V1 Sports · golf swing video analysis app
Drop the free tier for a free trial, and make long-time free users pay too
Revenue up 80-90% in 12 months despite a wave of one-star reviews
Workedpaywallpricing
What they did
Replaced the consumer freemium model (basic video telestration free, advanced paid) with a free trial into the paid Golf+ subscription (~$60, now $70/year). Long-time free users were not grandfathered; the change applied to future use and did not hold data hostage. The only free carve-out is students interacting with their own instructor. Decided on instinct because no one could reconstruct why freemium existed; the team accepted the backlash after wargaming complaints and betting that for every 4 complainers, 10 would subscribe.
What happened
Revenue grew about 80-90% in 12 months. The App Store reviews from that time were 'a massacre' of one-star reviews from users angry after 9 years free; about 10 subscribed for every 4 who complained.
- Stage
- Growth (20+ year old company with a plateaued consumer line)
- Effort
- Whole consumer user base; one-time switch
In their words
Sub Club by RevenueCat · How V1 Sports Doubled Revenue with Bold Bets — Alex Prasad, V1 Sports“But we basically switched from a freemium model to a free trial model to simplify things.”
“And by the way, if you switch from free trial or from freemium to free trial, you're just going to make more money doing it.”
“So if you go back in the look at the V1 Golf app in the iOS store, and you go back 2 years, you're going to get a massacre, right?”
“Yeah, I mean it grew 80-90% in 12 months or something in terms of revenue.”
Related topics
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More from this episode
- V1 Sports: Keep it free for students to share videos with their own golf coachCoaches bring in about a third of new sign-ups every day
- V1 Sports: Tell existing users about the change with one short, honest reasonUsers only heard the first point; they complained anyway
- V1 Sports: Act out a conversation with an angry customer before making a big changeGuided the paywall switch; guest says the bet played out as expected
- V1 Sports: Ask every new user "Why are you here?" during sign-up10-15% want a coach; those users subscribe far more often
- V1 Sports: Connect golfers looking for a coach with the instructors already on the platformEarly; guest says it is far from optimized
- V1 Sports: Let support staff make deals with upset customers, but never free forever
- V1 Sports: Keep the first price low ($70/year) and earn more as users grow
- Flo: Sell higher tiers and extra features to people who already payCohort revenue retention ~60% in year one, then rising every year