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eBay Business Model – How does eBay make money?

How many hours do you spend on browsing the internet? 2 hours or 3 hours.

If you’re a shopaholic you might surely know that power of eBay. For most people, eBay is the destination for buying products at reasonable prices. And for a few people, the marketplace is the go-to destination for running their business. Creating a seller account or buying a product on eBay is well worth.

What is eBay?

eBay is the best online marketplace that let sellers and buyers connect with each other without hassles. eBay is popular for online merchants to promote their products or services. Simply put, many businesses are creating a seller account and using eBay as a “Sales Channel”. As international sellers are selling their products or services, customers can buy them from many countries. However, customers can easily search for the available local products by entering the zip code. Also, customers can search for products that are available internationally.

Anybody can create an eBay account for free!!! Whether you’re planning to buy or sell the products, it’s absolutely your choice. When you create a seller account on eBay, there are listing and commission fee are associated with it. The charges may vary from one product to another product.

eBay Stats and Facts

  • Pierre Omidyar is the founder
  • Founded on September 3, 1995
  • Headquarters located at San Jose, California, United States of America
  • Over 185 million active buyers around the world
  • Net worth – 770 Billion U.S Dollars (as of September 2020) 

eBay business model

According to the analysis, eBay is the 2nd most influence marketplace in the United States. eBay is the popularly known for a massive range of products. It’s no surprise websites like eBay such as Amazon and Flipkart and performing well but eBay revenue generation model. eBay doesn’t store the inventory of bulk projects rather than handle-over the purchases to the sellers directly.

At the end of Sep 2020, eBay posted a net worth of $770 billion. This could be great news for eBay investors. As mentioned earlier, creating an account is free on eBay. But the million-dollar question is how does it make money. If you want to know the answer, continue reading…

How does eBay make money?

eBay is performing strongly in the market right from the beginning of its launch. There are multiple business segments that are introduced by eBay. It includes fees, advertising services, StubHub, PayPal and more. Let’s dive into the topic…

No charges are applied for customers

Customer is King!!! eBay doesn’t charge a single penny when customers purchase a product on its platform. If you’re planning to purchase something on eBay, you don’t need to bother about charges or fees.

Fees to sellers

As discussed earlier, sellers need to pay a portion of the fee for the listing and selling their products on eBay. It’s no secret that eBay generates a good amount of revenue through fees. The charges are applied according to the product. For example, when customers purchase a laptop the fee will be more. On the other hand, if the customer purchases an earphone, the fee will be less. Simply put, the fee may range from 3.5% to 10% of the total sale. With more than 88.4 billion dollars worth of sales are conducted on eBay. Here the seller’s fee is generated 1/3rd to 3/4th of eBay net revenue.

Don’t let the fees will put off from selling your products on eBay. It’s a good place to increase your sales. Because there are millions of monthly visitors similar to Amazon and Walmart. Also, the fees are lower when compared to other marketplaces such as Amazon and Flipkart.

Advertising

eBay is a profitable company. Apart from selling fees, eBay is making good income by offering advertising services to its sellers. Yes, you’ve heard it right!!! If you’re a seller and looking to make better profits, advertising your products on services on eBay home page is the best way for you. This way many sellers are selling their products without hassles. Also, eBay has earned more than $333 million in the Q2 of 2020. As millions of sellers are planning to advertise their products for better conversions, therefore we can expect that advertising services will become a primary source of income in the upcoming years.

StubHub

If you’re the one who loves watching a movie or attending a sporting event then you must be aware of the resale company – StubHub. It is a popular ticket exchange company. Users can buy or sell sports, concerts or movie tickets on StubHub.

The online ticket agency StubHub was acquired by eBay on Jan 2007. According to analysis, StubHub is the 2nd largest ticket platform in the United States. StubHub is the best place for the sellers who are planning to list movie or concert tickets. Because there is no listing charges are encouraged on StubHub. Sounds amazing right!!! You might be wondering how does eBay make money through StubHub. Sellers will be charged 15% when the ticket gets sold out and buyers will be charged 10% on their purchase.

PayPal

PayPal is the most preferred to pay online. Sending and receiving global payments is simple and easy. Did you know eBay is earning good revenue through transaction charges on PayPal? Yes!!! More than 1/3rd of PayPal revenue was generated via PayPal. eBay has generated $3.9 billion net worth in the last year. It means 41% of revenue is generated from PayPal.

