7. What's Missing: The Gap Between Built and Paid, Renewed, Referred
Assumption: nothing is built yet. So these are gaps between the idea and a business.
7.1 Gaps to pay
| Gap | Why it blocks payment | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| No chosen ritual | You can't list, price or search-optimise "one ritual, TBD" | Anonymous questions, on Teams. See 02 §2.1. |
| No pricing | Undefined | Flat per-organisation tiers: Team $29, Business $79, Organisation $199, Enterprise custom, annual at 10× monthly, 14-day trial. Test in the first 90 days. |
| IT approval | On Teams, a user who wants the app often can't install it | Minimal permissions, security one-pager, publisher attestation, a request template, and a pilot path through the admin's own catalogue. |
| No trust proof | "Anonymous" is a claim until it's explained | A public page that shows what's stored (content, a rotating hash) and what isn't (user IDs, names). Offer to walk IT through it on a call. |
| No payment path the buyer likes | Larger organisations won't add a new card vendor | Microsoft SaaS offer (3% fee, paid on their Microsoft invoice) plus Stripe for smaller buyers. |
7.2 Gaps to renew
| Gap | Fix |
|---|---|
| Episodic use (reorganisations, layoffs) | Tie to the monthly all-hands: recurring question windows, reminders to the host, and a monthly summary to the buyer. |
| No switching cost | The answer archive: a searchable record of what leadership answered. Leaving loses it. |
| Buyer doesn't see value | A monthly admin email: questions asked, answered, answer rate, top topics. No identities. |
| Monthly plans | Push annual with two months free. Target ≥40% annual by month 12. |
| A harassment incident | Moderation on by default, filters, and a clear takedown flow. |
7.3 Gaps to refer
| Gap | Fix |
|---|---|
| Nothing visibly shareable | A small "Asked anonymously with RitualBot" footer on answered-question cards, which every employee sees. It can't be removed on the Team tier. |
| No reason for an employee to tell another company | Employees move jobs. The footer plus a one-click "suggest to my new company" link. |
| No partner channel | Internal-comms agencies and Microsoft 365 consultants who set up Teams for clients. Offer a 20% recurring referral fee. |
| No reviews | Ask every organisation that runs 3 question windows for a Store review. |
7.4 Non-product gaps
Distribution
- Channels that fit: the Teams Store listing, exact-match search content ("anonymous questions in Teams", "post anonymously in Teams channel"), answers on Microsoft Q&A and Tech Community where people ask this, and Microsoft 365 consultants.
- Channels that failed for Abot: SEO campaigns, blogger outreach, Product Hunt and a marketing agency. "Close to nothing." Don't repeat them at scale.
- One-off spikes: a Hacker News or LinkedIn post can bring a burst, as it did for Abot in March 2018. Useful, not a plan.
Positioning
- Current: "a paid bot for one team ritual". Not a pitch.
- Better: "Anonymous questions for Microsoft Teams. Your people ask what they really think. Leaders answer in the open. Nobody, including us, can see who asked."
Sales motion
- Self-serve for Team and Business tiers. Trial, then card or Microsoft invoice.
- Light-touch for Organisation and Enterprise: one call with the buyer and one with IT.
Platform rules and compliance
| Area | Requirement |
|---|---|
| Teams Store | Partner Center account, publisher verification, Store validation (time unverified), a linked SaaS offer for transactable plans. Admins can block apps and review requests. Aim for publisher attestation by month 6. |
| Microsoft Marketplace | 3% fee. Monthly payouts, $50 minimum, a 30-day escrow on card sales, refunds of recurring SaaS charges within 72 hours of a term starting. Buyers need an Entra ID. |
| Slack (only after the month-12 gate) | Marketplace listing is the "only appropriate channel" for commercial apps since 29 May 2025. 10 active installs before review, functional review up to 10 weeks. Don't impersonate users when posting. No training LLMs on Slack data. If you use AI, disclose the model, retention, tenancy and residency, and warn about inaccurate answers. Unlisted commercial apps get 1 request per minute on conversation history. |
| Privacy (GDPR, UK GDPR, CCPA) | A rotating hash of a user ID is still pseudonymous personal data. Post content may also identify people. You are a processor for the customer. Offer a data processing agreement, a retention setting and deletion on request. |
| Works councils (Germany and others) | Tools that could monitor employees may need works-council agreement before rollout (not re-verified in this run). A clear "no identity stored" design helps the buyer get it. |
| Whistleblowing law | Legal internal reporting channels carry statutory duties (EU Whistleblower Directive, details not re-verified). Don't market as one. |
| Content liability | Terms that make the customer's moderator the publisher, a takedown flow, and a ban on harassment in the acceptable-use policy. |
Team
- Not provided. You need one developer who can ship and support a Teams bot, plus access to 10 people who run all-hands at organisations on Teams. Without the second, the first 90 days stall.
Metrics and instrumentation
- Minimum set: trials a month, IT approval rate and time, trial-to-paid, question windows per paying organisation per month, questions per window, answer rate, month-1 and month-3 retention, monthly logo churn, share on annual plans, and source of each trial (Store, search, referral, network).