Event Marketing Platforms

Eventbrite

• Eventbrite is a self-service ticketing platform founded in 2006 that is headquartered in San Francisco, California. The company provided services for 4.7 million events in 180 countries during 2019 for over 949,000 event creators.
• Eventbrite is ranked as the number one company in the event management market share category by Datanyze. The company is estimated to have a market share of 61.98%.
• Responding to a global event market severely impacted by the restrictions imposed to curtail the COVID-19 pandemic, Eventbrite CDEO Julia Hartz announced a 45% workforce cut in April 2020. The job cuts were expected to reduce Eventbrite's workforce by an estimated 500 persons from an estimated workforce of 1,000 to 1,100 employees.
• At Eventbrite, developers can use the Eventbrite API to push and pull data from Eventbrite, use webhooks to procure real-time data, customize checkout experiences, and integrate apps or websites.
• A review of both the company and developers' website did not provide any information regarding the total number of developers at the company.

The Eventbrite Business Model

• Eventbrite employs a matchmaker business model, given that the company facilitates interactions and financial transactions between event organizers and attendees, as well as provide products to both attendees and planners that encourage further use of the platform.
• The value proposition to the planners is the facilitation of event planning, promotion, and sales. Resources such as dashboards, reports, templates, and training, are also provided to organizers on event planning.
• The value proposition to the attendee is the ability to view events taking place all over the world.
• Eventbrite operates a freemium pricing model and captures value from the fees it places on each ticket value. Free options are available under each of the three packages, Essentials, Professional, and Premium.
• In the Essentials package which offers one ticket type, the company applies a 2% fee plus $0.79 per paid ticket. For the Professional package, the fee per paid ticket is $1.59 plus 3.5%, while custom pricing is applied in the Premium package. Clients can access unlimited ticket types under the Professional and Premium packages. Total tickets in 2019 amounted to 309 million (65%), of which 109 million (35%) were paid tickets.
• Self-sign on represented 46% of paid ticket volume and 51% of net revenue. Sales activity represented 54% of paid ticket volume and 49% of net revenue. There was a 21% year-on-year increase for self-sign-on ticketing, and 6% for sales generated ticketing.
• In implementing the business model, Eventbrite employed three phases, namely laying the foundation, driving growth, and building a team. The foundation pieces revolved around understanding the customers, developing a succinct value proposition and positioning strategy, evaluating the brand and culture, asking the "why" question, and developing the brand tenets. After settling the foundation for the brand, the company focused driving growth by becoming intimately knowledgeable about key metrics, defined the sales funnel and channels, and developed content marketing.
• In 2006, close to $250,000 in seed funding for Eventbrite was provided by Kevin Hartz. Since formation the company has also accessed seven rounds of funding in December 2008 ($1.5 million), October 2009 ($1.1 million), November 2009 ($8.7 million), October 2010 ($20.1 million), May 2011 ($50 million), April 2013 ($60 million), and September 2017 ($134 million).
• Funding has been used by Eventbrite to increase the rate of international growth, mobile use, event discovery and innovation, and to attract and retain talent.
• Eventbrite has also received $1.5 million to service debt in December 2008 and $60 million in private equity in March 2014. On 11 May 2020, Eventbrite received financing for up to $225 million in term loans from Francisco Partners. The funding will be used to bolster liquidity at the company and to give the company flexibility as it navigates COVID-19 recovery scenarios.
• Eventbrite believes that a desire to reconnect with, and reinforce, the human connection, a preference for smaller, local events as opposed to mass gatherings and traveling, and flexible business supporting creators, are trends that will benefit the company, post COVID-19.
• To ensure that it benefits from these trends, the company targets the handing over of more control to clients with an easier to use product that features more attractive pricing, an improved CX experience, and making available more tools to clients to create more efficient events. Frequent creators will be able to access more advanced permissioning, easier organization for multi-event creators, and increased data and insights on the platform.