Attractive features of online marketplace eBay

  • eBay is the best place to buy and sell products online.
  • Customers always look for return policy. eBay is offering return product with a 100% money-back guarantee.
  • The authentication policy and product verification are handled and managed by professionals.
  • eBay offers multiple payment options such as net banking, PayPal, Paytm and more. Customers can choose their preferred payment method according to their convenience.
  • EMI option is also available. Customers can buy their favourite products through monthly instalments.
  • Customers can wishlist their favourite product. Write feedback or review through the catalogue on eBay.

Why eBay is successful?

eBay is the leading marketplace. It means the website has good competition. With the attractive features and benefits, eBay stood as a good e-commerce platform across the globe. The website is facing a large list of competitors. eBay is the one-stop destination to offer an auction of products. The auction feature is setting a large audience base around the world. There is no platform that is offering the auction feature on their website. eBay is presenting with unique and rare collectable products. Also, the auction feature is making it more appealing to all the customers on eBay.

Let’s discuss eBay user interface. eBay is offering a unique and attractive user interface. Users can search for local and international products with effective search functionality. The eBay interface is setting the eBay unique from the competitors in the marketplace. The number of products and services, price and other features are the key aspects for the eBay that is letting it’s successful.

As mentioned earlier, eBay is the one-stop destination to buy or sell products across the globe. The e-commerce platform eBay is pretty different when compared to other key players. The ultimate goal of eBay is to offer good services for both sellers and buyers. The auction feature is allowing sellers and buyers to engage effectively on eBay.

Wrapping up

Whether you’re planning to buy the latest mobile phone or fashion accessories, eBay is the perfect destination for you. The platform is offering free shipping on millions of products. Customers and sellers are taking good advantage of eBay. Since eBay has earned trust from millions of buyers and sellers, the marketplace is making a good income. eBay has earned $770 billion in 2020. The major income is generated by commission fees, advertising and StubHub. With an effective user interface and the auction is letting the eBay stand unique from the huge competition. Also, eBay will earn more and more profits in the future as well.

Microsoft Business Model – How does Microsoft make money?

Don’t compare yourself with anyone in this world… if you do so, you are insulting yourself.

This motivational quote is written by Bill Gates.

It’s no surprise that Bill Gates is the world’s richest person who is the founder of Microsoft. No matter whether you’re running a small or large business, you actually need a Microsoft software to accomplish your world. The tool Microsoft is used by almost 80% of companies. There are multiple reasons for them to use Microsoft such as improve team communication, increase productivity, user-friendly and more.

What is Microsoft?

Microsoft is the popular vendor of computer software, gaming systems, hardware, mobile, cloud services and more. The company headquarters is situated in Redmond, Washington. Microsoft offices are located across the globe. 

As mentioned earlier Bill Gates is the entrepreneur of the world’s largest company i.e Microsoft. He is one of the richest people around the world. Microsoft is the most valued company. Microsoft net worth is $1000 billion by the end of October 23, 2020. The net revenue is $1 trillion, sounds amazing right!!!

Let’s discuss the history of Microsoft, business model and how does Bill Gate earn money.

Origin of Microsoft

It’s all started on April 4th, 1975. At that time Americans use typewriters. This could be difficult for them to complete their work as the procedure is time-consuming. Therefore, Bill Gates and Paul Allen has founded “Microsoft”. Their primary goal is to build effective computer software that makes everyone’s job easy. By 1979, Microsoft has grown into a leading multinational technology company. When Bill Gates become the world’s youngest billionaire when he was 31 years old in 1987.

Microsoft Business Model – Explained

Microsoft has introduced amazing products such as Microsoft 365, Office, Windows, Surface, Xbox and much more. Microsoft is running a successful company since it was the origin. Also, it is stated that Mircosoft is the 3rd large organization in the United States as of 2nd Sep 2020.

Le’s discuss Microsoft business model

Microsoft is a popular and leading technology organization that is offering excellent software products and services to people around the world. According to its reports, Microsoft has three business segments. Let’s have a look at how exactly Microsoft is making money.

How does Microsoft make money?

Microsoft is not just about Windows. It’s no surprise Microsoft is playing a major role in the market. There are multiple ways the company is making money. Let’s discuss them now,

Productivity and business processes

The business segment consists of a set of Microsoft products and services. These are ranging from productivity to information services. According to the analysis, Microsoft has generated over 33% of the net profit from productivity and business processes.

Office commercial – Microsoft is earning good profits whenever users installed and purchased a license of Microsoft Office software suite. Microsoft is responsible to enhance the individual and business productivity. This business segment is the primary driver of Microsoft revenue. People are subscribing to Microsoft office for various services such as Office, Exchange, Skype for Business, Microsoft Teams and SharePoint.

