> We believe that making people invest time, commit to a trial, and put skin in the game will help you build a more engaged user base. This friction weeds out the people who aren’t serious and creates a sense of urgency. It also forces you to focus on the customers and users that really matter.
I did! I guess you didn't read the rules on HN, though?
That paragraph is exactly what inspired me to comment. It misses the mark. It's not just about weeding out those who aren't serious. And it's not just about increasing engagement. It's about commitment.
You can build commitment by introducing moments of friction. Every hurdle they overcome makes them more committed to their purchase decision. It's NOT about engagement. You can have commitment from someone who isn't engaged. They're separate things.
In fact, when selling to enterprises, the person making the purchase decision is probably not the person who will actually use the product. So you need to get them committed to the product too. It's easy for the purchasing department to say: "That free thing you've been using? You can keep using it as long as its free." It's a whole other thing for them to say, "That thing you've been paying for? That you now want to pay 10% more for in order to get more functionality? No, throw it out."
So yes, I read the article and thought about it deeply. Thanks for asking.
It is actually incredibly clever and never thought about it until now. I can relate to so many services I have spent some time curating, managing, triaging, etc ...
It helped me create an emotional connection with the product I am using and certainly will generate an emotion if the service will closed or if they introduce features that break the existing user flow.
> We believe that making people invest time, commit to a trial, and put skin in the game will help you build a more engaged user base. This friction weeds out the people who aren’t serious and creates a sense of urgency. It also forces you to focus on the customers and users that really matter.