Can we have different plans / price points / data combinations / plan sizes?

[Michel L.]

Hi, I find limited in the choices of subscription plans. Basic/free and Pro/110$

I'd gladly pay something like 25$ a year for 50GB and a 2 users family plan.

Considering iCloud have a 12$ plan for 20 GB and 48$ for 200GB, that seems reasonable..

[Rich]

Eliminating the smaller plans and making the big, more expansive one the standard

Exactly what smaller plans have they eliminated?

Dropbox Pro used to be 50GB and they it doubled to 100GB, without raising the price. Then it was increased to 1TB, again without raising the price. No smaller plan has been eliminated. They've simply kept adding more space for the same price.

[Daniel G.31]

While Dropbox may have tried smaller plans in the past, I think that it is worth reconsidering now. I don't need 1TB of storage, and don't care to pay for that much. Other solutions such as Google Drive, OneDrive and Apple iCloud offer more afforable storage options, and they are becoming more feature rich. So far, I find that no one else matches Dropbox as far as seamless integration with mobile apps, file sync and automatic photo backup capabilities. I would love to have a 100GB option at $2/month with Dropbox - I could consider closing my Google drive account and move back 100% to Dropbox. Without that option, I may eventually end up doing the opposite... Please, please, please, reconsider providing a smaller plan option. I am convinced that you would end up getting a lot more paid subscriptions. I have been a big fan and a promoter of Dropbox, but many of my friends are difficult to convince to fork out $9.99/month for a lot more storage than they will ever need. As a result, I end up helping them clean-up their Dropbox account when it gets full, by showing them how to move their photos from Dropbox to their local computer. Thanks. 

[Mark]

I believe they have only just finished a trial on this again Daniel. 

However, as there have been no public releases again I doubt its going to happen. 

I also have no doubt that less cost = more subscribers but you are all missing the point that keeps being brought back up - everybody else DOWNGRADED. That meant they did get new customers, yes, but that it in no way covered the loss of revenue from all the downgrades. 

e.g. you pay $2 per month so revenue is +$2, but, I then downgrade to that plan and also pay $2pm. They've instantly lost $7 but have increased costs. 

[Daniel G.31]

Thanks Mark for the prompt reply.I appreciate your perspective. 

It's too bad if they have been testing it, and are not going forward with it. 

I understand the concern with the loss of revenue because of the downgrade, but that seems to be a very short term view. There is a more strategic view: the world is rapidly changing - it's a subscription world out there -, and competitors are catching up. Dropbox needs to think creatively, and deliver to the needs of their customers, if they want to not only keep them, but entice them to upgrade to a paid subscription.

As a Dropbox user / potentially paying customer, this is how I see it.   

• I probably currently subscribe to 10 different monthly online services, for a variety of needs. I can't afford to pay $10/month for each one. Cheaper options will allow me to subscribe to more services, at a level that meets my needs. 
  
  
• If users downgrade to the cheaper option, it's because the current offering do not meet their needs - like me, they don't need 1TB.
  
  
• From a revenue loss perspective due to downgrade, it would take 4 new paid users @ $2/month for 100GB to compensate for the lost of revenue of 1 user downgrading from 1TB  @ $10/month. Presumably, the storage cost for Dropbox of supporting these 5 users would be half since the 5 taken together would only consume 500GB. So there would be a slight increase in net revenue with that scenario, since the 1TB would be consumed by 10 users at $2/month - that is doubling the revenue for the amount of storage.
  
  
• The market is growing for users who need more storage than the free offering - more and more users need to backup phones that have 32GB and 64GB of storage capacity. Get these customers before Apple gets them (I don't and don't want to backup my photos with Apple).
   
• I can already think of at least one family member and 2 friends that I would strongly encourage to pay $2/month to automatically backup photos on their phone without maxing out their Dropbox account. 
  
  

• Heck - I am a generous guys and would consider giving some of them a 1 year subscription as a gift for $24/year to get them started, since I have to help them move files around when they run out of storage.   

It seems to me that giving the customers what they need is the secret to success, customer loyalty and comes down to a question of survival. 

[Robert S.]

From a revenue loss perspective due to downgrade, it would take 4 new paid users @ $2/month for 100GB to compensate for the lost of revenue of 1 user downgrading from 1TB  @ $10/month. Presumably, the storage cost for Dropbox of supporting these 5 users would be half since the 5 taken together would only consume 500GB. So there would be a slight increase in net revenue with that scenario, since the 1TB would be consumed by 10 users at $2/month - that is doubling the revenue for the amount of storage.

I'm afraid that false assumptions always lead to erroneous conclusions, as is the case here.

