🚀 We just launched a free version of our plugin on the WordPress repo — did this work for you?
Hey Product Hunt community! 👋
We've been running Fabio Chatbot, a paid AI chatbot plugin for WordPress, and we just released a free companion version — Fabio Chatbot Lite — on the official WordPress.org plugin repository. 🆓
👉 https://wordpress.org/plugins/fabio-ai-chatbot-lite/
The idea was simple: give away a solid free version to get discovered by more WordPress site owners through the repo's search & directory, and hopefully drive more traffic (and eventually conversions to the paid version) 📈
We'd love to hear from founders/makers who've tried this strategy:
🤔 Have you released a free/lite version of your product on a marketplace or repo (WordPress, Chrome Web Store, etc.) specifically to boost traffic?
📊 Did it actually move the needle — more visits, more signups, more paying users?
⏳ How long did it take before you saw a real impact?
⚠️ Any downsides — cannibalization of paid users, support overhead, etc.?
Genuinely curious to compare notes with others who've been down this road. Thanks in advance! 🙏
The WordPress repo seems like a particularly interesting discovery channel because the free version can reach people already looking for a plugin. I’d be curious how much of that directory traffic actually turns into paid users, rather than just installs.
After a few days the traffic has increased, not that much, I will be able to assess in a month.
That makes sense. A month of data should give you a much clearer picture than the first few days.