I said it early on in Plus V3, but I’ll say it again. Why don’t you stop locking down threads and just keep one continuous and evolving conversation for this project?
Why are we even measuring the frequency of “updates”? I think we’d all be much more at ease if we just had an ongoing dialogue, even if it just means casual discussion with the team and the occasional request for feedback on specific problems as they arise.
You’ve created a problem here when there didn’t need to be one at all. Now we’re wasting even more time discussing the frequency of updates, when we could be addressing the issue of paywalling. It all feels like a diversion to be honest.
Nobody kept track of how often Bruno “updated” us on the new nav thread because it was always timely, appropriate and measured - with the correct balance of news/progress and individual responses to questions and concerns from the community.
Im happy for any of the communication options, im just really excited for it to launch and find out what it has to offer. I hope to see some stuff that my current bank has like rewards and cashback!
Do we have a timeframe on when the new Plus is going to launch, will we be looking at Q1 2020 :stuck_out_tongue
Updates when there’s something to share but also pop in now and again and answer some of our questions. If you can’t answer the question due to e.g. commercial sensitivity then say so. I would understand that. It’s radio silence after the post that’s the frustrating part. Look at the paywalling chatter and how it’s worrying a lot of folk without further interjection from Monzo to explain it a bit more.
I chose the third option because I don’t want to be “kept in the loop” about daft things like the sign up flow or the naming of an unknown product.
Proper updates are interesting but release them when they’re ready, not on a forced schedule.
Right now, Plus doesn’t feel ready for all the attention it’s getting. It sounds like it’s still a commercially sensitive, secretive project so it makes little sense to keep it in the spotlight.
Plus 1,2 didn’t fail due to lack of communication, and neither will 3.
Your reset after v2 didn’t seem to question the fundamental premise, and tried to build the same thing differently with a new team. At this point I think you’re pretty clear on what the community thinks of the ideas presented and have chosen to ignore it (which is ok if you know exactly what you are doing and why and are confident of success).
My main problem with your process so far is that plus v1,2,3 seem to have started not with a customer problem, but with a problem for Monzo (what can we charge a monthly fee for?), and now you’re trying to build a product around that. This is not the recipe for a successful product. It should start with something your customers are asking for - e.g. if lots of them asked for a premium packaged account, give them that (not a blend of that with other features), if lots of them asked for certain expensive software features, perhaps consider how best to sell those to them (is plus the best wrapper for that?), if lots want card choices, sell them that. Starting instead with how can we charge a monthly fee and stuffing unrelated features/products into that is not likely to deliver something lots of customers will pay for, and the more you add paradoxically the less broadly attractive it will be. There’s also your competitors - you may consider revolut with its freemium model your biggest competitor, but most of your customers will continue to compare you with retail banks and their offerings.
I’d echo the others here and say if you want to communicate better on plus answer the deeper questions about strategy and exactly that the product is and why you’re making it from a customer perspective. At present it seems you’re trying to build a product without knowing what it is. If you do know exactly what it is and just can’t tell us for some reason perhaps better just to wait till you can announce it as it won’t be amenable to this sort of ‘help us build x’ communication. If you still don’t know what it is perhaps it is time to reset quietly and build something people want.
It doesn’t need to be a problem… Monzo could quietly create copies of the high street banks’ packaged options to make it easier for people to switch to Monzo. I don’t think this is unreasonable.
Sadly, it’s gone wrong because of the nonsensical hype surrounding Plus, which has created an expectation that Monzo are doing something new and radical, which Monzo have twice failed to deliver.
This is part of my rationale for thinking that the fortnightly Plus updates should stop.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts in this thread. I think we can say that we’re broadly in agreement on a few topics:
We shouldn’t share things just for the sake of sharing something
It’s ok if our updates don’t come on a regular cadence
You’d like more info on the fundamentals of why we’re exploring paid plans
It’s a tough balance: we don’t want to leave you hanging without an update for ages, but we also don’t want to share things that aren’t valuable to you. Likewise, while plans are still in flux it’s not super valuable for us to share things, as it just creates confusion.
However, I think @Peter_G’s post gives us an indication of a way to go.
We want to be able to share updates about what we’re building. And that’s a separate conversation to why we’re building Paid features. Sure, there’s overlap - especially around the issue of what goes into a paid version of Monzo. But we want to be able to share things without retreading the same ground each time.
So I’d like to create a thread here on the forum answering some of your Frequently Asked Questions. Questions like…
And then also have separate threads where we share the things we’re building, as we build them. We’ll be up front that these are paid features. And the feedback we’ll be looking for will be on those features, not on the idea of ‘Monzo doing paid’.
In the FAQ we’d also explain the things that we can’t or won’t be sharing, and why. (Commercial sensitivity is one such reason, as you’ve noted).
I don’t think that’s correct. I’m paying for the features I have plus the features that were promised, which is precisely what the new product is derived from and is the premise for.
No that was the Supporter bundle as part of V2 that was totally cancelled.
I think the £3 / month was the original early bird package.
This one didn’t get cancelled as it’s ts and cs did not mention any specific deliverables that were cancelled, unlike v2. (There’s a thread called “legacy Monzo plus issues” for more, rather than discuss here)
FAQ sounds good, although perhaps the ‘formal’ one would be better? So each question isn’t picked apart for unintended nuance?
Previously I’ve used a simple system to handle this exact issue - schedule fortnightly updates and track if you post them or not (you could even collate them and decide whether they are worth posting or not, and keep them for later?). Any more than three unposted updates should be a flag that you have to post SOMETHING (even if that is ‘we know we’ve been quiet for a while but we are still working hard’). That lets you define a max period of silence that you think is acceptable, and helped us realise when we’d fallen behind on our communication goals (it can be very easy for a couple of weeks to become a couple of months and more).
That aside, I think all of this will help and if nothing else will establish a new norm that we can all get used to before trying to improve again.
