This editorial for the SSC newsletter ran last week and talks about the conundrum for software vendors – how do you let customers try the product out, is it partial functionality for a long time, full functionality for a short time, or some other combination? The comments on the editorial are – as always – interesting and diverse.

I think if I was selling software (I’m not, and not a marketing whiz either) at the very least I’d go for a 30 day trial period with full features. I haven’t seen it done, but I wonder if it wouldn’t be interesting to try to capture some usage/feedback right in the app and send it back during that time. Did it get downloaded and not used? Did they struggle to use a needed feature? I’d also make it easy to give them some additional trial time, maybe based on filling out a quick survey of what they’ve thought about the product so far. Are they interested in a sales/tech call?

As I write this I’ve made a note to ask Steve Jones to see if he can get a vendor to write about this, what shapes how they do this? Have to think the successful vendors have found a way that works, even if we don’t entirely like the way that they do it.