6 ms·
Ask HN: How do Tumblr & Posterous make money?
Both are free blogging services, no price plan, no add-on charges, free support. And I'm not aware there is ads too. Where do they get their income? Consultation fee? Writing a book about their platforms?
- Throlkim 16y agoI would assume that they're building momentum before they introduce premium services. Flickr's probably quite a good example of this. I know Posterous have mentioned that they'll be implementing paid-for extras in the future, but that the current offering will remain free.
- pjy04 16y agoYup, this is a popular option. Offer a free version to get people in the door then add value added features for users who want to do more with the service.
- fletchowns 16y agoDoesn't seem fair that somebody can come along and offer a service for free/no ads in order to get people to switch over from a provider that charges/has ads, only to eventually switch over and do the same.
- BrandonM 16y agoConsidering that they do not lock you in (they allow to export your content), I see nothing at all unfair about it. If you have your own URL that you point to your blog, switching should be pretty seamless as far as your readers are concerned.
- ergo98 16y ago>Flickr's probably quite a good example of this. Flickr had contextual ads since, I believe, day one. Then they added paid accounts and I subscribed and have never regretted it. I've been a paid "pro" subscriber to Flickr for many years, trusting them with my media (http://www.flickr.com/photos/dforbes/4657268471/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/dforbes/4657268471/ <- one of my sons nibbled by a goat!) because I had faith that they had a coherent, sustainable business strategy. Similarly I have faith in Gmail because I can see they aren't struggling to find a revenue model. I don't trust services that are saving a revenue model until "sometime later", especially where the service has any sort of lock-in or inconvenience if they get bored and move on. Such a make-money-later strategy usually arrives with very negative changes when the day of reckoning comes: It is essentially a bait and switch tactic (one that PG is a big advocate of), and really I view as deceptive, even if it gets a big enough user base that you can flip it to some VCs. "All blogs now served with free pop-under advertisements!"
- Terretta 16y ago> I don't trust services that are saving a revenue model until "sometime later" ... essentially a bait and switch tactic Ning! Ning! We have a winner!
- Tichy 16y agoI seem to remember that Posterous tested changing outgoing links to go through a affiliate program proxy. Not sure if they kept it up.
- staunch 16y agoI just checked. They do appear to still be doing that. a4agarwal's response at the time http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1309849 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1309849
- Tichy 16y agoOpinions obviously differ widely on that one. To me it is unacceptable, especially if done in such a sneaky way. Other people seem to be fine with it. If enough people who are fine with it become their customers, why not. I don't think they announced this big when they rolled out their massive "all other blogs are stupid" campaign...
- gsiener 16y agoTumblr has launched a number of premium add-ons, like themes and getting featured in their directory.
- gramakri 16y agoVC funding :)
- maushu 16y agoPosterous is selling domains for around $25 per year (with discount for more years). I don't believe they make all the money from that though, but I'm sure it helps.
- josefresco 16y agoWholesale cost on domains has got to be less than $5 or so for them so they make a little. Not much though.
- pavs 16y agoI recently started using tumblr and its mind blowing how much they allow you to do for free. There have very little limitations, if any. They allow you to put ads on you blog with no string attached AFAIK, custom domains (other do it too). I think they make a decent amount of money on premium theme and get your blog listed on featured directories and other paid features. I was hoping that they would allow API access to password-protected blogs. I use marsedit to post on my blog, but can't do it on my private blog.
- macarthurrobert 16y ago"Coca-Cola is using Posterous for its NCAA “Dept of Fannovation” where people can come up with ideas to improve the experience of being a fan, and a chance to win $10,000." http://ycombinator.posterous.com/posterous-s08-jumps-on-the-revenue-wagon-sign http://ycombinator.posterous.com/posterous-s08-jumps-on-the-...
- taylorwc 16y agoIt's a classic freemium model. Their modus operandi is going to be get as many hyper-engaged users as possible, and hope to monetize by either introducing premium-type features, or gathering user data and advertising (but probably a combination of all available options).
- sjtgraham 16y agoShouldn't the question be 'do they make money?'
- unohoo 16y agoPlatforms like posterous and tumblr rely heavily on scale - ie, a large number of users. So, their first priority is to get as much users on board as possible from other publishing platforms. Once they reach a certain threshold, they can start experimenting with revenue generation - be it in form of advertising or premium hosting etc. Thats similar to the way Wordpress played out.
- antidaily 16y agoI noticed that Wordpress.com sites started serving ads too.
- jamesgeck0 16y agoIf I remember correctly, they've been serving ads occasionally since close to the beginning of the site. It was just a reasonably infrequent occurrence.
- retube 16y agoSure. But how the hell do they convince investors to get on board? Any future numbers are so pie-in-the-sky, and revenues so far off, why would anyone touch it?
- unohoo 16y agoUnfortunately, I'm not a VC so cant offer a response that'd do justice to your question. Most of the VC investments happen based on the team and little based on the idea (at least thats what I've read everywhere) - so I guess the founders impressed the investors enough to invest.
- nl 16y agoIt's not pie-in-the-sky. Anyone should be able to make between $4 & $5 per 1000 visitors from just running AdSense. Use that as a baseline and do the math from there. If you can add-on non-advertising forms of revenue then that is a bonus.
- 16y ago
- csomar 16y agoThey don't have a clear income. They aim to get big and then think of income after that. I don't like this model, because at first, I'll have to rely heavily on Buzz and VCs.
- againstyou 16y agoI started a thread, how url shorteners services make money, if they really make some. http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1633979 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1633979
- rogwil 16y agogood one. nice and good site check out this. http://www.shrtnews.blogspot.com http://www.shrtnews.blogspot.com
- niico 16y agoTumblr now has some premium features such us paid themes and blog promotions