GummySearch's $10 Day Pass

In 2024, subscription fatigue has become a real concern. Many consumers find themselves trapped in multiple recurring payments:

• Netflix: $8.99/month (Basic with ads plan)

• YouTube Premium: $11.99/month (Individual plan)

• ChatGPT Plus: $20/month (only plan available)

• Spotify: $10.99/month (Individual plan with ads)

• Audible: $7.95/month (Plus plan)

The Growing Subscription Problem

These costs add up quickly ($59.92), making people think twice before committing to new subscriptions.

GummySearch's Innovative Solution

GummySearch has introduced a refreshing alternative: a $10 day pass alongside their traditional $59 monthly subscription.

This model offers several benefits:

• Flexibility: Users pay only for the days they need

• Low commitment: No long-term financial obligation

• Trial opportunity: Users can test the full service without monthly subscription

Why One-Time Payments Make Sense

The shift back to one-time payments reflects several market realities:

1. Consumer Psychology: People prefer clear, single transactions

2. Value Perception: Customers feel more control over their spending

3. Business Benefits: Better cash flow. Reduced customer resistance. Higher initial revenue.

The Pay Per Use model will become more popular in the post-AI world. It will work like paying freelancers for a task completed.

Want an AI Landing Page Copywriter? Pay $30 per use.

This isn't theory. Headshot Pro uses Pay Per Use Model to give you 100 headshots of your own photo for just $39.

The Future of Software Pricing

It points to a return to the purchasing models of the 2000s, where users bought software outright. Companies are calculating lifetime value differently:

• Smart Pricing: Setting one-time fees based on average customer lifetime value

• Hybrid Models: Offering both subscription and pay-per-use options

• Customer Choice: Letting users decide their preferred payment method

Marc Lou made $1m+ by charging one-time fee. He would've hardly gotten to $10k MRR for the same businesses.

The cost of those websites to run for 5 years would probably be negligible compared to the revenue he made.

For context, all his websites can be hosted for $100/month. For 5 years, that would be $100 x 12 months x 5 years = $6000.

He essentially got self-funded to build a SaaS business in the future.

Once by 37Signals probably made $5m+ doing the same.

The same goes for Tailwind UI which has been around since 2020. My guess is they netted $10m-$20m.

The day pass model represents a smart response to subscription fatigue. As more users seek flexibility in their software spending, expect to see more companies adopt similar pricing strategies.

Top Tweets of the day

1/

The cream of the crop AI talent is poached for $1m+ per year salary for the same reason.

A single 10x talent can turn the whole company around. Look at Logan Kilpatrick who has turned around Google's Gemini by taking user feedback seriously. Before him, Google felt like a sinking ship.

Other examples include John Carmack, Andrej Karpathy, and Ilya Sutskever.

2/

As far as UX goes, my top 3 are:

1. Google Sign-In

2. Email + OTP

3. Username + Password (only possible due to Password Managers)

Remember, most normies don't use password managers but prefer Google Sign-In.

If you have to verify, go with OTP instead of Magic Links.

And the data from VEED supports this. They switched from Magic Link to OTP and saw a big bump (65% to 82%) in email sign-up completion.

3/

You can also pitch them design and agency services. They need all the help they can get.

Rabbit Holes

1. DO HARD THINGS by Casey Neistat

2. How AI Works by Every

3. OpenAI Email Archives (from Musk v. Altman) by LessWrong

Until next time!

If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing it with a friend. If a friend sent you this, get the next newsletter by signing up here.

Read all the old case studies here.

And don't forget to follow me on X.

More Startup Spells 🪄

1. How KSI & Logan Paul Fooled The Media With The Prime Launch (LINK)

2. Herd Mentality (LINK)

3. Shocking Colorful Hooks (LINK)