💰 Set the Right Price

👋 Hi there - it’s Egemen. Thanks for reading Scalable.

Free trials are often treated as a given when it comes to going to market, and pricing is often overlooked when it comes to launching a SaaS.

I was reading the RevenueCat report after a friend of mine shared it on Linkedin, and decided to have a deep-dive on it.

Not all apps benefit from free trials. Many are shifting away from this model, using subscription or purchase events in paid ads to attract more high-value users instead.

Here’s a snapshot of what’s on the menu today:

☝️ Scaled This Past Week: Passionfroot

Passionfroot has announced their seed round of $3.8M - it’s the scale of the week!

Passionfroot is the fastest and easiest way to do creator marketing at scale. You can find the right creators on all platforms, book, collaborate, and pay - all in one place.

With this announcement, they’re launching Passionfroot 3.0—the first AI-powered B2B creator marketing platform that takes this mission further.

• This evolution is transforming how companies scale go-to-market strategies through creator partnerships.

• As AI reshapes marketing and platforms favor individuals, creators have become essential to any B2B marketing mix.

💡 Spotlight

Presented by

Try the internet’s easiest File API

Tired of spending hours setting up file management systems? Pinata’s File API makes it effortless. With simple integration, you can add file uploads and retrieval to your app in minutes, allowing you to focus on building features instead of wasting time on unnecessary configurations. Our API provides fast, secure, and scalable file management without the hassle of maintaining infrastructure.

Try it now!

👉 Scalable partners with best-in-class publications.
Take a look at what our readers also enjoy reading.

🧠 Deep-Dive: Set the Right Price

Deciding on a winning pricing model is probably just as hard as building an app. You have to be conscious of purchasing frequency, category, psychological price points, and much more.

As a founder, you need to be well-organized to manage all of these, and probably leverage some AI capabilities to help you gain some momentum.

Well, lucky enough, Scalable has an offer to present to you with Notion:

Free Notion and Unlimited AI

Thousands of startups use Notion as a connected workspace to create and share docs, take notes, manage projects, and organize knowledge—all in one place. We’re offering 3 months of new Plus plans + unlimited AI (worth up to $3,000)! To redeem the Notion for Startups offer:

1. Submit an application using our custom link and select Beehiiv on the partner list.

2. Include our partner key, STARTUP4110P67801.

Learn More

Latest data shows a shift towards mixed trial strategies. Nearly 48% of apps now offer trials occasionally, while those offering trials consistently dropped from 30% to 23%.

These mixed approaches let developers optimize campaigns for higher-value users rather than focusing on low-value metrics.

Interestingly, shorter trials (5-9 days) outperform longer ones. The number of 17-32 day trials rose by 50%, driven by developers abandoning 10-16 day trials in favor of full-month options. Although longer trials can slightly improve conversion, shorter ones keep customer acquisition costs (CAC) manageable by speeding up conversions.

The most common price points for subscription plans are:

• 1-week at $4.99,

• 1-month at $9.99,

• and both 3-month and 1-year plans at $29.99+.

Identical pricing for 3-month and 1-year subscriptions suggests a strategic push toward longer-term commitments, offering more value for annual plans at a competitive rate compared to shorter ones.

In areas like business and shopping, higher annual subscription averages are driven by a few high-priced outliers, although the most common annual price in these categories remains $29.99.

These price trends reflect an emerging pattern of stability in subscription costs across most categories, while certain sectors see more variance due to premium offerings or niche market factors.

👉 So, when you finish all the hard work, build the app, and are ready to go to market. Do not rely heavily on arbitrary pricing and a free trial giveaway for the sake of early adopters. Know your customer’s worth over time and the value your product creates, and price yourself accordingly, set the tone right from the beginning.

👋 Working on a startup? Here’s how I can help:

📨 Keep in mind - you can also reply to this email, I read every reply.

🗺️ Method: 3 GTM Stages for Founders

You can easily come up with quite some useful material with Notion AI. It’s also pretty quick to get a website up and share information as a digital product.

So, here is a little trinket for everybody this week - which is representative of the 3 phases of startup go-to-market. Generated with the help of Notion AI, prompted by yours truly.

I’ve detailed the main pillars based on my experience: Experimentation, Early Traction, and Growth to Scale.

🙌 I hope this helps you visualize what you need to do based on where. you are at - it’s yours!

⚾️ Catch: The news that matters 📰

I’m personally a subscriber and a fan of Confluence VC - it’s a daily newsletter where 13000+ VCs and venture-backed founders get their news. You should check them out!

Get your news where Silicon Valley gets its news 📰

The best investors need the information that matters, fast.

That’s why a lot of them (including investors from a16z, Bessemer, Founders Fund, and Sequoia) trust this free newsletter.

It’s a five minute-read every morning, and it gives readers the information they need ASAP so they can spend less time scrolling and more time doing.

Subscribe for free

Do you like newsletters like Scalable?