Cvent

• Cvent is a provider of events, meetings, and hospitality management services. The company was founded in 1999 by Reggie Aggarwal and is headquartered in Tysons Corner, Virginia. The company has approximately 4,000 employees globally, and provides services to over 30,000 customers and over 268,000 hotels and venues.
• Cvent is ranked at number three in the event management category on Datanyze with a market share of 3.30%.
• The Cvent API platform is built around the RESTful APIs. The RESTful APIs is protected with 0Auth2 and uses a JSON-encoded request and response format, together with HTTP codes, in processing the status of requests received. A search of both the company and developer websites for Cvent did not provide any publicly available information regarding the total number of developers on the platform.

The Cvent Business Model

• Cvent pivoted to a SaaS platform and a matchmaker business model in 2001. The company offers a platform for event and meeting planners to budget, plan, source venues, market to, manage (event and attendee) and measure meetings. The Cvent Supplier Network offers an online marketplace that connects hotels and venues with event and meeting planners.
• The value proposition to event and meeting planners is the ability to increase attendance at events, increase efficiency, reduce costs, and to enhance the return on investment.
• The value proposition of the Cvent Supplier Network to hotels and venues is the prospect of increased revenue, enhanced marketing targeting, improved productivity, efficiency, and analysis of operational factors.
•  Services are offered in an Event Cloud and a Hospitality Cloud hosted on Amazon Web Services. Automation of the solutions offered in the Event Cloud allows the company hosting the event gains insights that can be used to enhance marketing efforts.
• The Hospitality Cloud applies machine learning and artificial intelligence in a lead generation tool that assists with the prioritizing, evaluating, and routing of request for proposals (RFPs). Cvent estimated that it would process an estimated 25 million RFPs in 2019.
• Cvent operates a subscription pricing model. The company states on its website that pricing for solutions is variable and based on the addition of advanced features to the platform and annual registration volume. Mobile apps are priced per event.
• Cvent's business model has allowed it to integrate company products and offerings directly with large, complementary technology providers such as Marketo, Concur, and Salesforce. The company added to its capabilities significantly with the 13 acquisitions it made between 2012 and 2019. Acquired products are integrated into the Cvent offering without losing the original brand name.
• The company has received nine rounds of funding totaling $146.9 million. In 2011, the company received $136 million in investments from New Enterprise Associates and Insight Venture Partners. The company indicated at the time that the money would have been used to hire over 200 new employees, primarily engineers, to enhance the company's capabilities as it moved to a SaaS model, evolve and improve mobile, social media, and web offerings, and to accelerate growth at Cvent Supplier Network.

Marketing Platforms

Hubspot

• Hubspot was founded in 2005 by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah. The company is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts and employs over 3,700 employees at its ten global offices. The company has over 86,000 customers, operates in more than 120 countries, has over 150 user groups in 21 countries, and has over 276,000 inbound professionals trained and certified.
• Hubspot has a market share of 20%, and offers its services on both a B2B and B2C basis. The company offers over 500 integrations.
•  Developers are offered the opportunity to build an app, create custom integrations, and build websites. The App Marketplace at Hubspot offers developers the opportunity to tap into the 94% of Hubspot's customers that use apps for business growth, while scaling and security is handled by the CMS facility, removing the burden from the developer. Finally, the documentation, developer tools, training, community forums, and a support team provides developers with an enabling environment to support building apps and websites.

