How Trends.co Convinces Broke Founders To Pay For A $300/year subscription

Before any mention of price, the site simply asked me to enter my email if I wanted to join the community.

I liked the idea. So I entered my email. And so on some level I committed to the idea of joining their community.

It was at this point when they mentioned that an annual subscription costs $299. Wow. But luckily, the 7-day trial was just $1. An absolute steal right?

This is an example of price anchoring. The high price creates a perception of high value in the mind of the potential customer. It makes the $1 trial feel like a no-brainer deal.

Then to top it off, this trial offer was only valid for 8 minutes. A big countdown timer made me very aware of that. This manufactured fear of missing this deal. So I was forced to stop overthinking it and make a decision a lot quicker.

From here, it’s up to Trends.co to prove their value before the trial period runs out. If they successfully do so, there’s very little friction for a trial customer to become a full customer. Since the credit card is automatically charged for the yearly fee after the trial, they defer customers ever really making a true purchasing decision.

Before any mention of price, the site simply asked me to enter my email if I wanted to join the community.

I liked the idea. So I entered my email. And so on some level I committed to the idea of joining their community.

It was at this point when they mentioned that an annual subscription costs $299. Wow. But luckily, the 7-day trial was just $1. An absolute steal right?

This is an example of price anchoring. The high price creates a perception of high value in the mind of the potential customer. It makes the $1 trial feel like a no-brainer deal.

Then to top it off, this trial offer was only valid for 8 minutes. A big countdown timer made me very aware of that. This manufactured fear of missing this deal. So I was forced to stop overthinking it and make a decision a lot quicker.

From here, it’s up to Trends.co to prove their value before the trial period runs out. If they successfully do so, there’s very little friction for a trial customer to become a full customer. Since the credit card is automatically charged for the yearly fee after the trial, they defer customers ever really making a true purchasing decision.

If you have a premium product subscription, using a paid but super-cheap trial could be highly effective.

Note: a business relying on tricking people into paying for expensive subscriptions they don’t use is a terrible business.

I believe honesty is the best policy. You can be transparent, notify customers if a trial is about to roll over, etc etc.