LinkedIn – LinkedIn is the leading destination that connects professional under one roof. The professional social media channel is generating good income by offering monetised solutions such as talent solutions, premium subscriptions and marketing solutions.

Dynamics – Microsoft is providing a cloud-based solution to help its customers. Also, the on-premises business solution is also introduced such as ERP and CRM. Here, the revenue is generated by the number of subscribers.

Intelligent cloud

According to recent reports, the Intelligent Cloud business segment is comprised of more than 31% of revenue for Microsoft. Intelligent Cloud is offering Microsoft public, private, and hybrid server products. On the other hand, Microsoft is offering cloud services that are important to run a modern business.

Server products and amazing cloud services

Did you know Microsoft’s server is offering provides integrated server infrastructure? Yes!!! This is an excellent service provided by the company. Also, the software is offering a middleware designed to assist software applications that are built and designed on Windows operating system

The popular server products are Microsoft’s SQL and Windows. These products are generating good income by launching several licensing programs. Also, the company is offering a rich set of cloud services such as Microsoft Azure. This is making good income whenever a user subscribed to the service.

Enterprise services 

Have you ever heard about Microsoft Consulting Services? This is the best service offered by Microsoft. This service is completely project-based commitments to support customers plan. Ultimately, customers can get good value with Microsoft products or services.

More personal computing

Here is something interest news for all the users. Microsoft is earning a good income through “More Personal Computing”. This segment consists of Microsoft products and services are provided according to the user interest. Also, developers and IT experts can personalize the services and products as per their requirement. This segment includes

  • Windows OEM licensing
  • Windows Commercial
  • Windows Cloud Services
  • MSN display ads
  • Search Advertising
  • Gaming – Xbox, Subscriptions

Devices

Someone said, “Microsoft is no more a software company”. This statement is absolutely true!!! The company provides several devices such as gaming consoles, mobile devices, PC accessories and more. These devices are affordable and high-quality, therefore most of the people prefer to buy Microsoft products.

Microsoft Surface series portable laptops are one of the stylish and premium devices so far introduced. People are showing interest to buy Microsoft Surface as the device is available on a budget. Also, Microsoft mobile phones are also generating good income for the company.

Now, let’s talk about Xbox. If you love gaming then you would have Xbox. This is the best gaming device introduced by Microsoft. It’s no surprise that Xbox is the best gaming console available in the market and loved by the people in the gaming community. According to the analysis, Microsoft has sold more than 100 million Xbox gaming console. Ultimately, Microsoft has earned $13 billion in 2020.

Advertising

Did you know the company is making good income through adverting? Yes!!! Similar to other platforms such as Facebook and Google, Microsoft is generating good revenue by advertising other products and services on Microsoft Edge. Microsoft Advertising is earning over $7.63 billion in this segment.

Other businesses along with the estimated revenue

Apart from Intelligent cloud, personal computing and advertising, there are other sources of revenue for Microsoft. The other sources include Skype, Github and set of software.

Skype is a popular communication software specially designed for audio calls, video conferencing, chat, share and more. Small and large businesses use Skype for various purposes. Microsoft is earning good income through Skype i.e $1.7 billion in Q2 2020. On the other hand, Microsoft is generating good income through its software. The popular Microsoft software’s are Access, Excel, OneNote, PowerPoint, Xbox, OneDrive, Teams and more. Though this software’s are available for free while there are few paid software.

GitHub is one of the leading services available on Microsoft. The ultimate goal of the GitHub project is to help developers to design the projects without hassles. Currently, there are more than 50 million people use GitHub to build and design their own projects. Microsoft has earned more than $250 million through GitHub.

Conclusion

Is there anybody who’s unaware of the brand – Microsoft? Ofcourse nobody right. It was founded by Bill Gates. Whether it could be an operating system or cloud services, Microsft is the best option. In this article, we have discussed the history and business model of Microsoft. As mentioned earlier, Microsoft has a diversified business model. The business has several moving parts that helping its growth. While Microsoft Office and Windows operating system have remained as the key products of the organization. Microsoft is generating good income through various segments such as cloud services, gaming, devices, search advertisements, LinkedIn and more. Microsoft net worth is $1trillion by the end of October 23, 2020.

cash app Business Model – How does cash app make money

Not long ago you had to carry cash to most of the places. This is because that was the only way you could pay if you ever bought something. There were even places where you could swipe your credit card to pay the bill. But this was not the case all the time. Because not every place would have the facility to swipe your card. So carrying a little bit of cash was absolutely necessary. This is only one of the problems when you want to exchange money for goods or services. But if you wanted to transfer the money to someone else’s account it was a different deal altogether. Most people only know one way to do it, that is going to their banks and deposit the money into other bank accounts. This is a very simple process but it consumes a lot of time.