The Hubspot Business Model

• Initially a marketing app, Hubspot evolved into a SaaS/Customer Relationship Management (CMS) platform that offers a marketing, sales, services, and CMS hub.
• The value proposition offered by Hubspot's marketing hub is the ability to increase traffic and to execute inbound marketing campaigns at scale that convert more visitors to the customer's website. The sales hub provides the CRM software that automates tasks, creates insights that delve deeper into the needs of prospects resulting in the completion of the sale much faster.
• For Hubspot's clients, the service hub provides software that facilitates interactions with customers that exceed expectation, thus tuning those customers into evangelicals for the business. Finally, the CMS hub provides flexibility for marketers, a powerful tool for developers, and a secure, personalized experience for customers.
• The company has adopted a business model that it terms the Flywheel. In the Flywheel model, momentum is built when strategies acquire and retain customers. Friction that slows down the flywheel occurs during hand offs between teams. Hence, the grease that keeps the flywheel spinning is efficient team alignment and communication.
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• Applied to the inbound methodology, service, sales, and marketing functions add force to the wheel and reduces or eliminates friction in the attract, engage, and delight phases.
• Hubspot's CRM tool is offered free, and is the instrument used by the company to attract more customers. Revenue is derived from the sale of software, in the app marketplace, or from consulting, on a subscription basis.
• Product packages are offered in Starter, Professional, and Enterprise packages. CRM services are offered free across the board, pricing in the Starter package begins at $50 for the marketing, sales, and service hubs. Professional packages in the marketing hub begins at $800, at $500 in the sales hub, and $400 in the service hub, and $300 in the new CMS hub. Enterprise packages begin at $3,200 in the marketing hub, $1,200 in the sales and the services' hub, and $900 for the CMS hub.
• Hubspot has received six rounds of funding totaling $100.5 million. Seed funding was $500,000, Series A funding in September 2007 totaled $5 million. Series B funding totalling$12 million was used to support hiring of sales and product staff, Series C funding totaling $16 million was used for R&D purposes targeted at making the company product easier and more powerful to use, as well as to promote efficiency for users.
• Series D funding in the amount of $32 million was also used for R&D purposes to improve speed and overall capabilities for the application and to begin the move of the product into a platform from the development of an API. Series E funding totaling $35 million was used for hiring, acquisitions, and to increase the rate of international growth.

MailChimp

• MailChimp was founded in 2001 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. The company has an estimated 1,174 employees as at October 2020, over 12 million active customers, 5.5 million multichannel campaigns sent by customers, and just under 11,000 new users joining on a daily basis.
• MailChimp is ranked at number one in the email marketing market share report by Datanyze with a market share of 68.89%.
• The developer website offers marketing and transactional APIS. The marketing APIs facilitates the pulling of custom data from an app into MailChimp. Developers can use data to create and manage audiences, use tags and segmentation to organize contacts, use the codebase to schedule and send campaigns at scale, and initiate automated campaigns rooted in behavioral events.
• The transactional API allows developers to push targeted and event driven emails to individual and e-commerce customers. Webhooks are used to pull events int an app, activity emanating from a single email or trends discerned from multiple sends can be viewed, inbound emails can be received, parsed and routed back to the developer app, and branded links can be used to click tracking and sub accounts. A search of the company and developer website did not provide the number of developers using the MailChimp platform.

The Mailchimp Business Model

• MailChimp's provides an all-in-one marketing platform for small businesses. It operates in a non-differentiated mass market business model. The nature of the product the company offers makes it useful for all companies, across all industries. However, the freemium pricing model the company operates, is attractive to small businesses.
• The value proposition offered by the company to its customers is accessibility, convenience, risk reduction, and brand/status. Customers can use a platform that offers personalization options that is easily adaptable to a unique style. A simple, easy to use format that deploys automation features to ensure communication sent at the right time to the right person, along with template and collaboration options provides convenience to the customer. Customer risk is addressed and reduced from updates on the platform and support teams.
•  New business is sourced from its business development team, and the product through activities such as sponsorships, and on its website, social media accounts, and via an e-mail newsletter containing case studies, marketing tips, and best practices. Customers interact with the company primarily via its platform.
•  Integrations at MailChimp are provided by partners in eCommerce, CRM, Social, and Word Press categories.
• Operational costs are minimized in a cost-driven structure aimed at utilizing automation and low-price value propositions. Revenue is generated from subscription fees for the marketing and transactional products.
• Products on the marketing platform is offered in Free, Essential, Standard, and Premium packages. The Essential package begins at $9.99 monthly, the Standard package at $14.99, and the Premium package at $299.00 monthly.
• Pricing for transactional emails are offered in blocks priced on a reducing scale as the number of blocks increase. A package with 1 to 20 blocks is offered at $20 per block, while the packages with more than 161 blocks are offered at $10 per block.
• When MailChimp switched to a freemium pricing plan in 2009, the inclusion of the hyperlinked image of Freddie, the brand mascot, at the base of user emails helped to drive traffics to the company website while adding value to the MailChimp client in the form of "MonkeyRewards Credits".
• Within one year this move had increased the user base from 85,000 in September 2009, to 450,000 in September 2010. Each month 30,000 free, and 4,000 paid, users were added each month. Profit increased by 650%.
• MailChimp has not accessed funding from external sources.

