Would You Pay $10/Year to Keep Xmarks Going? Xmarks Says 'Prove It'

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mseyf

October 01, 2010 at 2:32pm

Hmmm... Taking a page from the Good Old Games Playbook?

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Wildebeast

October 01, 2010 at 11:50am

Xmarks is a good product.  I'm just constantly amazed, by the stuff that jumps from free to $10.

If 2% of customers paying $10 gives them a [small] profit ---how about just having 97% of them, pay $1.50/year??

It makes me angry, that product after product goes from the freeware/open source [for which, I can't blame them], to deciding they'd really like to have a 9999% profit margin.... I don't mind paying, I've got no problem with them making a decent profit.

I find the sync requests annoyingly come too often, and I don't need it more than a a handful of times a year.  Also, I'd be just as content to just use a flash drive, to sync manually.  This is not a $10/year service, to me.

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Eoraptor

October 01, 2010 at 10:40am

Well I'm glad that they did. While probably only half of people who say they'll pay actually will, this is a much better step than hjust pointing to some anonamous market "research" done by some third part company, as it puts those of us who use Xmarks in more direct touch with those who make it, rather than through some faceless, droning survey taker.

I would definitely pony up $10 anually for Xmarks in its current form to keep all my browsers across all my OSes synched up. Hell, i'd go as high as fifteen. That's what I pay for my Trillian. So I guess we'll see what we see.

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Keith E. Whisman

October 01, 2010 at 8:37am

Instead begging for donations they should host advertising for cash. They should try to merge with a large company with a contract employment so they can't just be fired over night. Sell the technology to a tech giant. 

Would I invest in this company? Not a chance. Do I think this company has a chance of staying afloat on donations alone? Not a chance. Do I think the people that run this company are morons? You betcha I do. And the reason why I think the way I do about them is that they are unwilling to do what they need to do to turn a profit. There would be advertisement on the site if they were even trying. 

They need to change their business model of just assuming profit will fall from the skies automatically. These guys probably believe that Avatar is reality and it wasn't a movie but a way of life. 

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Paul_Lilly

October 01, 2010 at 12:17pm

I don't see how ads would make a huge difference. Once you download and install Xmarks, there's no reason to return to the site.

To go that route, they could hit you with a pop-up every time you sync your bookmarks, though that probably wouldn't go over very well with their userbase.

-Paul Lilly

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Keith E. Whisman

October 01, 2010 at 4:15pm

I was thinking about ads on the site. They need to at least to make some money to pay the bills. $5 bucks here and there can help to show they are trying. Build onto the site extra functionality, like a BB or something like that. Something to try to make money. You can't just go into business without a way to make a profit, not even the Government can run that way, they tax us for profit. 

That's what I'm trying to say, they need to do something to make money. Hell build two versions with one as a two browser trial edition with the full version that only costs $10 bucks. That would at least give them a chance for making a profit and at least is a plan for making money. They went into this with the idea that profit will in your own words Paul, "just happen" or something like that.. I'm sure it's a misquote but who cares... These guys need to go back to school to learn how business works.

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Eoraptor

October 01, 2010 at 10:47am

I really don't think that's the issue. Given that Xmarks is largely used by tech-savy users who probably, nay almost certainly, have ad-block apps installed, running ads of any type would really be not even a drop in the bucket. The ad-supported model is really such a joke it's not even funny. I can't name a single service that is able to opperate soley on ad-revenue for more than a few months before it has to go under, be bought out, or fold up shop.

The real issue, at least what I got from the blog on Xmarks, is that these guys are too removed from their customers. Their not so much "expecting money to fall from the sky" as they're spending too much time relying on "prospects" and "scenarios" generated either by themselves or by some third party. Asking if people would pay for this when their are free alternatives is an excellent step instead of just assuming tht no one would. It has worked for a few other services that I use quite well. I would NEVER pay for MSN or AIM, but I gladly pay for Trillian, which lets me run both and then some and aggregates my contacts in one location, the way Xmarks does for my bookmarks and tabs (when ToomanyTabs is attached) and for Iobit services like System Care even though I could input those registry hacks myself.

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scabbynacker

October 01, 2010 at 8:11am

I already switched over to Firefox Sync.  I have no reason to switch back except for a couple small convenience features that I can live without.  Why switch back, get things set back up properly, and pay for it... and then have them threaten to close every time they want to charge more?

 

I'll stick with Firefox Sync; no Chicken Little moments from them yet.

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