Según lo describe la Wikipedia, “Fremium” hace referencia a un modelo de negocio según el cual se ofrece una oferta amplia de servicios gratuitos, sostenidos principalmente por publicidad, buscándo captar tráfico y crear una buena base de usuarios, para luego poder ofrecerles servicios de valor añadido.
“The freemium business model was first articulated by venture capitalist Fred Wilson on March 23, 2006:
“Give your service away for free, possibly ad supported but maybe not, acquire a lot of customers very efficiently through word of mouth, referral networks, organic search marketing, etc, then offer premium priced value added services or an enhanced version of your service to your customer base.”
Podemos ver un gran artículo de Katherine Heires, del Magazine “Business 2.0″(sí, creado por Chris Anderson, el mismo de pasadas entradas…)
OFrece “nine tips” para un “Fremium” exitoso:
“How can you make your freemium service soar? Here are nine tips from venture capitalists and entrepreneurs.
1. Have a product or service that truly stands out. Its performance, ease of use, and reliability should be superior to those of current offerings.
2. Know your upselling plan from the beginning. Before you even go into beta, make sure you have at least one paid, add-on premium service up your sleeve. Better yet, have more than one.
3. Once you’ve decided that a product will be given away for free, don’t change your mind. “The fundamental ‘what’s for free’ and ‘what’s for pay’ divide needs to be set early,” says Adeo Ressi, CEO of Game Trust, a startup that hosts 45 free games and sells enhancements online. If you make changes, Ressi says, you risk alienating customers accustomed to getting your product for free.
4. Access to your product should be just one click away. The fewer time-consuming plug-ins, downloads, and registration forms required, the better. Otherwise people may get bored or frustrated and abort.
5. Make sure the major bugs have been exterminated. Your product can be in beta, Rimer says, but not “so much in beta that it doesn’t work well.”
6. Harness the collective intelligence of your users. Mårten Mickos, CEO of MySQL, says customer suggestions can help speed up product improvements or inspire ideas for premium services.
7. Keep improving the product to give users more reasons to stick with it. “The reality is that offering a product for free can be far riskier than if you actually charged for your product,” says Howard Anderson, a lecturer at the MIT Entrepreneurship Center. “Only one in 10 companies will succeed at pulling this off.”
8. Identify a range of revenue sources. The Epocrates service, which offers medical professionals both free and premium access to reference material via PDAs, doesn’t charge just for the premium information. It also charges fees to pharmaceutical firms for surveys it conducts of Epocrates customers. Similarly, MySQL makes money from customer service as well as from fees charged to firms that redistribute the software.
9. Timing is everything. Make sure that revenue from your premium service soon covers the cost of your free service. Otherwise, cut your losses and move on to the next startup.”
Otro gran artículo de Paul Sloan, editor de “Business 2.0″.
Y por tierras patrias, un genial artículo de Enrique Dans en “PC-Actual”, y que podemos ver reseñado en su blog.
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