Adobe

• Adobe was founded in 1982 and is headquartered in San Jose, California. The company has over 22,000 employees globally. Company apps have been downloaded over 376 million times, electronic and digital signature transactions exceeded 8 billion in 2019, and the company has been named as an industry leader in close to 30 categories.
• Adobe is ranked second in the marketing automation category by Datanyze. The company has a market share of 11.35%.
• There are more than 350,000 developers working with the Adobe Experience Cloud along with close to 13,000 partners.
•  Developers can access APIs to manage project, assign credential, view analytics, and access APIs. Project Firefly is available for developers to build and deploy custom web apps, Create XD plugins allow developers to add new features to Adobe XD, and cloud-based APIs allow for the embedded viewing and manipulation of PDF s. Developers can build on the Adobe Experience Platform, and use the document cloud view SDK, Adobe I/O Runtime, Analytics API, Stock API, Photoshop API, Sign API, I/O events and Creative Cloud.

The Adobe Business Model

•  Adobe products are the Adobe Creative Cloud, Adobe Document Cloud, and Adobe Experience Cloud.
• The value proposition offered to potential customers are accessibility, innovation, and brand/status. Accessibility is created from the multiplicity of options available for use by customers. The company was the innovator of Display PostScript, the language that initiated communication with a screen rather than through a printer. The Adobe brand is one of the most recognizable globally.
• Sales is generated both from a sale force and directly from the company website, and customer relationships are primarily personal in nature and effected from the delivery of consulting services, customer relationship management, technical support, and training services. Customers are also afforded self-service options for training. The company has partner programs for enterprises, resellers, training, and for creatives.
• The key resource for Adobe is its human resources given that the primary product is software. Adobe has adopted a value-driven structure, with the main drivers being the provision of personalized services to customers, frequent product enhancements, ongoing R&D, fixed costs, and cost of revenues.
• Prior to 2013, Adobe's pricing model relied on one-time purchases of software, and additional income from the same product was available from versioning its products. Using this pricing structure did not allow the company to profit from minor upgrade, as the buying incentive for the customer would only exist when the product offered substantial improvements to what they already had.
• In 2012, Adobe began to offer its Creative Cloud solution on a subscription basis, and switched all its products to subscription pricing. Although less than a perpetual license, the subscription model offered Adobe the opportunity to increase its customer base and increase the lifetime of the products with customers with an affordable entry point.
• Adobe received $2.5 million in funding in 1984.

Business Communication Platforms

Slack

• Founded in 2014, Slack is headquartered in San Francisco and has an estimated 2.045 employees. The company has over 12 million daily users, over 119,000 paid customers, including 65 of the Fortune 100 companies, in more than 150 countries.
• Slack is ranked third in the Datanyze market share category of team collaboration with a market share of 4.68%.
• The Slack API site offers an introduction to the Slack app, along with information on how to plan, design, and build out the app. Books are available for download on building out the app and the best practices being used in designing the Slack experience. Actions that can be taken with the app include sending messages, automating workflows, setting up internal tools, and publishing the app.
• Slack has an estimated 600,000 daily active registered developers on its platform.

