Forced continuity
1
Purpose
The purpose of forced continuity is to reduce churn and increase paying customers.
2
Psychological principles
This pattern uses the psychological principle of the status quo bias.
3
Prevention
Assume any company will charge your credit card whenever they can.
Set reminders to cancel a free trial before it ends.
Forced continuity is silent and cunning
When signing up for a free trial, we may not realize that it comes at a price. Many free trials are built as a ruse to entice users to use the product long enough to be charged the full price once the trial ends.
This is especially nefarious when paying for a full year is auto-checked when signing up, causing users to be charged a full year’s subscription, not just a single month.
Forced continuity is also inherently silent. Users aren’t notified when the trial is about to end or of upcoming charges.
Forced continuity is often paired with the roach motel pattern to make the unsubscription process especially brutal.
Behind the pattern
Status quo bias. This bias suggests that people prefer things to stay the same. When people sign up for a free trial, their new status quo includes that product. Silently charging users in the background further distances people from the cost of the new status quo.
Loss aversion. People attribute losses as more significant than gains, even if they are equal. We value the ability to keep a cookie more than the ability to buy another cookie. So, once this subscription is added "for free" we have an aversion to losing it.
Cognitive dissonance. When we make decisions, we tend to believe they are right, even if given evidence otherwise. Even though we may recognize that the subscription doesn’t provide ample benefits, we may justify the decision anyway because of our inflated belief that we made the right decision.