Why does quicken charge new customers less than loyal existing customers?

GWA603

I'm curious how Quicken justifies their "drug dealer" pricing methodology of charging new Premier customers $4.19/month or preexisting Premier customers $6.99/month? Is this how quicken rewards customer loyalty?

Jon

You think $1.60 a week is "drug dealer pricing"? Those are some very benign drug dealers you have in your neighborhood.

There are plenty of threads already discussing very topic, why don't you read some of those so we don't have to point out the obvious reasons for this yet again?

GWA603

Perhaps you've spent a bit too much time with the drug dealers you have in your neighborhood. What I said was "pricing methodology" not "pricing". My point is that its classic drug dealing strategy; get 'em hooked on the cheap and then rachet up the price once they are addicted or in this case invested in the product. At best its opportunistic at worst it predatory pricing.

Rocket J Squirrel

We long time users are not necessarily "loyal" - we're trapped. There is no easy exit from Quicken to another product.

GWA603

RJS, exactly! This is precisely why this sort of pricing practice is so repugnant. Quicken is seemingly discounting new users and gouging existing users to subsidize the new user pricing. Once again, I'd really like learn how Quicken justifies this pricing methodology?

Jon

Introductory pricing for new customers is routine for subscriptions - either a reduced rate or giving one or more months free. Most of Quicken's competitors are also subscriptions based & do the same.

As for being locked in, I didn't have any trouble switching away from Quicken back in 2011. Honestly, it took more work to switch back to Quicken than it did to leave. But Quicken has always been the 800 lb gorilla in personal finance software, so that's not too surprising.

Boatnmaniac

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20371359#Comment_20371359

It's the same pricing strategy that is used by most cable, dish, Internet, cell phone and many, many other subscription products/services. Lure in new customers with nice discounts for the 1st year or a set period of time and then bump them up to the full retail price. Nothing out of the ordinary since it is a very common practice.

If you want to get lower pricing, search retail outlets like Amazon, Walmart, Costco, Best Buy, Office Depot, eBay, etc. You might need to search for a while but eventually you will find Quicken being discounted by as much as 30%-40%. Just make sure it does not say anywhere on the box nor in the product description that it is for new subscribers. If it doesn't say that then existing subscribers can take advantage of and use it. Also, especially if buying from eBay or some lesser known retailers, make sure the activation code is less than 2 years old since they expire after 2 years. You probably won't need to be too concerned about out of date activation codes being provided by the major retailers as they have a strong reputation for standing behind what they sell or issuing full refunds.

mshiggins

One way to get Quicken to change its pricing strategy would be to start a venture capital company, make millions of dollars, and buy Quicken Inc from its current venture capitalist company.

jacobs

@GWA603 As noted above, this is pretty typical pricing strategy for many (most?) subscription products and services. I don't see how you label this as " 'drug dealer' pricing methodology." Newspapers, magazines and paid content websites do this routinely, offering a teaser rate for an initial period. Satellite radio (SiriusXM) does the same. Cable/internet providers often have a lower rate to attract new subscribers, with a rate reverting to their regular price at the end of the initial term. Many retailers offer discounts for new customers (just check coupon websites like RetailMeNot, Offers.com, and many others. And so do many software service providers. (Check out backup service provider iDrive, for instance, which offers up to 50% off for new subscribers.)

Some software vendors and service providers offer free trial periods, which is an alternative means to accomplishing the same goal: gaining new users. Quicken doesn't, because there are some infrastructure costs (new users are more likely to call their support centers), so instead they use the pricing model of making everyone pay form the start, but offering a discount to new users to get them to try the software.

Could Quicken be like, say, Adobe, and offer no discounts to new users? Sure! And who wins? If discounts help bring in more users, the company gets some new revenue in the short-term, but they're counting on retaining enough users to generate more revenue for the long-term. And in the long term, customers win when the company is successful in growing its user base and has more money to support ongoing/faster/better development of its products.