Subscription Strangulation?

Question

Our company had a ton of services as subscription and due to the crisis, these are now one by one either cut entirely, or singificantly reduced to one subscription per company that is shared.Is this whole buisness model not crisis resistant? Are there companies out there, giving up on subscription as a buisness model, pivoting back to selling "packaged" software versions?

DerekBickerton · Accepted Answer

I prefer lifetime licenses of software. That way I reduce the cognitive load of tracking subscriptions and I have lifetime access. I don't mind the high cost of certain serials/keys. I don't like when companies switch to subscription-only after selling buy-once-keep-forever licenses. (Looking at you 1Password).

quickthrower2 · Answer

I don't think so? $10/m is better than $200 lifetime for cashflow. Unless your company has $200 in cash and it can't get a better return by doing it's business.
It may look like $10/m is 60% annual interest rate vs. $200 lifetime, but take into account the risk of not needing $thing and the risk of dealing with a company that offers lifetime so can't sustain itself, I would say that the monthly becomes more attractive.
If it is a choice between say $200/m vs. $400 lifetime, then really the $/m is too high or the lifetime offer too low.
On the other hand, in lean times you are going to see people cancel stuff they don't really need. They should be doing that in fat times too, but maybe it is less of a motivation.

version_five · Answer

SaaS appears to make more sense when money is free. From the vendor perspective, the present value of a subscription is higher, so it's worth pushing. For buyers - I'd speculate that many SaaS products look better when you're not trying to pinch pennies, and so it's an easier sell.Overall, there's always funny business that can go in involving annunity-like products when lots of money is chasing high returns.