From owner-freebsd-isp  Wed Aug  7 05:47:08 1996
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Date: Wed, 7 Aug 1996 05:46:44 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Mel Lester Jr." <meljr@connet80.com>
To: Peter Hawkins <peter@clari.net.au>
cc: freebsd-isp@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: Trial accounts
In-Reply-To: <199608070010.KAA01174@rhiannon.clari.net.au>
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They are not a customer until they pay.  Free trials are a marketing
scheme that probably doesn't pencil out.  People don't appreciate what
they don't pay for and you would be better off giving them free on-site
installation with a prepaid account.  Give the first month's payment to
the installer and keep 70% of your new customers for at least one year. 
The other 30% will move or leave you for other valid reasons that no one
can control.

What is a paying account worth over a year?  How many free trial users 
actually convert to paying customers?

-mel

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On Wed, 7 Aug 1996, Peter Hawkins wrote:

> Hi fellow ISPers,
> I'd like to gather some feelings about providing (perhaps restricted) "trial"
> access to anyone who logs in (user=register). It's pretty common here but I
> have steered away from it for two reasons:
> 
> 1. security
> 2. The potential for someone to dial in under that name indefinitely.
> 
> However I don't want to lose custom :) so if there are ways of
> addressing 1. and 2. I'd like to hear them.
> 
> Peter
>