Freemium and Free trial are the two business models. The detailed comparison Freemium vs free trial will give good idea on this.
For those of you who do not know what freemium and free trial are, they are comprehensive solutions to business environments that seek to adopt recurring models of products or devices. Though they provide a common purpose, there is a lot of difference between the two.
Freemium
Freemium is a business model that involves a product to be bought in the market free of charge but charges are levied on advanced features and functionalities. The word freemium is a term that is used to denote the aspects of free charge and the premium concept. Business organizations use the concept of providing freemium products or services in order to increase brand value and gain recognition in markets. Not all services fall on the freemium segment of the business and marketing structure, so, companies strategically embrace this idea of extending freemium services. The use of freemium services is limited, but the time duration though is unlimited. Therefore, it is a risky gamble for institutions and business organizations.
Free Trial
A free trial, on the other hand, is a concept that allows a client to explore various aspects of a service or a product. This also has proven to be a strong market strategy for organizations as free trials certainly help in promoting products and help in attracting valued customer reviews for an organization. Whereas, free trials enable customers to explore all possible features of a particular service that is being offered but only for a limited period.
If customers are satisfied with the product and wish to continue using it, they have to do by the unlimited service. For instance, a company like McAfee would allow users to test the trial version of their antivirus software, and if users want to continue using the software, they must get it. The duration of trial periods depends on the type of service that the company has to offer.
Freemium vs Free Trial
The distinction between a freemium plan and a free trial plan:
Customers generally look out free services that companies have to give. Free services fall under these two aspects of freemium and free trials. Therefore, if you are a company that is all set to launch a freemium service or a free trial service, customers are all eyes, and the rest depends on your product’s performance in the eyes of the customer. Customers, especially when using a free trial service, determine various features and aspects that are integrated in the product, they are using. Moreover, there are psychological implications, as well. When companies offer free services, they are actually winning the trust of customers by attesting the quality of their product.
For customers using a freemium service, the thought that pops up is the advantage of using the same product also extensively if they upgrade to a premium account. They think of the many features that they can use if their account or service requested is upgraded. Usually companies that have full confidence in the performance of their product offer freemium services to track customers into buying the full version of the product.
For companies offering free trial services, the product has to be strong enough for customers to be satisfied and continue using the service by paying for the unlimited usage.
In terms of costs, it is not reasonably possible to strike a contradiction between what the cost of the product can be in each case if customers were to utilize a full, unlimited feature of the product.
Choosing what service to provide for what kind of product is essential as part of business strategies of companies is concerned.