paid account sandbox

[deborah]

Title:
paid account sandbox

Area:
paid account features

Summary:
There should be a place where people can see the paid account features and play with them to decide whether or not a paid account is worth their while.

Description:
There should be a place where people can see the paid account features and play with them to decide whether or not a paid account is worth their while.

There should be a place where people can see the paid account features and play with them to decide whether or not a paid account is worth their while. Perhaps in the official site communities, for example, most of the entry page features could be automatically enabled. In addition, there could be a paid_sandbox community where people can experiment with the features. This would work for:

1. Ability to receive copies of comments you make in other journals in your e-mail.
2. Ability to post polls.
3. Ability to create custom mood themes (maybe? But only use them in the sandbox community?)
4. Ability to edit comments after posting
5. Thread expanders

And maybe other things?

For some features (e.g. number of icon slots, number of sites you can cross post to, forwarding e-mail address) this of course wouldn't work. But there are lots of paid features, and if you don't have access to them, you have no idea how cool they are. I didn't realize I couldn't live without comment editing until I got comment editing.

I'm not sure how difficult it would be to implement "everyone is a paid user when posting in the following communities".

Poll #7749 paid account sandbox

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 53

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
9 (17.0%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
3 (5.7%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
15 (28.3%)

(I have no opinion)
24 (45.3%)

(Other: please comment)
2 (3.8%)

Comments

[matgb]

FWI, the Suggestions feature turns HTML off in the post, but if you edit it, your list can display properly.

[deborah]

Ta, I forgot.

[rho]

Am not going to vote against, but I worry that anything of that nature could turn into a magnet for spam and/or abuse.

[ninetydegrees]

I think what I'd like better is 1) a better explanation of all these features 2) a demo/tour of all these features 3) a little blurb showcasing some of these features when you sign up and a link to the demo/tour/FAQ instead of the cryptic "Purchasing a paid account will give you more account features" the site has now (well, yeah, I sure hope it does!!).

[majoline]

This is a good point! Just better coverage of what these all mean might draw more people in.

[deborah]

I like this plan. Maybe even with a little video where appropriate.

When I was putting this suggestion together, and I wanted to find the chart of paid and paid premium features, it was difficult, and I know the site pretty well.

[voldsom]

FAQid 4. :) It's lodged in my short term memory. But while it appears on the FAQ section under accounts ("What are the extra services available?") it's not very clear. Also, the page is very much an FAQ and a difference breakdown, like you say it doesn't do anything to promote the features.

I think that I'd prefer to see better promotion of paid features over a sandbox community, though I can see the perks both ways. You still have the issue of actually promoting the sandbox itself, as well.

[matgb]

I agree with this. I actually put that page on my list of pages that could do witha rethink when I was supposed to be taking over FAQ writing, but I never did get around to actually starting doing that.

I really need to get my CLA signed and start doing stuff.

[cesy]

+1

[montuos]

+1

A sandbox community would have to be promoted for people to know it's there in the first place, and if you're taking the effort to promote something, it makes a lot more sense to me to promote the features themselves.

[saekhwa]

+1

[stormy]

+1. I'd much prefer a demo or tour, possibly even a video showcasing the features. All three of those options seem like good ideas.