Outline and document best practices for trials (Support & Sales)
Presently, Support has the power to grant a trial for gitlab.com and self-managed. Some Sales members have access to the license app and can currently generate a trial license for self-managed.
As far as I know, there are no documented guidelines around generating a trial for a customer. I'm concerned that, without guidelines, we end up being too lenient (or maybe too strict) with extending trials. Because trials can come from a sales-assisted lead or a customer asking Support, it's important that there is consistently across Sales and Support.
We need clarity re: the process for generating trials (trial licenses for self-managed). Specifically:
- Should there always be an opportunity in Salesforce before we generate a trial (license)?
- Are there limits on how long we should extend a trail (license)?
- Are there limits on how many users we can generate a trial (license) for?
- Are there limits on how many trials we can generate for an account (similar to how long, but takes plan type into account)?
- Are there any differences in process/guidelines between trials for .com and trials for self-managed?
- What about extending an expired trial? Should this be treated as a new opportunity?
- What about users requesting an extension? Should they be referred to Sales? Is there a threshold for sales referrals? e.g. X number of users? In case it's not referred to sales, should we refuse?
And 1. Should Sales have access and be able to generate licenses for customers? This question is perhaps a discussion for another issue. It was sparked by this slack thread and the fact that I see trial licenses being incorrectly generated.
If there are additional questions we need to answer around trials, please add them and let's get these guidelines fleshed out.