Wunderlist has been a to-do and GTD app staple since its launch back in 2010, but 6Wunderkinder, the company behind it, has always given away its products free of charge, free of advertising and available across a variety of platforms. Now, the Berlin-based startup is debuting its first efforts at monetization with Wunderlist Pro, a new premium subscription option open to all Wunderlist users.
This first version of Wunderlist Pro is essentially the addition of one new feature, which 6Wunderkinder CEO Christian Reber says was far and away the top requested one being asked for by Wunderlist users. Wunderlist Pro’s flagship addition is the ability to assign tasks to specific colleagues and friends, making for easier delegation across a team of Wunderlist users. Also available on the $4.99 per month (or $49.99 if you commit to a full year) plan is the ability to set unlimited subtasks for any single task, and a selection of eight new in-app backgrounds.
“Our goal was to start really simple, and to deliver the most-requested feature, and the feature we’re working on now is files, which will come in the next update of Wunderlist Pro, hopefully at the end of May,” Reber said. “And then we will improve it step-by-step and add new features.”
Essentially, Reber says that this first release of Wunderlist Pro is a way to introduce the concept to its existing users, and the startup expects that initially at least, it will mostly appeal to the company’s superfans and power users, those who have in some cases been seeking ways to pay Wunderkind for its existing services already. The startup learned a valuable lesson from trying to do too much too soon when it originally launched using cross-platform development tools, and then later had to make the tough decision to switch to native apps for each type of device on which it appears.
This time around, 6Wunderkinder intends to focus on each new Wunderlist Pro feature and stagger their release, which should see the introduction of around three or four new Pro-specific updates over the coming months. The pricing won’t change, however: all new Pro features will be available to those who sign up at the current rate. Eventually, features will start to help Wunderlist target SMB and enterprise customers, as it looks to become more of an Asana competitor. Reber admits that brings new challenges, but also thinks Wunderlist’s existing success will help with that.
“Our advantage is definitely that we launched this with a large user base, and probably a much larger user base than most of our competitors have,” he said. “But still it’s a challenge to convince people that Wunderlist is really not just a to-do app. At the moment, all our challenges are technical, I think, and in the long-term we’ll see how we can grow in enterprises and adapt to meet their requirements.”
Basic Wunderlist users don’t have to worry about being ignored, either, Reber says, as development resources will continue to be fed into the free product. The next few updates will focus on Pro, just to get that offering caught up, but after that, updates should arrive with improvements to both sides of the business. Wunderlist Pro is available on iPhone, iPad, Mac and the web, with Android and Windows versions to follow shortly.
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