How Apps Like WhatsApp, WeChat May Make Money Even while Offering Free Texting And Calling3167033
Ever thought the way a messaging app can make money while providing free texting and calling? WhatsApp users in India could be surprised to learn that there's much more to messaging apps than communicating. Here is how: by providing services like digital payments, online shopping and also content.
China's WeChat is among the ultimate example of the huge opportunity which messaging apps hold. With more than 900 million monthly active users, WeChat helps them do every thing from messaging, purchasing grocery, hailing cabs, buying online food and also offline payments at restaurants - all this without needing to go to another app. These kinds of services not only offer the company incredible customer stickiness, in addition they create a outstanding revenue model.
At the moment, WeChat's rivals outside China this includes WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Skype, Viber as well as Line are behind the curve on this front, although some have started on the path to becoming greater platforms. "The actual reason chat apps are widening beyond communications is to build a lasting monetisation strategy," said Neha Dharia, a senior analyst with a focus on messaging at London-based research firm Ovum. "Chat apps are shifting away from being just a provider of communication tools chat, voice and also video) to becoming a platform for the exchange of services, payment mechanisms and content consumption." WhatsApp, the biggest messaging app on the planet with 1.3 billion every month active users, introduced a business version in India early on this week. "Based on research, we know that people are utilizing WhatsApp to speak to businesses. make business messaging less difficult for people and more efficient for businesses," a WhatsApp spokesman said in respond to ET's questions. Whatsapp Business is a different app from Whatsapp Messenger, aimed mainly at giving a direct communicating platform to smaller businesses, a lot of who might be using WhatsApp already.
Even while Whatsapp has placed the service free, it could extend it to bigger businesses with added features for example analytics, by which it could charge a usage fee at a later stage, thus creating a revenue model, segment watchers said. This actually also is targeted at improving subscriber connect that it can make use of for future monetization of their other services. The larger agenda - and a more important one - for these companies is to get active users to invest a lot more time on the app or services and make it viable for profit generation, according to experts.
"Every single technology company is vying for consumer stickiness, interaction and time spent on the app, and in order to keep them within the app's ecosystem they are broadening themselves to turn into platforms. Simply being messaging apps offering free services will not be a strong revenuegeneration model," said Jayanth Kolla, founding father of Bengaluru-based research firm Convergence Catalyst.
