Best type of monetization?
I'm planning out my app idea, and unsure of the best way to make money. The app divides expenses among friends (that's the simplified version), and I have a few ideas on how to create revenue.
The best one is also the one I'm not sure is viable. My first thought was to ask for a PayPal email address on sign up, then use that to pay friends on the user's behalf (and take a small fee on top). This would be optional, and they could manually pay everyone if they didn't want to pay the fee.
Does this sound viable? If it is, is PayPal the best solution for achieving this?
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I would say trying to take a percentage of a transaction at this stage, especially as you mentioned it’s more of a portfolio piece is probably overly complicated for the returns it would give you. My advice would be make the app free, grow it and see what users want. Then if you have the time and there is a decent demand for new and improved features you could charge for those with a subscription model.
It’s good you are thinking about revenue at this stage, it’s more than most unicorns. But launch first then you can explore revenue options as you show you once you have figured out value of what you are building.
I completely agree with you. One option to start the validation with adding revenue streams earlier might be to let your users create groups within which they split their expenses but to limit the number of groups. That way, they can try all features and give you feedback, and if they want to use it with more groups and are willing to pay for that, you can validate the value of your product.
I think the App splid is based on a similar concept.
Great advice! I think you’re right, this is the best approach.
Forget the name now but my friends have told me of multiple apps where you can set a cost and everyone pays their share. Been too long since I've seen friends though so I forget. I honestly don't really see a way to really make money on this at scale. Why wouldn't people just use Venmo/Venmo create this themselves?
You are right, I'm using this for a portfolio piece as much as anything. I'm not expecting to earn a lot from this, more to cover database/hosting costs.
The app has a (I believe) unique use case, and user investigation has shown an interest.