Trent posted that the accounting app market may be about to turn on itself. Point solutions are creeping into each other's lanes, every partner is about to become a competitor.

My observer take on it is that, for accounting app vendors, the answer traditionally has always been more product. Never less. No wonder the top complaint users have is that the "product is clunky".

Need to fix a low DAU:WAU ratio? The tactical mind thinks more features. To pave the way for a NRR uptick tomorrow, more features today. More roadmap! Usually doing things the product, the team or the business aren't equipped to deliver with quality. Superficially copying what others already know and do well.

That said, more product would be a sane choice if more vendors charged per module, à la HubSpot. 

For example in practice management, one pricing plan for the document management module, another for onboarding, yet another for the CRM, and so on. Old school, I know. That's how the old vendor guard (the on-prem crowd) still does it. Then expanding the product line would actually make sense, because it means clear revenue expansion rather than a 5-10% price hike at the end of the year.

"Hey customer, we have a new meeting manager module. Extra $10 per user per month. You can also keep using it alongside competitor X, Y or Z if you'd rather not sign up for the full suite just yet."

That only works if the module can stand on its own though, which brings us to the real problem. 

So many apps want to think they can become platforms. But there's no platform opportunity for closed APIs and cherry-picked integrations. 

These vendors could potentially do better just focusing on becoming the system of record for their smaller domain, and stop getting in their own way.