It's almost too simple to work.
There’s a growing trend among the early-to-relatively-early adopters in my community: we’re actually paying to use web and mobile apps.
Personally, I pay a monthly fee to use Github for source control and distribution on my code projects, and pay a monthly fee to Bluehost to keep some of my Wordpress-powered blogs running.
While paying for web hosting might seem like an old animal (it seems to be one of the few business models to not have reverted to free for whatever reason), it now comes in new forms, as I pay to use Amazon Web Services on a per-use basis as well.
My girlfriend has recently embraced another freemium web service, paying a nominal annual fee to host her Flickr stream.
And these are just the web applications I currently pay to use. Over the years I’ve paid to use 37 Signals’ Basecamp and several others. Which brings us back again to the mobile web.
While I force myself to be far more frugal with my App Store purchases than I know I could be, glancing through my phone right now, I have paid to use Bloom, FakeCalls, GL Golf, RJDJ, Word Party, Ocarina, Slate Poll Tracker, CityTransit NYC Subway, MovieMaker, and several others that have since been removed my phone.
Considering the fact that I’ve been using the web for about twelve years and have only had my iPhone for about a month, there is one clear assumption that can be made: there is a great revenue opportunity for mobile developers and it comes in the form of paid applications.
But something even more important is percolating to the surface: early adopters are paying to use web and mobile applications more and more over time.
At least in the early adopter community, this means the idea of actually paying real money to use software is no longer foreign. Applications aren’t assumed to be free just because they’re web-based.
And while this might come as no surprise in the world of early adopters, think for a second of what this means to the public at large. In two or three years, will it really seem so crazy to see your users as customers (and charge them money to use your application)?
The trend’s already there, and I’ll put down my 99 cents that paid applications will have a much more natural fit to the tech ecosystem in a few years.
So what does this mean for development teams and startups? Don’t be afraid to charge your customers. Provide great software and give great support. It might seem strange now but it won’t soon enough, so why not start turning revenue now? There’s no time like the present.
And, just for the hell of it, here’s a list of web applications I would happily pay to use (if the companies would simply let me):
- Heroku
- Gmail / Google Docs / App Engine
- Myspace (with ecommerce)
Further reading:
A radical business plan for Facebook - Slate
Essential viewing:
David Heinemeier Hanson Startup School The Secret To Making Money Online
