There’s a saying in the digital world:
You’re either a paying customer, or else you’re the product.
That means, if you’re dealing with a company, and they are offering you something for free, chances are that they are making money another way. Sometimes that’s obvious, such as the adverts that are interleaved with search results from Google and others. Sometimes it’s far more subtle.
Some websites and apps are genuinely available for free. One of my favourites (for Windows users) is Rick Brewster’s paint.net app, a decent alternative to Photoshop. You can download it at getpaint.net (where you’ll see lots of ads), you can make a donation directly, or you can donate via purchasing it on the Windows store.
Freemium
There’s a loosely defined term, Freemium. The idea is usually that there’s a free basic product (that may have ads), then you pay (usually by a subscription) for more features. Sometimes the free tier offers a lot (Canva is a great example). Sometimes it has decent functionality but it’s hobbled in some way until you start to pay (I’d put Kapwing in this category: one of my favourite low-cost tools in lockdown, but it’s now priced out of my reach).
Free for Non-Profits
Some apps and web services are made available for free to qualifying non-profit organisations. It’s worth thinking about how this works commercially. If the provider is treating this as a donation, then it will likely be associating a value and offsetting this against taxes. How, exactly, this works is between the company and the tax authorities. In these cases, that’s how the business is being paid.
I find this reassuring. If there’s a financial benefit to the provider, I think I can expect decent service. All the services I think of as basic digital infrastructure for churches are available as free-for-non-profit services. But there’s no hard-and-fast rule for what each company means by non-profit. As I introduce different services, I’ll point you in the direction of the qualifying rules. If your church is a UK registered charity, most (perhaps all) free for non-profit services will be available to you. If the tax authorities recognise your non-profit status, some (but not all) doors will open. If neither of these applies, it can still be worth making direct contact with the provider. I’ve been successful on a few occasions persuading companies to change their qualification policies to benefit all churches, and I’ve also sometimes been successful not in changing the policy for others, but just for a single case.
Sometimes the real cost of “free” is the hidden cost of your time.