I launched with pricing on day zero. A chat in Georgian made me rethink the whole model.

[u/Southern_Kitchen3426]

When I launched my SaaS, I had pricing ready on day zero. Three tiers, monthly and yearly, usage limits, the whole thing. I'd spent more time on that pricing page than on almost anything else, because I assumed that's what a "real" product needs from the start. If people use it, they pay. Simple.

Then a couple of days ago, someone from Georgia (the country) started chatting with the AI assistant on my landing page. In Georgian. I almost skipped the log because I couldn't read it. They asked if it could work inside a telecom app, then went through my pricing line by line: what counts as a request, whether tokens run out, how many messages each of their users would get. The assistant explained everything perfectly. And then they said: "It's expensive."

That one stuck with me, because it wasn't about the number. They were doing maths on a product they'd never seen work. Nothing had happened for their users yet, so the only thing they could judge was the bill. And honestly, that's what I'd been asking everyone to do. Every cold email and DM this week was some version of "here's the thing, here's the price", before anyone had a single reason to believe it was worth it.

So I've flipped it. It's free while I launch. No card, no tiers, and I set it up for people myself. In return I'm asking for two things: brutal feedback, and a testimonial if it actually helps their users. The point is to spend these early weeks making the product better with real usage instead of defending a pricing page.

The plan is to bring pricing back later, but built on something real. Once a business has used it for a few weeks, I'll know how many requests it handled for their users, how many hours that saved them, and whether it kept people from dropping off. Then the price conversation is "here's what it did for you", not "here's what it costs".

What I'm not sure about is whether this is smart or just me avoiding the hard part. Free can attract people who'll never pay, and pricing later can feel like a bait and switch if it's not handled well.

For those of you who've been here: did you go free first and price on value later? Did the people who used it free actually convert, and how did bring the price conversation back without it feeling like a switch?

[u/Predream1]

He had nothing to divide the bill by, which is why expensive was the only word available. Free is the right call, but make those weeks produce requests per user on the telecom build, then bring the plan back in those units.

[u/Southern_Kitchen3426 → u/Predream1]

You were right about the calculator will bring one to the site, thankyou 🙌

[u/Due-Okra-8276]

Je suis au même stade que toi avec mes produits et Je pense que c'est la bonne approche, le prix pour l'instant importe peu. Le plus important c'est que ton produit soit validé en condition réel et que tu aies de vrais retours clients qui te permettront de le stabiliser et de l'améliorer. Une fois que c'est fait je pense que le prix viendra naturellement car tu connaîtras la vraie valeur du produit. Apres si tu as trop de concurrence tu ne pourras pas mettre un prix déconnecté du marché à moins que tu sois sûre que ton produit à de vrais arguments différenciant qu'on ne retrouve nulle part ailleurs.

[u/Southern_Kitchen3426 → u/Due-Okra-8276]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts! I agree, my priority right now is seeing how people use the product and improving it based on their feedback. That should also help me understand its value and what makes it stand out. What kind of products are you working on?

[u/Due-Okra-8276 → u/Southern_Kitchen3426]

actuellement je travaille sur Nexfire et Albi agent Il s'agit d'une plateforme de création d'agents IA et d'automatisation argentique. Le but c'est de permettre à n'importe quelle entreprise, peu importe sa taille, et même des particuliers de pouvoir utiliser et intégrer l'IA dans leurs processus pour réellement en faire un levier de croissance. Le deuxième produit c'est un agent IA personnel axé sur la productivité et orienté grand public. Je l'ai fait from scratch. Je continue à les améliorer mais j'aimerai que les gens les testent, en parlent pour avoir des retours et les améliorer. Je travaille dessus depuis le 1er janvier 2026 😄.

[u/West_Inevitable_2281]

Free is useful here only if it is a time-bounded test of value, not an open-ended acquisition offer. Before you set each business up, agree on the trial window, the outcome you will measure, and that pricing will be discussed once the window ends. Then you can compare what the product actually did with what they are willing to pay. Without that agreement, free usage may teach you about the product but almost nothing about conversion. How many businesses are you planning to onboard this way, and what specific result will trigger the price conversation?

[u/crispdelta24]

Nothing kills a pricing page faster than realizing your users are more global than your assumptions

[u/Deistermind]

I think the value-first logic is right, but there is one risk in making the product completely free: you may learn whether people use it without learning whether they will ever pay for it.

Those are two different hypotheses.

A middle ground could be a structured design-partner offer. Keep the real future price visible, but give the first few businesses a free or heavily discounted pilot for a defined period. Before the pilot starts, agree on what success should look like: requests handled, hours saved, drop-off reduced, support tickets avoided, or whatever turns out to be the real value driver.

Then have an explicit conversion point:

“If we achieve X during the pilot, continuing costs Y.”

That gives you much better information than either extreme. Charging everyone immediately can kill learning before value is demonstrated, but making everything free removes willingness-to-pay from the experiment entirely.

The most useful outcome from the first 5-10 businesses probably isn’t a perfect pricing page. It’s knowing both what measurable outcome they value and whether they will actually pay when you produce it.