Revenera logo

You walk into a coffee shop you’ve been coming to for years that is a few steps from your office. As you duck and weave through the crowds and wind your way to the register, you place your order, and then grab a cup of the free new caramel cotton candy carrot latte positioned on the counter as you wait. You take a few sips, and are really just starting to enjoy yourself, when you discover that the cup is leaking. The staff are all busy, there are no more cups, so you toss it, all while making a mental note that you sort of liked that beverage, and to try it again.

A week later, you walk by the new coffee shop a few more steps from your office, and decide to go in. By the door, the owner hands you a cup of free coffee very similar to the one you had last week, and chats with you for a while. He learns about your likes, dislikes, needs, wants and your job. Your cup starts to leak again, but the owner notices quickly, and hands you another. Inspired by the experience, you become a new regular.

 

Revenera Monetization Monitor: 2025 Outlook

418 senior leaders at global technology companies share their thoughts on monetization trends for 2025 and beyond. See the results >>>

Across the consumer and B2B spaces, free trials are still a major way of introducing product to the market. And when you think about it, the basic principles of ensuring that customers buy after they try aren’t all that dissimilar between the two spheres. Ensuring conversion success relies on knowing your customer, leveraging that knowledge for personalized outreach, fixing issues that arise, and overall, solving your customer’s need or problem to fuel continued engagement with your product.

So when it comes to your free trials, which of those coffee shops are you? Do you really know your users, and can you follow them on their journeys so that you can meet their needs exactly when they have them? As hot (yes, it’s a pun) as your product is, it simply doesn’t matter if you can’t get your users engaged enough to eventually spend money on it.

So why aren’t your free trials generating qualified leads? Here is some advice on best practices to increase trial conversions….

Read the full article on OpenView Labs