Just imagine how much time you had to spend just to go to a bank wait and deposit the money. You would be wasting your working hours transferring the money. However, this was not the only way to transfer money as you could even do it through net banking. It is way easier to transfer money through net banking than going to a bank. But you need to have a good internet connection and a computer to do so as it is very hard to do it through your mobile. However, you must have noticed that in the past few years there have been various apps that made the whole process of money transfer so easy. All you have to do is install the app, link your bank account and phone number so that you can send money to others. This article is about one such app called Cash App. 

What is Cash App and how does it work?

Cash App is a peer-to-peer payment application that is developed by the company Square Inc. Square Inc is an American based company that deals with merchant aggregator services and financial services. Cash App was introduced for the first time in the year 2013. It was in 2015 the application was introduced for the businesses. Back then it was known as Square Cash. After that, the name was changed to Cash App. As mentioned earlier this app allows individuals to transfer money to one another. Cash App was not the first one of its kind as peer-to-peer payment services like Google Pay, Apple Pay and Venom were already present in the market. This was the step taken by Square Inc to compete with other similar services. By the looks of it Square Inc has been successful in achieving what they wanted. Currently, the Cash App has more than 30 million users. 

One of the main reasons for the success of peer-to-peer payment services is because of how easy they are to use. All you need is a smartphone if you want to use these services. You can simply take care of all the stuff related to your money using the Cash App. There is almost no task related to money that you cannot do using this application. You can pay bills and transfer money to your family and friends. Not only that but you can also use this application to buy goods and pay for other services. But there is more to the Cash App than most people know about. Most of the apps that are similar to the Cash App only deal with paying bills, sending and receiving money. But the Cash App can do much more than that. You can even purchase Bitcoin and invest in using this application. 

Business model of Cash App

For those of you who don’t know the Cash App is free for people to download and use. But it does depend on its customers to earn money. There are few sets of people who are really important for Cash App to make money. Cash helps all of these people to make their transactions easier who in turn helps it in making money. Let’s look at the types of customers the Cash App has. 

Consumers

These are normal everyday people who use the app to do payments. These are the most important section of their customer base as there is no point for businesses to use the Cash App if they don’t have people who pay through the app. The Cash App has been very successful in reaching out to customers. One of the main reasons the customers use it is because of its simplicity. Apart from that, the Cash App has more features that the customers could use. Above all, it eliminates the need of carrying cash almost completely. 

Businesses

Businesses are the most important customer base when you look at it in terms of revenue. If the business accepts payments through the Cash App it becomes easier for them to deal with money. They don’t have to worry about dealing with the cash. Businesses don’t have to look for change to give them back to customers. The transactions are completely cashless so it eliminates the chances of the money getting stolen completely. Above it has the complete payment history which is also great to keep an account of the money flowing in.

How does the Cash App earn money?

As you already know cash is an application that is used to transfer money from one Cash account to another Cash account. The users can even pay their bills using the Cash card which is a Visa card that is linked to their Cash account. So it is not hard to know how it makes money. It charges businesses and individuals for making payments through its application. Here are the following ways in which the Cash App makes money. 

Businesses

As mentioned earlier businesses are the major source of revenue for this application as there are lots of payments happening on a daily basis. If you are a business owner who uses the Cash App to receive payments then you have to pay a small percentage of every payment to them that takes place through their application. It charges 2.75% on every transaction. The customer can pay using the Cash App or they can pay using the Cash card but the percentage of commission is still the same. 

Transaction to other accounts

This fee applies to everyone whether it is a business or an individual. You might have observed that there is a delay in receiving the deposited money. One has to wait for some time if they want to receive money that is deposited into their bank account. But The Cash App allows you to make expedite transfers. You don’t have to wait to see if the money that you sent is deposited into someone’s bank account. The money will be transferred tk their account as soon as you send it. But the Cash App charges some fee to do this. You have to pay 1.5% of the money you are sending to the Cash App if you want to expedite transfers.

Exchanging Bitcoin

In 2017 the Cash App has given its users the ability to buy or sell Bitcoin through its platform. Two years after introducing this feature the Cash App started charging fees for transactions of cryptocurrency. It charges nearly 1.76% on Bitcoin transactions. Not only that but it also profits through this commission. This is because the prices of the cryptocurrencies are volatile. So the Cash App may acquire the Bitcoin for one price but sell it for more than the original price after some time.