The Slack Business Model

•  Slack is a collaboration hub that develops, maintains, and sells software as a service. It provides solutions for remote work, distance learning, engineering, financial services, sales, IT, Marketing Customer support, human resources, project management, and media. Teams in all companies that frequently require collaboration on team projects are enabled to work together within internal channels and with teams in other companies using Slack Connect, messaging and voice and video call services.
• Aside from the value delivered from being able to collaborates across and within distributed teams, Slack users can test the efficacy of the product for their business in the free version before purchase. When purchased, the pricing model for the product applies charges for the actual number of users, rather than for a block.
• Access to the product is provided directly on the website, and account management services, along with technical assistance is provided by sales and support teams. Customer relationships are managed using a self-service model, with customization options driven by user development of fit-for-purpose integrations.
• To deliver this product, Slack partners with developers, and third-party productivity and enterprise service providers. The company's key resources are its personnel, its IT infrastructure, the software platform, and its API.
• Costs at Slack are incurred from the development and maintenance of the software platform, retaining its R&D teams and its sales and marketing teams, and from the management of various partnerships.
• Slack operates a freemium pricing model. Paid-for packages are available in Standard, Plus, and Enterprise Grid versions. Billing can be applied monthly or annually, and is $6.67 for the Standard package and $12.50 for the Plus package. Pricing for the Enterprise Gird is available from the Slack sales team.
• To date, Slack has raised $1.3 billion from 12 funding rounds. Growth at the company began when networking was leveraged to generate interest in the product while it was still in its beta phase. Once product was at a point to be presented to the public, a press announcement invited persons to request an invitation to test the product. This activity generated 60,000 daily users and 15,000 paid users within months and was enough to help the company raise $42.8 million in Series C funding.
• Factors contributing to the growth of Slack centered around prioritizing and perfecting the user experience, creating a UI/UX that was simple and easy to use, and it's pricing strategy.

Zoom

• Zoom was founded in 2011 by Eric Yuan. The company is headquartered in San Jose, California and employs more than 2,000 persons.
• Zoom is ranked number one in the Web Conferencing market share category with a market share of 36.22%.
• Developers have access to the Zoom App Marketplace, an open platform that allows for the development of applications and integrations upon the video-first unified communications platform. Developers can leverage SDKs, webhooks, and APIs to create customized applications for a collaboration suite.
• Publicly available information regarding the number of developers using the Zoom App Marketplace was not found on either the company website or the app marketplace.

The Zoom Business Model

•  Zoom facilitates team collaboration on a cloud platform for chat runs, content sharing, voice, and video across room systems, telephones, desktops, and mobile devices.
• The company deploys a mass market business model to bring its products to organizations of different sizes and industries.
• The value proposition is three-pronged, offering brand/status, accessibility, and performance to its customers. Accessibility is created from the myriad options such as conference room features, online meetings, video conferencing, and group messaging, that are offered to customers.
• Zoom's product has engendered results for its users, resulting in productivity increases by 20-39% and savings of $25,000 annually. Respondents to a survey overwhelmingly said the Zoom solution was easier to use, a better quality, more reliable, and resulted in productivity enhancements exceeding 40%.
• Zoom gets new business primarily from its website, as well as from a direct sales team. The products are promoted via webinar, live demos, participation in symposiums and conferences, and social media. The customer relationship is primarily self-service.
• Primary partnerships for Zoom are related to integration, technology, resellers, and from the refer-a-friend option. Integration partners work in content sharing, unified login, room collaboration, meeting scheduling and starting, and marketing/Process automation. Technology partners are manufacturers, vendors, and application providers.
• Engineering, support, and customer service staff are the key resources for Zoom. The company has a cost-driven cost structure, with the reduction of expenses a primary result sought from automation and low-price value propositions.
• Zoom operates a subscription model for its pricing. The Basic plan is offered free, while the Pro, Business, and Enterprise plans are offered at $149.90 for the Pro and $199.90 for both the Business and Enterprise plans.
• To date Zoom has received $145.5 million in funding. Funding has been used to expand globally, scale sales and marketing teams, increase product growth and innovation, and to offer a broader set of features for the education and healthcare industries.

Workflow Automation Platforms

Microsoft

• Microsoft was founded in 1975, and is headquartered in Redmond, Washington. The company has 166,175 employees, of which 58.5% are in engineering.
• Microsoft leads the Software as a Service (SaaS) market with a market share of 17%.
• Developers on Microsoft Developer can access the .Net, GitHub, Visual Studio, Azure, Microsoft 365, and Power Apps products to build applications for use on the web, mobile devices, and in Windows apps, AI, Bots, machine learning, games, IoT, and Quantum products.
• A search of the Microsoft company and developer websites did not yield any information regarding the number of developers that use the Developer platform, an article from April 2020 references a total of 47,000 developers on the platform. The figure was taken from a quote by Scott Christiansen, a senior security program manager at Microsoft.

