As one of the top Act! resellers, I wanted you to be aware of this news: Starting on May 15, 2015 Act! Premium moved to a Subscription platform.

Starting then, you will have two options for purchasing Act! Premium software:

• Pay an Annual Subscription that you will need to renew annually. If you don’t renew your software will “go away” when your subscription runs out.
• Pay twice as much for a Perpetual License that you can optionally renew yearly at the lower Annual Subscription. Your Perpetual License will come with one year of Act tech support and free product upgrades. Using this method, you will be able to “pay once” and use the software as long as you want.

CRITICAL STUFF YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT Act! SUBSCRIPTIONS

• First and foremost, this information ONLY applies to those purchasing Act! Premium on or after May 15, 2015.
• Act! Pro will continue to be sold as it’s always been sold via a Perpetual License. However, you will not be able to access Act technical support.
• If you are already an Act! Business Care customer you only need to pay for an Annual Subscription to renew your tech support and upgrade benefits. You are grandfathered in to Perpetual Licensing. Should you decide not to renew you can walk away with whatever version of Act! you already have.

ADDITIONAL THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT Act! SUBSCRIPTIONS

Now that you’ve had a chance to digest how the subscription plans work, let’s get some of your other questions answered.

• Act! is NOT becoming a “cloud-based” product. It is the same software as it has always been. It can either be installed on PCs/servers on a local network, be installed on your own web server or it can be hosted by a third party provider.  I cannot stress this enough – the software itself is NOT changing – just the way you buy it is!

• There is NO choice of the “old way” or the “new way” when buying Act! Premium – all purchases on or after May 15, 2015 will be offered as either a Subscription or a Perpetual license. These changes do not affect Act! Pro.
• SwiftPage can change their policies at any time – they may offer discounts, they may not. They may make changes to the subscription levels. Don’t be surprised to see the price for the renewal increase. As a reseller, I’m there to support you in any way I can, offer you great pricing and answer your questions.

• Yes, the software will have a “kill switch” in it – if your Subscription is not renewed, the software will no longer work. Since your Act! database is a separate file from the Act! program, you will still have your database. However, you won’t be able to read the information in the database unless you have the software to go with it.

WHAT IF I ALREADY OWN Act! PREMIUM?

As a current owner of Act! Premium you are not immediately impacted by the new pricing model. Here are the options available to you in the months ahead:

• Keep using your existing version of Act! Premium – keep using the version of Act!  you currently have installed. If and when you decide to purchase a newer version of Act! Premium in future years, you will can then purchase either a Subscription or Perpetual license.
• Renew your Business Care plan when renewal time arrives – when you pay your Business Care renewal you will automatically get the free upgrade to the next edition of Act! Premium and twelve months of technical support.  However, you will receive Perpetual licenses as a reward for being a Business Care customer.
• Opt for the subscription plan – you can choose to opt in to the Subscription plan at any time you like.

ALTERNATIVES TO Act!?

I’ve written 13 books on various CRM products and am available to help you decide which product is the best fit for your company. However, I still feel that dollar for dollar Act! represents the best value in the CRM arena. In fact, if you normally upgrade your version of Act! every other year the pricing has actually gotten lower for you – and now includes technical support!

As an Act Certified Consultant you can count on me in the coming weeks to provide you with the any questions you have about this very significant change in the way Premium is being sold. And as most of you already know, I sell Act! at discounted pricing and will continue to get you the best possible pricing for your Act! software.