[antaviana]

We used to have a freeware product that a few years after became a commercial product sold as a subscription.

When it was a freeware product, several people wanted to donate but we never accepted any donation, just to avoid the feeling of getting paid too low. Also I guess we were a bit equalitarian: we wanted that either nobody paid or that everybody paid.

[simplehuman]

How did your existing customers react to it (switch bait?)

[antaviana]

In general quite well. It is a B2B product and being able to pay gives them some assurance that there will be someone behind. The freeware version continued to exist, and the transition to actually pay was long (free beta for the subscription lasted 4 months). We also did a heavily discounted launch promotion so that the transition from nothing to something was a lot smoother for existing users. Here is the announcement we did: http://www.apsic.com/blog/?p=25

[bbcbasic]

Good opportunity to make their donations go to a charity. They can feel twice as good!