The major costs aren't particularly in association with the storage space. What costs the money is each time you access/upload/download stuff in that space, for which Dropbox get charged (you don't). Regardless of whether you have a 100GB account or a 1TB account your going to roughly average the same amount of pulls, so the cost to DB will be the same.

It seems to me that giving the customers what they need is the secret to success, customer loyalty and comes down to a question of survival. 

There have been demands for many and various price plans ever since Dropbox first opened in 2008. Doomsayers, more often than not of the non-paying variety, regularly wash up here and claim that this-or-that price plan is essential or Dropbox will lose customers. None have been right yet, usage figures continue to increase, now in excess of four hundred million and rising.

Dropbox are perfectly clear about the level of service they provide and the price point they need to provide it. 100GB or 1TB, it costs DB the same to run your account, so they offer you 1TB and you use what you need.

I'm not aware of any rule which states Dropbox have to pursue policy they already know is detrimental to their business and it's not as if Dropbox is the only game in town. Competition is a wonderful thing, if something doesn't suit your needs, then other services are available.

[David C.110]

In my small business I have like 8 users with Dropbox that some are under the 2GB limit.  We deal with data (excel, text files, databases) so we don't need a lot of space.  Today, being close to the end of the year we have to archive some data.  We have people that are going over the 2GB (actually like 4GB with referrals).  I would gladly pay $25-$50 a year per user for the 10GB each user would max out at.  The owner has his $99 plan but it is hard for me to justify anyone else (even me the IT guy) having a paid $99 plan. Dropbox works really well and have no complaints except for this one.

FYI, in 2015 I purchased a File Transporter (ConnectedData) so I could have my own private cloud.  I have to say I was somewhat disappointed with it.  It does not handle file conflicts and had some other issues. 

[Kenny Y.]

Dear dropbox team, I am glad and proud to be one of dropbox's member because of the simplicity and sharing capability dropbox brings me. As for a student working aroud, it is very important for me to have such cloud storage so I can access files anywhere. But as time past, the amound of storage space is getting lesser. Indeed I am looking forward to upgrade my account to Pro but considering I am just a student with no income at this moment I felt that the only package available (1TB for $99/yr) is quite unaffordable for me. Plus 1TB might be too much for me to use at this moment. So i was wondering if by any chance that dropbox would consider implimenting other package choices that are much more affortable for us? Please do not misunderstand my intention as I am not just speaking on for my own benefits but also for others that might want a Pro account with affordable storage space.

What I have in mind if maybe the sales team could consider options such as

• 100GB $1.99/mth
• 250GB $3.99/mth
• 500GB $5.99/mth
• 750GB $7.99/mth
• 1TB $9.99/mth

or something like that. These packages are more affortable and users may select the amount of storage they wanted and upgrade to a higher package in the future if they need it.

From the business POV, insead of allocating 1TB for 1 user (which I believe most of them barely use up 50% of it) you can seggregate the space out for other users to be more profitable. For example 1TB costs $9.99/mth and 500GB cost $5.99/mth. So instead of 1 user hogging up 1TB of barely used storage why not selling it to 2 users which uses 500GB of storage space hence giving you more profit? Last but not least I really look forwared to hear from your team if such idea will be applicable and I am really interested to get a Pro account which is much affordable to me as a student.

Thank you.

[Robert S.]

I think I can pretty much guarantee it won't happen, search the forums.

Dropbox trialled smaller plans in the past and found that they weren't financially viable.

100GB or 1TB, it costs DB the same to run your account, so they offer you 1TB and you use what you need.

[Dave C.5]

Dropbox is sold to customers based on space, but much of dropbox costs are based on traffic.

If you had a 100GB account or a 1TB account, on average you will produce the same amount of in and out traffic, hence costs to dropbox are the same, so no smaller size accounts with price breaks are likely to appear as costs to implement them dont reduce.

FYI the 1TB account used to be 100GB and then they just x10ed it out of the blue one day, which sure points to space is not a driving cost factor.

Note: 1TB accounts do NOT get pre-allocated space, space is consumed as required, and any content data that appears in more than one account is cross referenced and stored only once, this is an additional under the hood saving that DB make which I expect significantly helps them to supply free accounts to users.

[Kenny Y.]

@dave and @robert thank you so much for taking the time to explain some of the inner workings of DB. Much appreciated and I am happy that I can learn so much from you guys... Anyways I really do want to get myself a Pro account but sadly I couldn't afford it at this time... (I'm from Malaysia btw so it cost me about 450MYR/yr)... Hopefully someday in the future I can be a part of the Pro team too... Cheers 🙂