tl;dr
Saying “Unlimited” might be a great marketing pitch and plenty of products try it. Personally, I’m a big fan of this at the buffet. And maybe it works in some contexts where there’s clearly some kind of consumption limit such that even the outliers don’t utterly destroy your margin. (For example, try as I might, there’s only so much chocolate pudding I can eat.)
However… even though we’ve seen this offer for digital products it’s probably a bad idea most of the time, and I’m going to tell you why.
Here’s the short answer and you can skip the rest if you buy it. Across years and products we’ve seen outlier abuse of unlimited plans can cause havoc or painful exception processes. Even honest usage can become a negative if costs go up in unexpected ways and you’re stuck with a brand and contractual promise you can’t keep.
Do you agree? Don’t do unlimited unless you have clear rationale and systems to deal with issues. That’s it. If you want more justifications for the assertion, read on. If you read further, as you do, ask yourself or your team members this one question: “Is the benefit of this tired claim worth all the trouble it could cause?”
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