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Zendesk releases a free plan

zendesk.com

28 points by D-mo 14 years ago · 9 comments

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JeremyBanks 14 years ago

This isn't a "free plan", even if the cost is small and doesn't go to them. (It's $20/year to a charity, if you didn't RTFA.) Their own homepage calls it "Better than FREE", even which I find less misleading.

latchkey 14 years ago

I appreciate the idea on the donation. Anything for a good cause.

It seems like the starter and regular plans are pretty anemic when it comes to services. For example, we are witholding proper security (SSL) until you pay more?!

Really, this is just designed to just push the customer into a higher paying plan. The service isn't really useful for most businesses until the Plus plan.

I'd rather that they just get rid of the starter and regular plans entirely. Two plans, Plus and Enterprise. Simple and would really make the comparison page really clean.

Just say buy the plus plan and we'll donate $20 to your choice of charity (and then name a few I can choose from, instead of just picking one). Effectively, that is what will happen anyway with the current system.

  • biot 14 years ago

    This reminds me of my favorite Usenet Oracle where all the upgrades give you what you assumed you already had with the lower account:

      The Usenet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was:
    
       > how do i switch to using netscape browser with my pipeline account?
    
      And in response, thus spake the Oracle:
    
       }       Thank you for your question.  As your Internet Service Provider,
       } we are pleased to assist in your exploration of the computing world's
       } fastest growing realm.
       }
       }       As you have no doubt observed, the explosion of the Web has made
       } your existing command line account rather limited.  To better serve
       } your expanding needs, we are pleased to offer the following tiered
       } service packages:
       }
       } Baseline Account
       }       This is our most basic account.  You get a shell prompt.  On-line
       }       help is disabled.  Transfer protocol is 'cat'.
       }       $5.00/month
       }
       } Extra(tm) Account
       }       All Baseline features, plus:
       }               o On-line help
       }               o On-line manual pages (first 20 accesses free)
       }               o XModem (checksum)
       }       $7.50/month
       }
       } Super(tm) Account
       }       All Extra(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Unlimited manual page reference
       }               o Lower case support
       }               o 8-bit connection
       }               o XModem (CRC)
       }       $10.00/month + $1.00/hour
       }
       } SuperExtra(tm) Account
       }       All Super(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Command line editing (backspace, ^X)
       }               o 24-hour access privileges
       }               o XModem (1K blocks), YModem
       }               o Free outbound mail
       }       $12.00/month + $1.25/hour
       }
       } Master(tm) Account
       }       All SuperExtra(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Free inbound mail
       }               o Newsgroup access
       }               o ZModem
       }       $15.00/month + $1.65/hour
       }
       } MasterExtra(tm) Account
       }       All Master(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Configurable newline termination
       }               o Apple Newton(tm) support
       }               o Personal netnews killfiles enabled
       }               o 9600 bps access privileges
       }               o Kermit
       }       $20.00/month + $2.10/hour
       }
       } MasterSuper(tm) Account
       }       All MasterExtra(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Account password protection
       }               o Shift-lock support
       }               o Access to code development tools (vi, emacs, EDLIN,
       }                 etc.)
       }               o UUCP
       }       $22.00/month + $2.50/hour + $0.01/Kbyte
       }
       } MasterSuperExtra(tm) Account
       }       All MasterSuper(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Access to additional code development tools (cc, as,
       }                 etc.)
       }               o 80 column support
       }               o 512K storage
       }               o Tint control
       }               o Gopher
       }       $25.00/month + $2.75/hour + $0.05/Kbyte
       }
       } Executive(tm) Account
       }       All MasterSuperExtra(tm) features, plus:
       }               o Access to compiled output (a.out)
       }               o 2048K disk storage (additional to 512K on tape)
       }               o 600 DPI
       }               o SLIP/PPP
       }       $50.00/month + $4.99/hour + $0.198/Kbyte
       }
       }       We are also pleased to announce our first account specially
       } tailored for businesses:
       }
       } Entrepreneur(tm) Account
       }       o Your choice of shell (csh, tcsh, ksh, bash, etc.)
       }       o SLIP, PPP (yielding direct FTP and HTTP connections)
       }       o 14400 bps, 28800 bps, ISDN, or leased line connections available
       }       o 20M storage on RAID array with mirrored backup (additional
       }         storage for extra charge)
       }       o Full suite of development tools (yacc, lex, sed, awk, perl,
       }         etc.)
       }       o DNS registration (become your own domain on the net!)
       }       o Complete PGP tool set
       }       o CNID reverse-lookup phone database
       }       o USGS maps collated and annotated by zip code and demographics
       }         (in Postscript and DVI)
       }       o Access to all our members' registration data (excepting those
       }         who explicitly requested at least three times to be excluded)
       }       o Public relations tools (SpamTool, with NoCem evasion heuristics)
       }       o Libel/slander control facilities (canceltool)
       }       o Intelligent mail filter suites
       }       o 24-hour phone support
       }
       }       $300.00/month!
       }       (Must be registered as a commercial business within your state to
       }       qualify)
       }
       }       We think you'll agree these new options offer unparallelled
       } flexibility, and that no one else offers a better deal for direct
       } Internet access.  We're pleased you've chosen us, and hope will
       } continue to stay with us.  See you on the Net!
       }
       }       You owe The Oracle an account on best.com.
  • wvl 14 years ago

    From http://www.zendesk.com/product/compare it seems that SSL encryption is provided on the starter plan. Only hosting of an ssl certificate for custom domains isn't, which seems fair.

    • latchkey 14 years ago

      You are right. I got confused in the myriad of options in that giant comparison chart.

dclaysmith 14 years ago

That's a fantastic idea. Hopefully they'll post a followup and let us know how it affected business.

At some point Square was donating 1 cent per transaction--but can't find anything about it on their website. Anyone know if they are still doing this?

scoutlandish 14 years ago

There is a separate free plan for startups associated with ycombinator and other incubators. Details can be found here. http://www.zendesk.com/product/features/startups

drewda 14 years ago

Atlassian does this with their software too. It's great to be able to start using their packages for a $10 donation each.

ecaron 14 years ago

How about a plan that doesn't involve a 5x cost increase when you go from 3 to 4 users? Now that's something I'd upvote!

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