sense dictates that nobody will pay anything near $180\yr. on a tasking tool - and that number is a stretch even for an enterprise tool which TD clearly is not and has a long way to go to get there. Value is mostly subjective ESPECIALLY when weighed against the inertia of using a given product for even a moderate period of time. TD is an awesome tool mainly, I believe, due to the degree of tweak-ability it affords the user which I believe translates directly into it being tailorable for most individual's use case. However, there are many ToDo tools out there that do surpass TD in several areas but always seem to lack in 1 or 2 areas that I simply can't live without. Again, enter the almost endlessly tweak-able TD to the rescue...and for that I tolerate the horribly ugly UX, the almost unusable mobile experience, the complete lack of any reporting, etc...etc...etc... So despite the tweak-ability aspect, with those key glaring holes, it is impossible to justify going north on cost with zero functional increase... Cart has been placed several meters before the horse... |
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