The profit model associated with path by Passbook

Path in June this year, the number of users has exceeded 3 million, compared to the path 2.0 just launched when the number of users soared, the result is good, say bad. After all, this is an application that is positioned on a private social network, and its positioning determines how fast it can grow faster than the social networking leader Facebook and the new Instagram.

Path can be in the midst of the fierce competition of social networking sites to settle down, it is not easy to investigate its fundamental, or deep cultivation.

As we all know, Path 2.0 attracts countless fans with its unique UI design. As the iphone and Android phones become popular around the world, the UI design used in large touchscreen handsets has not had an impact on innovation. Path 2.0 appears as if the spring breeze is blowing, let people praise. When the user is using path, it feels very comfortable and natural, as if browsing through a beautifully crafted diary, which records the lives of himself and his friends. It is this comfortable, natural user experience that keeps the path at a high level of user activity.

After accumulating enough user activity and loyalty, path is the time to start thinking about how to make a profit out of this platform. While path holds the idea that everything is centered on the user experience, path cannot continue to be outstanding if the company is not consistently profitable. The founder and CEO of Path, Dave Morin, has expressed reluctance to implant ads in path at the expense of the user experience, so the business model on the platform of Path must innovate.

First, let's analyze the current profit model for path:

Sell Filters

The most used feature on path is photo sharing, and when you publish your photos to path, you can choose to add filters to render the photos different. There are 7 free filters and 5 toll filters on the path, with a charge of 0.99 USD (6 RMB) per charge filter. Filters are an important source of revenue, but because of the limited number of users and the speed of growth, this revenue is equally limited. In the future, filters can only be a small proportion of income.

Cooperation with Nike

In March this year, PATH announced a partnership with Nike, which allows users to NIKE+GPS running data and running routes to the path and share them with friends. In fact, shortly after the launch of Path 2.0, Dave Morin the ability to record fitness data. However, no one would have thought that path would work with Nike, and that a feature of the product would work seamlessly with a giant company, and that it would naturally be embedded in the application, and that the effect of the integration was truly stunning! It can be said that such cooperation is an absolute win.

Apple's users are not hard to find, the iphone has built-in nike+ipod functionality that enables the iphone to sync with the sensors in the Nike running shoes.

Nike as the world's leading sporting goods brand, the ability to absorb gold naturally is beyond doubt, to work with companies such as Nike may be the dream of every internet company. Path can be in the 2.0 release only three months after the cooperation with Nike, visible early preparation of the full and user experience design capabilities.

Nike, as an industry leader, also attaches great importance to product design and user experience, and can identify and work with path, which in itself affirms the potential business value of the path platform. Although the amount of revenue that the two partners bring to the path is unknown, it is certain that the number will never be low and that the value added to the brand for path will be very impressive.

Nike launched a comprehensive unit of measurement--nike Fuel in January this year and has added this unit to the recently updated NIKE+GPS 4.0 version, which is believed to be on the path soon, allowing path users to share standardized personal data with their friends.

Looking back at the current profitability model of path, we can see that the existing two paths, while not bringing huge cash flows, are at least stable. In order to analyze the potential profit model and ability of path objectively, we must first define the concept of path. Like other great companies, path puts the user experience first, and profitability is second. "The second phase of path is to allow people to capture all the experiences on the path of life," Dave Morin in the Path 2.0 release. This sentence is full of meaning. On the one hand, path's vision is to accompany the user life, record this process the wonderful dribs and drabs; On the other hand, path attaches great importance to the actual experience of the user, and hopes to combine the actual and virtual experience in a unique way, so that path becomes the perfect platform for the user's wonderful Life.

On this year's WWDC, Apple released its own app Passbook, and we can simply generalize about its function as an electronic bill-receiving application, which many media and Apple fans have hailed as another blockbuster for Apple to kill into electronic payments. While praising Passbook, we can also pry out many details from this application, which can also be applied to the path and have the potential to be part of the path's future profit model.

Geo-fence. We know that in iOS geo-fence applications are not a few, such as Apple's own reminder or well-known public comment, and in IOS6, Apple is a fine carving, so that geo-fence shine, There are geo-fence applications from phone to Passbook. And in the path, we are very impressed that every time a user converts between cities, path automatically records the arrival of a city. Imagine the future, we go to a Starbucks, coffee to sit down, open the mobile phone open path, has automatically released a "I at Starbucks xx shop, guess what I ordered today?" "Similarly, when we are on a certain flight, path will automatically release the" I am taking xxxx flight to XX City ", complete this function, also need to path also has two-dimensional code input function. With the help of geo-fence, Path realizes the social functions that passbook does not have.

numeric auto Input service. The service was launched at the beginning of Path 2.0, and Dave Morin, who emphasized that there would be more numeric automatic input services on the path so users could bring more personal data to the path. Hence, this so-called "numerical automatic input Service" will be very well written. Nike+gps has been an example of the personal movement data into the path, what will be next, what do we usually have the cumulative value or data? The points of a shopping mall or café, or the amount of money a Michelin restaurant consumes? The passbook has the function of displaying card account balance, while path as a social tool will naturally not provide the function of revealing personal privacy, how to provide valuable automatic input service, it is also expected in the future.

When we analyze what the path is going to do, we should consider what kind of functionality the user needs and what they would like to share with their best friends. Now the existing features, photo sharing, and who together, location check-in, listening to music, information and sleep status have a certain degree of activity, then what is the existing function of the deficiencies?

In existing functionality, the sleep state is no longer as attractive as it was initially, and gradually abandoned by older users as the path message record increases. Sleep state This function, if it's chicken, path will certainly give up the function that promotes its fame; If you want to enhance this feature, it's just a sleep-quality analysis that automatically draws a sleep-depth icon (as Dream:on provides), which calls for more cell phone sensors. and listening to the music this function, the need for users to record a piece of music is still not convenient, if you can provide a combination of Spotify or Pandora, the automatic sync songs list into the path, I believe it will be a cool feature, but also more realistic to share music with friends.

Path is the best part of the user friend, the user will not want to publish some information to make these friends feel disgusted (such as showing off the nature or really boring content), so the information quality on the path is very important. Path's profit direction will focus on improving the quality of user information All of the features are designed to enable users to better show their lives a wonderful part of life, if through some features can make users more confident, more cordial to show themselves, users will be very willing to pay for such features.

Path is not a Facebook-like public social networking site, unable to earn revenue through hard advertising, and if you can embed ads (or valuable collaborative or activity design) cleverly, believe that an excellent platform such as path can be favored by more loyal users, And this part of the user has a strong consumption capacity, so the platform's advertising value is very considerable, the only question is how to "have affinity" and "like friends interact" the same way to display ads.

Path is also not a company like Tencent, there is no QQ platform to gain revenue through value-added services. Does path require a member or a variety of drilling services to demonstrate its unique status in the virtual network life? Obviously no need, in path, the intimate relationship between the users of mutual concern is a state of equal communication and healthy interaction, and providing similar value-added services only destroys the ecological balance and makes the path deviate from the original values.

Path is a good start-up that goes further than any competitor on a private social network. and return to a problem that every internet company can't escape--the question of profitability, we hope that this excellent company can also have unique, innovative solutions, while maintaining and improving the user experience, we would like to see the company to create a different way to make a difference with other Internet companies in the profit model, In the fast-changing environment of internet competition, keep the spirit of the start-up and the enthusiasm, continue to be the unique leader in the industry to lead other Internet companies to enhance the user experience.

(Responsible editor: Lu Guang)