When we were designing Opsicom's pricing model, per-seat pricing was the obvious choice. It's what everyone does. Investors understand it. Accountants like it. The predictable revenue-per-user math is clean.
We chose not to do it. Here is why.
How creative teams actually work
Most SaaS businesses were designed around companies with stable, predictable headcounts. You have 50 employees, you pay for 50 seats. Clean.
Creative businesses do not work that way. A production studio might have four full-time operators and 12 contractors who rotate in and out depending on volume. A marketing agency brings in freelance editors for production-heavy months and drops them after. A content studio might have a core team of three and a rotating cast of 20 contributors.
Per-seat pricing creates a perverse incentive: the software gets more expensive exactly when you need it most. When you are scaling up for a busy period, you are also paying more for every tool that charges per user. When you want to invite a new contractor into the system so they can see their jobs and confirm their schedule, you are also being charged for the privilege.
The access problem
There is a subtler problem with per-seat pricing: it creates artificial access gates.
When adding a user costs money, teams start making decisions about who actually gets access to the operational system. The editor who only needs to see their assigned jobs doesn't get a seat. The part-time admin who handles client communication doesn't get a seat. The senior contractor who needs to confirm their schedule has to go through someone else to see what they're booked for.
All of those workarounds create friction. You end up managing access in a spreadsheet, forwarding schedules via email, and doing manual work that the software was supposed to eliminate.
What we charge instead
Opsicom uses a credit model alongside a flat plan tier. The plan determines your storage, your included monthly credits, and your feature access. Credits are consumed when you use AI-powered or high-value actions - social post generation, Opsy AI sessions, bulk exports and delivery packages.
Core features - job management, scheduling, client portals, invoicing - are always available and never cost credits. You can add as many users as you need without the bill changing.
Every Opsicom plan - Starter at $49/month through Business at $349/month - includes unlimited users. No per-seat charge. No artificial access gates.
What this means in practice
A studio on the Professional plan at $149/month can add their full crew, their admin team, their editor and any contractors they work with - all for the same price. A Business plan at $349/month works the same way, even at 50 or 100 team members.
Compare that to a per-seat tool at $30/user. At 10 users you are paying $300/month. At 20 users you are paying $600/month. At 30 users you are at $900/month. The tool doesn't do more for you at 30 seats than it did at 10 - you are just paying for access.
The trade-off
We are not pretending the credit model has no trade-offs. If your team runs heavy AI workflows - lots of Opsy AI sessions, high social publishing volume, frequent bulk exports - you will need to top up credits. We built the top-up packs to be fair: 100 credits for $12, 500 for $50, 1,000 for $80.
But the floor stays flat. The bill for your 20-person team does not grow just because you added person 21.
* All prices quoted in this post are in Australian dollars (AUD) and were accurate at the time of publishing. Current pricing - including pricing in NZD, GBP, USD and CAD - is available on the Opsicom pricing page.