{"id":251775,"date":"2020-04-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-15T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/blog\/should-you-charge-for-support\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T12:48:29","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T17:48:29","slug":"should-you-charge-for-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/blog\/should-you-charge-for-support\/","title":{"rendered":"Should You Charge For Support?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"et_pb_row_inner et_pb_row_inner_0\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_column et_pb_column_4_4 et_pb_column_inner et_pb_column_inner_0 et-last-child\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_text et_pb_text_0 et_pb_text_align_left et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\">\n<p class=\"p-lead\">If you want to make money from support, you need to charge for it and most technology companies do.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"et_pb_row_inner et_pb_row_inner_1\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_column et_pb_column_4_4 et_pb_column_inner et_pb_column_inner_1 et-last-child\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_module et_pb_text et_pb_text_1 et_pb_text_align_left et_pb_bg_layout_light\">\n<div class=\"et_pb_text_inner\">\n<h2>Should you charge for support?<\/h2>\n<p>The majority (89.7%) of technology companies offer some form of fee-based support option. Not all support programs are the same \u2013 some are extensive with many choices for the customers to select while others are limited in scope. Fee based support options are not always presented to the customer as a choice. In some cases, the support fee may be bundled within the product price or included as a compulsory first year option. Very few companies offer free support.<\/p>\n<p>The starting point for this discussion is that Support should be sold. A well-defined support offering is far too valuable for both customers and the company offering it. For customers, support is a means to gain access to the expertise they need to help them apply the product to its fullest potential. For the product vendor, good support it too costly to give away and the financial benefits of the ongoing annuity are too attractive to not pursue.<\/p>\n<h2>Sell Support Unless:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Your product or service is so simple there is no reason a customer would need assistance.<\/li>\n<li>Your market is so competitive that introducing fee-based support would create a significant competitive disadvantage.<\/li>\n<li>Your product is used at a time or in a way that there is no practical way to deliver support.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you want to make money from support, you need to charge for it and most technology companies do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":251776,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":"","_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[46,8,11],"tags":[63,74,75,76,77,137],"class_list":["post-251775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-support","category-grow","category-programs","tag-portfolio","tag-pricing","tag-programs","tag-selling-services","tag-service-sales","tag-support","post_outcome-grow-revenue","post_outcome-transform-and-innovate","post_activity-expansion-sales","post_activity-program-management","post_activity-renewal","post_activity-sales-enablement"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251775"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251775\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":254973,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251775\/revisions\/254973"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.servicexrg.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}