@_jacksmith Thanks Jack that's a great question. So the core status page product is the same but we do things a little different. Focussing on the human response rather than robotic status updates. We offer Full control over status page theming, with pro developer tools. We have a fair pricing model which allows access to all of our features. Whilst the platform can be customised to suit you, we do steer away from confusing dev-ops stuff like performance metrics as default.
I'm the founder of All Aboard!. We're happy paying customers of Sorry. We were just looking for something simple that didn't require us to make a bunch of coding, integration or design changes.
Sorry has definitely delivered on that for us. Moreover, Robin (I haven't had the pleasure of meeting Robert yet) has been so enjoyable to work with. He took the time to do the status page design for us based on our landing page and colors - I didn't ask for this, he just did it for us.
Most of us think about status pages as an afterthought - something to do when a problem pops up.
These guys LIVE this stuff and also give great feedback on our messaging. Robin got on a Skype call with me and helped me outline our disaster response and messaging strategy. I was making the classic mistake of updating our status page with "X is wrong" without really explaining what this means to customers or what we should do about it. They have since encapsulated this into their excellent guide: http://guides.sorryapp.com/weath...
There are a ton of different ways to do status pages. In the end I just really enjoyed being a customer of these guys. They are hard-working, humble guys slowly building a useful product. They remind me a lot of Joel Gascoigne when he started building Buffer - people you just want to see succeed.
@kevindewalt Thanks so much for the kind words! Consider this our introduction, It's a pleasure to meet you, Robin has only good things to say about you.
Really pleased to hear that we've been able to help grow your perspective on service status - you have done much the same with us when it comes to the way we tackle on-boarding.
With such kind support from people like yourself it gives me a great sense of hope that we'll see Sorry™ grow and succeed.
Congrats on shipping!
I was excited to see friendlier pricing there than StatusPage (who are awesome guys by the way, we've been a customer for years) but I don't actually see the differences between each of your tiers. Maybe it's because I'm browsing on mobile and they're cut off - is it traffic limits? Update subscriber limits? What limits are there on joining the £0 or £19 plan?
@liamgooding Hi Liam, that's really good to hear you’re a happy customer. We have a lot of admiration for what they are doing. We had in fact had Sorry on the back burner for some time, and it was seeing the launch of StatusPage that really motivated us pull our thumbs out and get things produced.
At the moment our pricing tiers are policed as part of the on-boarding process - there are no hard limits as to which plan people sit in - we appreciate this is a fairly uncommon model, but were really keen to put something which seemed 'fair' into the world, rather than monetizing features as is commonplace in the SaaS market.
Our biggest challenge at the moment is that people are used to dealing with firm boundaries, and without them figuring out which plan they sit in can be confusing.
Thanks for the question, I hope that answers it for you.
BTW, Track.io looks very good, will signup for a platform tour soon.
@sirrawlins@liamgooding yes sorry this pricing model seems very idealistic and nice and fluffy and all... but totally bad signalling from a business point of view. It doesn't work. And I like to buy from companies who are likely to be around in a years time ;-)
I'm being very tongue in cheek of course... but you understand my point. Real companies accept spending A to receive B, and using B they can make/save at least xA. If it isn't clear what 'B' is or what 'A' will be, then I can't do that quick value equation (x, or ROI) and I can't make a purchasing decision.
"Price Intelligently" is a great blog with lots and lots of discussions on pricing metrics for SaaS . It can be very difficult and there wont be a perfect answer (at Trakio we've flip-flopped around on per user, per terrabyte, per 1M events, feature-gating... etc) but eventually you need to choose at least one metric.
I admire you've cut feature gating...(custom domain in particular).... but be aware that StatusPage (or any encumbant) have been playing with their pricing for a long time and there may be some wisdom (or at least lessons to be learned) on where their pricing metrics/tiers came from. A very smart VC told me that if I'm cheaper than the expensive whale, I better have solid evidence/strategy of how/why my costs are lower (and will stay lower even when we grow).
@liamgooding I absolutely see your point, and thanks for taking time out of your day to share your thoughts. I really do appreciate it.
We shall make more of an effort to demonstrate what A and B are, it’s definitely a weak point we’re aware of.
“Price Intelligently” are great people, and we’ve spent some time on the phone with them not so long ago - the biggest challenge as an early-phase startup is getting our hands on enough data to start making choices.
For now, while we are busy collecting, common sense and gut instinct are our key drivers. However, that all important metric won't be too far away.
I agree there is a great deal to be learned by watching the competition - but we also have to walk our own path, otherwise you’re destined to be forever chasing their tail.
Thanks again for the insightful question Liam.
Wow - thank you Product Hunters! It's been brilliant fun today.
Talking with new people, watching our analytics's go crazy and best of all.. coming up with new ideas.. So its getting towards the end of the day here in the UK so Robert and I are relocating to the comfort of our homes, where we can continue the conversation with the rest of you around the world.
@jpvalery well you have the status.sorryapp.com but having some others displayed would be cool. Maybe select the best from your clients so you involve and engage them, while showing real cases to the world ?
@jpvalery Thanks JP - I completely agree we could do a better job of showcasing our customers, it's something we've been talking about amongst ourselves recently too.
You may have seen AwesomeWall launch on PH recently, and they use us for their status page (http://status.awesomewallhq.com/) You can also see @kevindewalt talking about http://status.allaboard.io/ in his kind comments above.
Hello Hunters. We've built Sorry™ which is a simple Status Page service. We hope we can help de-stress companies and their customers when the shit hits the fan.
Now feels like the right time to open up discussions here on Product Hunt. Both Robin and I are here to respond personally; despite having nervous sweaty hands we look forward to chatting.
Hustle X