The Microsoft Business Model

• Microsoft's product and services portfolio is very diversified and serves the needs of a range of commercial and general consumers. End users and businesses are offered software and cloud computing solutions in the Office 360 productivity suite, while consulting services, IT support, and server management is targeted at corporate clients. Products and services for the mobile phones and video game platforms targets the mass market.
• Microsoft is the market leader in the provision of software solutions that can be synced across multiple platforms. The compatibility of the Microsoft suite of products and service provides a powerful incentive for prospective users.
• The products and services are available online, while consulting and customer support services are available from interactions with the sales and marketing teams. The nature of these products dictates the level of engagement between customers and the company. Software and hardware products are primarily self-service, while productivity products for enterprises require a more personal interaction.
•  Key partners for Microsoft are companies operating in internet hosting, data management, data analytic, telecommunications, digital advertising, distribution, app development, marketing, systems, and integration. Authorized resellers and software vendors are also important partners for the company.
• Important resources for Microsoft are its intellectual property for the proprietary technologies it has developed, its personnel, and its founder, who is viewed as an industry leader.
•  Revenue is derived primarily from the productivity and business processes, intelligent cloud, and from personal computing products.

Google

• Founded in 1998, Google is headquartered in Mountain View, California. In April 2019, the company had 103,549 employees.
• Google dominated the search engine market segment, with a leading market share of 92.26%. 

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• Google Developers offers developers to build anything on the Android, Google Cloud, Maps platform, YouTube, and for Google Ad, among others. Information regarding the number of developers on the platform was not publicly available on the company or developer website.

The Google Business Model

•  Customer segments for Google are enterprises, developers, advertisers, mobile users, and internet users.
• The value proposition offered to prospective internet users is the use of a search engine regarded as the best in the market, for advertisers it offers a product that has high rates of user interactivity, and a for developers it offers a platform for the sale of their apps.
• A key channel for the company is its search engine websites, which are customized for most countries, however the company can also offer its services via the Android phone platform, YouTube, Gmail, and similar company products.
•  Customer relationships with regular users is automated, however for the larger business clients, there is a sales team to service their needs. The company maintains key partnerships with distribution partners, mobile phone manufacturers, payment processors, and websites using the AdSense product.
• The PageRank algorithm has been joined by a number of additional algorithms that are key resources for the company. Software and IT architecture, such as the massive data centers, are important to the daily functioning of the company. The company has developed brand recognition to the point that it is now a key asset of the company.
•  Costs for the company emanate from the operational costs of running the IT architecture to support Googles core businesses, investments to maintain technical currency and capability, and the payment of Traffic Acquisition Costs are also key components of Google's cost structure.
• The primary revenue stream for Google is from advertising, which contributed the bulk of its revenue in 2019.n

Data Analytics Platform

SurveyMonkey

• SurveyMonkey was founded in 1999, and is headquartered in San Mateo, California.
• The company is ranked at number two in Datanyze's customer feedback management category, with a market share of 17.06%.
• The SurveyMonkey API is available for the use of developers to customize apps, automate data, and engage with customers. Based on REST, the API employs OAuth 2.0 and returns responses in JSON. Information regarding the total number of developers using the developer platform at SurveyMonkey was not publicly available on the company or developer website.

