David Christiansen runs TroopTrack and posted a bit of an analysis of your conversion rates; powered largely by a couple graphs. Its an interesting analysis, but what is really good from a startup perspective is the findings in the Correlation or causation? section.

  • Customers who have a good experience with a support ticket during their trial have a higher likelihood of purchasing a subscription
  • Customers who see an improvement made during their trial period have a higher likelihood of purchasing a subscription

That is an important finding, and one that in my gut I think is more true for more products than people give credit.

When I was at HP we pretty much knew who was considering buying our product because the Support group had contract with them. Right now I have a similar interaction with people who start to use Saunter — though that is because I need to update the docs.

SaaS products are easy to capture this information and interaction; an opensource product that you sell service and support around is much harder. And a problem I need to figure out at some point in the near future.

Disclaimer: David is a friend and I want TroopTrack to succeed — even if it is so he can add Canadian stuff to it.