I’ve been a beta tester for apps and startups and SaaS for more than 10 years. And while I’m frustrated, I do want you to succeed.
I like to be as helpful as I can be. I am about to be no-sugar-coating real with you. Because feedback is what companies need to know exactly where they are struggling.
- My pricing, and my usage tied to that pricing, should be viewable in my dashboard, this is not negotiable. Anything less is not a solution people will take seriously and you’ll be a service only for hobbyists. Businesses must, must, must be able to measure and control their costs.
I would sooner use your pro plan and use an external data option that allows me to measure, estimate, and control costs than to use your blind pricing for data usage.
I actually referred another entrepreneur to the adalo solution and they passed because of this specific issue, which I didnt even point out to them.
- The #1 complaint I have seen online about Adalo besides lack of transparency on usage/cost, is that the cost for data is too high.
I would estimate the majority of your users stick to the medium tier pro plan and use external databases.
The reason I assume this is because your databases are still external to the apps on users phones. So why pay the inflated data prices for the same or slower result by going with adalo databases?
- Speed - Anything that takes more than two seconds to load is dead. Dead. DEAD.
I’m able to support 14k users on a $40/month wordpress install just fine but adalo started to have performance issues when I had 7 users in my testflight (with only me beta testing) the database. This is horrifying. (Granted, I will allow that this has been the past few days when maybe you had more performance issues going on).
You have some great functionality - like conditional assets, database filtering, some fancy components I can add and have paid to upgrade to - but I have to come to the forum to find out I should actually AVOID your best components so that my app will load and function?
This is … to put it mildly… insane.
Now, enough about me. You are suggesting pricing changes. You seem to have scalability issues.
Here is what I would suggest - and what I would personally expect on a mature pricing page for Adalo.
Pricing suggestions:
Test accounts / Not paid accounts - One app total, 50 lines of data, ‘in production’ banner.
You will end up with people that will create multiple accounts and ‘in production’ banner will prevent some elements of abuse. In production banner means it’s still able to be tested, can still be shown to clients, but it’s not something you can sell with that banner.
Which means - if you have clients, you can pay.
The free tier is meant to prototype. It can be a prototype forever. You get one prototype.
Once they have confidence in what they have made:
$10 a month (with incentives / room to do annual upgrades) - Remove the in production banner, keep the 'made with Adalo banner, 1 gig of data total (total for app size and database usage, split based on however the app is used). No external app access.
This tier could be paid and then canceled. But if they go over the data, the entire app breaks.
This won’t be your most profitable level, it qualifies as a loss leader judging by how you’re charging for data. But it will keep your costs from spiraling by limiting it to one app, versus many apps. Both Adalo and client grow - and expand into the next pricing tier.
That pushes them / me into the next tier.
$50 a month - 1 app that is 5 gigs in size, No banners, 5 gigs of database data.
Your consumable is your databases. My assumption (that’s all I can go off of) is that your primary users are on the Pro plan and that means perhaps most don’t go over 5 gigs for the size of their overall app. (I’m guessing, work with me).
This pricing method limits the size of the app, gives users a reason to keep their app size optimized, and makes a clear distinction between asset size and consumables (databases) that can be measured and controlled.
So you need to attach the add-on cost to the consumables - database size.
But you cannot break the faith with customers and be predatory.
Which is why the $50 plan would include external database options and you’ll need to stay competitive to cheaper data packages.
Each additional app is $50 a month with 5 gigs app size, and increases your database data by 5 gig.
They add on their data per app. This allows you to have agencies build out within your infrastructure and upgrade packages to their clients. Each app needs data reports.
Make it measurable.
If you want to be an enterprise solution, you absolutely need to have enterprise pricing.
I ramble a lot and I’ve streamlined my thoughts on pricing as structured below.
Free
- One App
- 50 lines of data
- in-production banner
(includes made by adalo in that production banner)
- 1 gig total app size
*Not able to be published
$10 Basic
- One App
- 1 to 5 gig total data (app and database usage combined)
- Made with Adalo banner
- Can be published to app stores
– No External database access
** $50 PRO **
- One App
- No banners
- 10 gigs (5 gigs app assets / size, 5 gigs database)
- External Database access
** $200 Enterprise **
- 4 Apps (20 gigs for Space - 20 gigs database) (to get started)
No banners
Dedicated database / servers, not shared hosting style.
External databases
** Custom - Agency **
$200 per app/mo on Enterprise plan, wholesale database pricing
- Client dashboard (not admin or editor), monthly cost per client dashboard. (not for editing, only for viewing usage, app reports, etc)
- Editor seats, monthly cost per seat.
- referral /affiliate commission if the Agency transfers the app to the client entirely as long as the client remains on Pro plan or above.
- Transfer fee $1,200 for each client to take control of their app (within their own adalo account, free of the agency) and become admin/editor, the fee / offer is for the agency to decide and not offered directly from Adalo.
- Custom ‘in production’ banners that can be branded to agency name
Agency is all about scale. It must must have stability to scale.
By giving custom agencies the wholesale pricing, but shifting clients to enterprise pricing if the clients leave the agency to manage their app themselves, you give agencies an edge without it being a detriment to your stability or a competitor.
And you have the potential, if that client decides to buy their app and manage it themselves, to make money on the enterprise data prices and passing some of that back to your agencies (profit share, in a way).
You should aspire to enterprise and Agency.
This gives you a way for some of your best forum users to create agencies, create apps for others and sell them to their clients.
You create an eco-system that rewards developers, bootstrap agencies, and your community.
It keeps your database costs in control, encourages developers to build on your infrastructure (growth), make sure your data costs are covered (wholesale data reflects your cost, not a locked in cost).
You should give Adalo users the option to allocate their extra app size data to their database. It encourages adalo users to keep their apps light (static on your servers). I assume app assets take up more space and resources, while database entries are cheaper on the data side for you as you expand at wholesale prices. (please, be aware of my assumption here). It also gives users a good feeling that they can optimize and best use the resources they’re paying for.
This is how I think on a the developer side, on the entrepreneur side, and my experience with agencies.
Perhaps it’s not the right place for this feedback. Or the right time.
They would be pretty massive changes.
But since Adalo looks like it’s undergoing some pretty big changes, it was worth typing it all up and offering it.
Whatever happens, I hope you succeed adalo.
for my sake!