The SurveyMonkey Business Model

• SurveyMonkey's business model is segmented to meet the variations of needs by customers with different requirements. Customer can be classed as either non-enterprise or enterprise.
• The value proposition offered to the customer is an accessible product that is custom-made from a brand that is a leader in its market segment. Accessibility emanates from a product that is simple to use, and which offers results in real-time.
•  Customization of the product is offered from the wide variety of survey templates covering a multitude of industries, offered by a brand that is a leader in the field,
• The SurveyMonkey website serves as its main sales channel and marketplace. Customers can access the product via its mobile app, and support and customer service are provided either through email or phone.
•  Partners are mainly from third-party providers of apps and widgets, and key resources for the company are its software platform and its human resources. The company has a cost-driven structure, where expenses are minimized from automation and low-price value propositions.
• SurveyMonkey has adopted a freemium pricing model wherein the basic plan is offered free, the Standard Monthly plan begins at $35 a month, the Standard Annual plan is billed at $31 a month, billed annually, the Advantage plan costs $34 monthly, billed annually, the Team Advantage plan costs $25 a month, per user, billed annually, and the Team Premier plan costs $75 a month, per user, billed annually.

Web Content Platform

Shopify

• The Shopify platform began operations in 2006, and now has merchants from 175 countries. Headquartered in Ottawa, Canada, the company has over 5,000 employees, more than one million merchants, and total sales in excess of $200 billion.
• Shopify is ranked third in the eCommerce platforms category on Datanyze, with a market share of 12.32%.
• Top developers on the Shopify platform can earn as much as $272, 000 annually. Payouts to developers has increased from $3.9 million in 2014 to $90.8 million in 2018. Developers can build apps for Shopify admin, for custom storefronts, and embedded apps. There is no publicly available information on both the company, and developer, websites regarding the total number of developers using the Shopify developer platform

The Shopify Business Model

• Shopify provides ecommerce solutions for independent and commercial retailers.
• The value proposition provided by the company from its brand reputation and identity, the accessibility and ease of use for the product, its innovative proprietary technology, the cost effective nature of the product, and the functionality of the platform.
•  Sales channels for Shopify are its website, the ecommerce platform, and the mobile app. Customer relationships are serviced primarily through its self-service business with constant support, and customer service provided by phone, email, or via the online chat service. Customers can also interact with the company via its community forums.
•  Key partners for Shopify can be organized into supplier and vendor, development and integration, affiliate and marketing, and strategic and alliance partners. Key resources are the technology and intellectual properties of the platform, the IT and communication infrastructure, the partner network, the R&D facilities, and the personnel.
• Shopify's costs are incurred from technology development and platform maintenance for the IT and communications infrastructure, procurement of services, management of partnerships, implementation of advertising and marketing campaigns, and personnel retention.
• Revenue is generated when ecommerce solutions are provided to small and medium-sized businesses via the online ecommerce platform. The pricing model adopted is a subscription model with packages offered in Basic Shopify, Shopify, and Advanced Shopify packages.
• The Basic Shopify package is offered with a starting price of $29 monthly, the Shopify package is offered at a price of $79 monthly, and the Advanced Shopify is offered at a price of $299 monthly.

Project Management Platform

Dropbox

• Dropbox was founded in 2007, and is headquartered in San Francisco, California. Dropbox has an estimated 600 million registered users from 180 countries.
• Dropbox is ranked second in the file sharing market share category with a market share of 12.05%.
•  Developers can use the Dropbox platform to build application with Dropbox. SDKs are offered for several programming languages, and embedded components are offered to enable developers to select, save, or embed content from Dropbox. There are 500,000 developers using the Dropbox platform.

The Dropbox Business Model

• Dropbox provides cloud storage and file sharing solutions to both general and commercial entities, The company's target audience are individuals, small businesses, and enterprises.
•  Value is provided to customers of Dropbox from the reliability and quality of the solution, the company's reputation and standing in the industry, the security and privacy control offered with the product, support from specialist technical personnel, and the accessibility of the solutions.
• Dropbox conducts sales primarily through its website and from an internal sales team. Customer relationships are effected from a self -service basis, and from the internal sales team for enterprise solutions. All customers receive technical support.
•  Key partners for Dropbox are its channel partners such as consulting firms, websites and independent software vendors, technology partners such as technology companies and software developers, and its strategic and alliance partners.
•  Key resources for the company are its technical and intellectual properties, the IT and communication infrastructure, partnerships, the sales and distribution channel, personnel, and the online and mobile platforms. Revenue is generated from cloud storage and file sharing.