This section defines the common business model concepts adopted by all apps that are built on the stock app infrastructure. This section outlines key strategies, including subscription tiers for monetizing user access, user adoption strategies to drive growth and engagement, and basic sales strategy for the application. The goal of this section is to ensure that the stock app functionality is aligned with the go-to-market strategy of the companies that operate the applications.
As the Stock App is built we’ll work to collaboratively define the best way to surface these concepts as features in the system that can readily be extended for each application on the platform.
Subscription Model and Tiers
While the exact details of subscriptions will vary from system to system we’re presuming there are three basic subscription levels with prices and feature scope varying from system to system.
Get Started (Free)
- Designed to attract individual users and drive organic adoption.
- Allows users to experience core features of the app and generally get started
- Goal of this tier is to acquire new users, get those users into the system and start using it
- It, combined with the Organization Graph and Rich User Personas should allow us to make this a personalized experience relevant to the user
- Success is that
- The user has explored the app and is engaged enough to have a sales discussion with us
- The user has invited other users into the app to drive organic user growth within customers through internal sharing and collaboration and across customers to others in similar roles
Pro-sumer / Professional Edition
- Description:
- Single user costed tier
- Unlocks all features for a single user
- Materially increases limits in the system
- One to to material integrations supported
- Goal of this tier is to
- Convert high-value individual users to paying customers.
- Demonstrate the significant impact of the system on high performing individuals
- Encourage further adoption within the customer by showcasing the value of the paid tier
Enterprise
- Designed for entire teams and departments within an organization.
- Unlocks all features
- Provides team and organization specific functions that allow for control of all customer configuration aspects and performance reporting on users
- Provides for full range of integrations and synchronization.
- Dedicated customer management and support.
- Advanced security and compliance features.
- Goal is to
- Drive enterprise-wide adoption and maximizing ROI.
- Enabling data-driven decision-making and continuous improvement.
Example Related Features To Implement
The exact set of features to support these standard license levels can be developed but general examples would include:
- Feature Differentiation and Access Control – Mechanism to flag specific functionality in an application to be specific to subscription tier while showing the grayed out version to lower subscription tiers
- Usage Limits – Enforcement of usage limits for different tiers
- In-App User Engagement – In app prompts utilizing Firebase Cloud Messaging targeted at React apps to prompt features to explore or look at on the upgrade path
- In-app Invites – In-app invite prompting to encourage users to invite colleagues. Free access for invited users to experience core features and drive organic adoption
- Critical Mass reporting to trigger sales cadences when an organization reaches a certain level of adoption
- Enterprise Tier Reporting and Analytics
- Performance reporting on users for the Enterprise tier
- Basic analytics to track user engagement and feature adoption
- Enterprise Tier Support and Onboarding
- Basic framework for in-app support information
- Integration with Salesforce for support management
- Extensible framework for an onboarding wizard for new customers
- Enterprise Tier Security and Compliance
- Advanced security and compliance features for the Enterprise tier
- Basic SSO support for enterprise customers
- Enterprise Tier Integrations
- Full range of integrations and synchronization for the Enterprise tier
- One to to material integrations supported for the Pro-sumer tier
- Integration management using Prismatic or a related system
“Through the Floorboards” Sales Strategy
The “through the floorboards” sales strategy is a bottom-up approach to driving product adoption and enterprise sales. Instead of targeting decision-makers at the top of an organization, this model focuses on creating tools that are highly valuable to individual contributors in specific roles. These tools address the day-to-day challenges faced by these users, enabling them to adopt the product without requiring organizational buy-in or approval from higher levels of management.
Two commonly cited examples of the through the Floorboard strategy are Slack and Atlassian. Here’s an overview of how each did it:
- Slack
- Free and Easy to Start: Slack offered a generous free tier, allowing individuals and small teams to easily adopt the platform without any upfront cost or complex IT approvals.
- Focus on User Experience: Slack prioritized a clean, intuitive interface and powerful features that resonated with users, making it a joy to use for communication and collaboration.
- Virality through Sharing: Slack’s features, like shared channels and integrations with other tools, encouraged users to invite colleagues and external partners, naturally expanding its reach within organizations.
- Organic Growth: As more teams within a company started using Slack, it became a de facto standard for communication, creating a “bottom-up” demand for enterprise-wide adoption.
