Lifetime Deals: Buying Cycles, Customer Lifetime Value, Code Stacking

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This is the free version of Trends PRO #0047 — Lifetime Deals

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❓ What You’ll Learn

Why are lifetime deals becoming alternative assets?
Who’s combining lifetime deals and recurring revenue?
What’s code stacking? And how does it work?
Which LTD is sold at a 500%+ markup?
Why is LTV more important than MRR?

🔍 Problem

You need early adopters, feedback and revenue.

💡 Solution

Lifetime deals offer lifetime access to products with ongoing costs for a one-time price.

🏁 Players

Lifetime Deals

Platforms

Facebook Groups

🔮 Predictions

LTDs will become an alternative asset class. Generous deals like ActiveChat’s are sold in Facebook groups at 500%+ markups.
SendFox’s lifetime deal plus subscription model will become common. A $49 one-time payment is required to subscribe.

☁️ Opportunities

Attract early adopters and evangelists with lifetime deals. Deep discounts and a promising roadmap can convince users to take a chance.
Raise from customers instead of investors. The Option Alpha team held onto equity by selling LTDs for $2,497 each.
Learn faster. Matt Byrom mentioned useful feedback, not revenue, as one of three main reasons to launch an LTD.
Allow code stacking to boost your average order value. Curated lets you use multiple LTD codes to unlock more functionality.

🔑 Key Lessons

Customer lifetime value matters more than recurring revenue.
Lifetime deals shorten buying cycles. Urgency leads us to treat lifetime deals like insurance. We buy what we might need.

😠 Haters

“Lifetime deals are used by mid and late stage SaaS companies too.”
Sure. Large companies like Deskera offer LTDs but this is rare.

“What about books?”
Books don’t have ongoing costs. Lots of things are ‘lifetime deals’ if we remove the ‘ongoing cost’ constraint.

“Preselling lifetime deals is risky.”
It’s a two-way door if the goal is validation, not funding development.

“I’m on the hook forever if I sell a lifetime deal.”
See MegaMaker: “Lifetime access” refers to the lifetime of the site, not your individual lifetime. That being said, we’ve been going since 2013 and have no plans of quitting.

“I want recurring revenue.”
Would you rather get $5/month or $1000 upfront? This extreme example is meant to show you that LTV is what matters.

“What if I get high maintenance customers?”
Choose your value metrics and terms wisely. Reserve the right to “fire” and refund difficult customers.

“Lifetime deals are for low-quality SaaS.”
Zapier ran a lifetime deal in 2013. Maybe it was low-quality then. But how bout’ now?

“What if my current customers churn to buy the LTD?”
OWOX faced this problem. Make your LTD disadvantageous for current customers.

🔗 Links

How to survive a $510,000 launch on AppSumo • Following a successful launch, ActiveChat had thousands of free trials and 0 conversions. Why? The LTD was being resold in Facebook groups at 500%+ markups.
How to Launch a SaaS Product on AppSumo • An in-depth guide on launching an LTD.
How SaaS Companies Can Quickly Obtain U.S. Market Share • Large companies use LTDs.

🙏 Thanks

Thanks to Dan Rowden (ilo), Gene (Swipe), Jeremy Abraham (Spiffy), Logan Johnson, Yarty Kim (Kick Ass Letters), Janel Loi (Newsletter OS), Vishal Srivastava (Trainedge), Neeraj Hirani, Stewart Townsend (Channel as a Service) and Rocco Savage (Option Alpha). We had a great time jamming on this report.

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What you’ll get:

28 Lifetime Deals (211% More)
17 Platforms for Lifetime Deals (325% More)
11 Facebook Groups for Lifetime Deals (266% More)
4 Predictions (100% More)
9 Opportunities (125% More)
4 Key Lessons (100% More)
10 Summarized Links (233% More)

With Trends Pro you’ll learn:

(📈 Pro) Who’s offering multi-year subscriptions?
(📈 Pro) How do secondary markets threaten your business?
(📈 Pro) How can lifetime deals lead to network effects?
(📈 Pro) How to validate your idea fast?
(📈 Pro) How to prepare to launch a lifetime deal?
(📈 Pro) Why should you share your product roadmap?
(📈 Pro) How to launch your lifetime deal outside of AppSumo?
and a lot more…

Markets and Ideas