Free trials · Empirical study testing free-trial types and ratings in consumer-software sampling.
Effects of Different Types of Free Trials and Ratings in Sampling of Consumer Software: An Empirical Study
Journal of Management Information Systems · 2013
Summary
Trial format and ratings affect software sampling/adoption outcomes, demonstrating that “free trial” design and social information jointly matter.
For your marketing
Possible founder application
Use the study to frame a pricing or packaging hypothesis and identify outcomes to measure; estimate effects with your own customer mix and willingness-to-pay evidence.
Reported result
What the study found
Trial format and ratings affect software sampling/adoption outcomes, demonstrating that “free trial” design and social information jointly matter.
Research question
What the authors investigated
How do free-trial format and ratings influence consumer software sampling and adoption?
Design
Empirical study testing free-trial types and ratings in consumer-software sampling.
Sample and setting
Consumer software sampling; users exposed to alternative free-trial formats and rating information.
Scope and transfer
Limitations to keep in view
Consumer-software sampling context and experimental/task setting may not generalize to ongoing SaaS subscriptions; rating effects depend on the displayed information.
Research sources
The publisher-indexed reference identifies the exact title, authors, empirical-study designation, journal and DOI. Direct publisher-page retrieval was recorded on 2026-10-09; this profile uses the publisher abstract/metadata and does not claim independent review of unavailable full text.