- Enterprise Sales Follow-up: Once Slack had gained a foothold within an organization, their sales teams could approach management with a proven solution that was already being used and valued by employees, making the pitch for paid plans much easier.
- Atlassian:
- Freemium Model: Similar to Slack, Atlassian offered free versions of their products like Jira and Confluence, allowing individuals and small teams to experience their value firsthand.
- Developer Focus: Atlassian heavily targeted developers and technical teams, who were often early adopters of new tools and had significant influence within their organizations.
- Community Building: Atlassian fostered a strong community around its products, encouraging users to share knowledge, contribute to development, and advocate for the platform.
- Word-of-Mouth Marketing: Satisfied users naturally spread the word about Atlassian products within their companies, leading to organic growth and increased adoption.
- Enterprise Solutions: As usage grew, Atlassian offered enterprise-grade features and support for larger organizations, allowing them to scale their use of the platform and consolidate tools.
Key Elements of the “Through the Floorboards” Strategy
The following are the key aspects of the Through the Floorboards strategy that will be leveraged across all apps built on top of the platform.
- Role-Specific Tools for Immediate Value – The strategy begins by developing tools tailored to the needs of individual roles within a company. These tools are simple to use, solve specific pain points, and require minimal setup, allowing users to quickly see value.
- Viral, Bottom-Up Adoption – As individual contributors start using the tools, their success and satisfaction drive word-of-mouth adoption across the organization. Through the Organization Graph all apps are aware of a likely list of employees at the company and actively prompt inviting those users into the system at logical points. As the platform is inherently collaborative, specialized people editing the data make the resulting AI functions more powerful more team members naturally adopt them, creating a viral effect within the company.
- Critical Mass as a Catalyst – Once a significant number of individuals or teams within an organization are actively using the tools, it becomes easier to justify a broader conversation about enterprise-wide adoption. The product’s value is already proven and transitioning to a larger agreement allows the enterprise to provide proven tools in a safe and secure method to the entire team.
- Enterprise Conversations Post-Adoption – With a solid base of users and demonstrated results, the company then approaches decision-makers to discuss an enterprise sale. At this stage, the value proposition extends beyond individual productivity to organizational efficiency, data consolidation, and strategic insights that only an enterprise-level implementation can deliver.
Why It Works
By empowering end users with tools that improve their workflows, these companies foster organic growth and build a natural demand for their products. Decision-makers are often more receptive to enterprise solutions when their teams are already using and benefiting from the tools, significantly reducing barriers to adoption.
Advantages of the Model
- Low Friction Entry: Individual users can adopt the product without requiring formal approval or complex integration.
- User Advocacy: Happy users within the organization become internal champions, advocating for broader adoption.
- Proven ROI: By the time enterprise conversations begin, the tools have already demonstrated their value, making the case for investment stronger.
- Efficient Scaling: Resources are focused on creating highly effective tools and letting organic adoption drive growth, reducing the need for extensive top-down sales efforts.
The “through the floorboards” strategy aligns well with the modern sales and marketing landscape, where individual contributors increasingly influence purchasing decisions. By meeting these users where they are and addressing their specific needs, this approach builds a strong foundation for long-term enterprise success.
Example Related Features To Implement
The exact set of features to support these standard license levels can be developed but general examples would include:
- Rich User Personas – Detailed, in system personas that allow the application to be personalized to specific roles and users in a highly tailored fashion
- Simple UI – Streamlined UI based on React + Material that gives users a simple, impactful UI that quickly solves their relevant pain points
- Viral Adoption – Features that encourage users to invite colleagues and collaborators.
- Leverage the Organization Graph to suggest relevant colleagues to invite.
- Provide incentives for users to invite others, such as increased usage limits
- Critical Mass Detection – Define “critical mass” metrics for each application (e.g., number of users, roles, engagement level).
- Track adoption within organizations and automatically trigger sales cadences when critical mass is reached.
- Enterprise Sales Enablement
- Provide reports to sales reps that summarize customer usage, users and let them effectively engage with decision-makers.
- Showcase adoption data and demonstrate the value of enterprise-wide implementation.
- User-Friendly Onboarding – Create a seamless onboarding experience for new users.
- Provide clear tutorials and documentation to help users get started quickly.
- Collaboration Features – Enable easy collaboration between users within a customer.
- Provide features that allow users to share data, work on projects together, and communicate effectively.