Annoying promo popups take the happiness out of Happyforms

Hey there, @skylabb ??

Bummer! Really sorry to hear you’ve found our plugin annoying.

It’s true, we are a freemium plugin. That means we do have ads in our free plugin. And the way WordPress itself rules things, it means we can’t use other — often less “in your face” — freemium strategies like usage limits.

It’s sucky. But it’s also how every other freemium plugin works.

What would you prefer us to do? How would you like to see us promote our paid plugin? Any suggestions or examples?

We’re all ears!

PS: We’re a little indie team genuinely invested in the WordPress community. As you can see, plenty of folks do find our free plugin handy. Every one-star review is a real blow to us. So if you would consider changing it or removing it (after we hear your feedback), we’d be greatly appreciative.

Thanks for the response, Scott.

I’ve used countless plugins over the years both free and commercial ones and not a stranger to freemium. It is the way the product being promoted that I think a bit too aggressive to a point of annoyance, thus backfires the goal.

First, I always appreciate a clear comparison listing of free vs paid features. Let the users decide whether they just need the free and basic features or something more advanced they should pay for. Several plugin author use the tactic of mixing all free and paid features in product description making the product sound like it’s loaded with all the goodies. Then the users get disappointed to find out the free version is not what they thought – and you hope they are likely to jump over to the paid version after feeling cheated? Not so fast.

Secondly, it’s common that paid version is promoted somewhere within the plugin UI screens. I’ve seen all different approaches for this. The worst are the loud banners taking up work flow space, popups that don’t go away, big “upgrade Now” buttons and honky red text – all of these create distractions for the wrong reasons. There’s no need to constantly remind users of the paid version – what if they are just happy with the basics and don’t want to keep seeing those annoying distractions day after day?

A couple of subtle touches in the UI is all that’s needed. And extra sub tab that says ‘Upgrade’ on the left admin column under plugin area is one good example. Also, have the advanced feature buttons or links grayed out and append them with a small word “Pro” is enough to let users know the difference.

Thanks for listening.

Got it, @skylabb. Thanks for the thoughtful reply!

Good point about making our description clearly seperate which features are free and which are paid. That’s something we can do — I’m taking notes.

I really wish WordPress made it a rule that freemium plugins could only list the free features in their plugin description. But if we were to do that while our competitors don’t, we wouldn’t rank in the search results at all. WordPress prioritises plugins by usage, so it’s already damn tricky for new plugins like us to be seen at all ??

Some of our competitors have a 10-year head-start on us.

We’re also really careful about making our plugin look “just like WordPress”. So you’ll notice we never actually add any headers, graphics, logos or brand names anywhere. We also try to use the subtle “Members Only” badge on paid-only features. I agree, though, we could make it clearer which pages are paid-only.

Anyhow, thanks again for your thoughts! As the new kid on the block, we’re always listening to see how we can do better. It’s a tricky balance.

And while I totally understand if you want to keep your one-star review, I would greatly appreciate it if you considered changing it. Maybe even a two- or three-star rating? Really, it’d mean a lot ??

Thanks for your consideration, Scott. I’m add two more stars to the review for timely and constructive response. I’m willing to give the plugin a try again once those promo popups go away for good when users have the option to hit the No, thanks button or something like that.

Thank you, Steven ?? I appreciate that!

And yes, we’ve jotted down your feedback — we’ll cook up and plan and see how we can make both our description and plugin better.