Conclusion

This is the business model of the Cash App. All the other similar applications have business models that are identical to this. You can check out other business models like the business model of Fortnite on Postling. 

Robinhood Business Model – How does Robinhood make money

What is the first thought that comes to your head when someone talks about Robinhood? Commission-free trading, right? It is one of the reasons why this platform has become so popular in the first place. Stock trading is an excellent way to earn income. But most people are highly afraid of it too. Wondering why? It is a risky investment, right?

One wrong move can cost you all your money. So many people are highly careful around stock trading, if possible they completely avoid. Also not to forget about the brokerage. They have to pay a good sum as brokerage too. Since they don’t understand much about it, people don’t get into it.

However, with Robinhood entering the market, the situation has changed for the better. Although this Robinhood may not steal money from the rich and give to the poor. This platform is truly helping people save good money. On this mobile stock trading app, people can buy or sell stocks without paying commission. This itself will help them in saving good money. And this is the reason why most young people are taking an interest. It will not be an exaggeration to say that this platform has helped many young people in taking investment seriously and start investing without fearing about brokerage. 

Robinhood Business Model 

Robinhood was founded back in 2013. It is the brainchild of Vladimir Tenev and Baiju Bhatt. This company has gone a long way since its inception. Although many businesses have come forward with the idea of commission-free trading. However, Robinhood has successfully become successful. Around 4 million people are using this platform to trade. Amazing, right? Robinhood has completed transactions of around $150 billion. It has also saved around $1 billion in transaction fees. 

If you want to understand the business model of Robinhood then you must first understand how it works. As you already know Robinhood is a mobile stock trading app that has been around for a long time. All the users need is their app. From signing up to buying stocks they can do everything on the app. So to complete a sign-up process you must provide all your details.

Once you finish the signup process you don’t have to worry about anything as you can buy or sell the stocks with your finger swipe. It is not an exaggeration to say that Robinhood has made trading easy and understandable for users. One of the main reasons why many people don’t try stock trading is because it’s risky and it is quite hard to understand. 

This brings us to, How does Robinhood make money? It is one of the questions that many people have. As you see people don’t understand how can this company make profits why offering commission-free trading for its users. For all trading platforms, the major source of revenue comes from the brokerage. However, the core idea behind Robinhood success is that they don’t take brokerage from their users. Which allows them to earn good money from trading. 

You also must be curious about how this business makes money owing to their business strategies. What are you waiting for? Then let’s jump directly into the topic without any delay.

How does Robinhood make money?

The business model of Robinhood is based on the freemium model. Although the users are not paying anything to this platform they are still making good money. So let’s see how it makes money. 

Interest

This is one of the ways Robinhood makes money. Since you know that this platform is offering the users an option to trade without commission. Most people wonder what this platform gets out of it. Valid question, right? They make money from your unused cash deposits. Yup, you heard it right. This platform earns money in the form of interest from the unused money from your account. As you see it charges 2% of interest on the money that is sitting in your account per year. Although this may not seem much you can see that they can make good money as they have 4 million accounts. Not only this they also charge an APR of 5% when users borrow more than $50,000. 

Premium Subscriptions 

As you already know that the business model of this platform is freemium. Which means it offers its users both free and premium. Yup, you heard it right Robinhood offers a premium plan (Gold subscription plan). This subscription plan offers many benefits to its users. Some of the benefits include extended trading hours. 

Yup, it provides traders with extra trading hours. The premium users can start 30 minutes before the market starts and they can continue trading for 2 hours even when the market closes. Users don’t have to wait for three days to make their deposit; they can deposit their trades immediately. Not only this it also provides users with more buying power with margin trading. 

If you’re confused about buying on margin. Let us explain. It means that the user can borrow money to buy more stock. Simply put, the users can borrow money to increase their potential earnings from a stock. But however, the users must remember that in case your judgement goes wrong you will have to lose all your amount and also pay back the borrowed money. It is definitely risky.

The price of Gold subscription plan $5 a month. If you want to upgrade to this plan you can do it within your account. 

Additional features

There are two methods in which this business makes money. Since you have understood how this company makes money, why not check out its additional features of its business model. In 2017 they launched the desktop version of Robinhood. So now traders can trade using both desktop and mobile apps.

Now, apart from stocks, the trades can also buy Cryptoassets on this platform. And the best part is that this is also commission-free. So the trades can invest without worrying about commissions. If you’re interested in options trading. You can also get that in the free plan. Cool, right.

Wrapping up 

As you have made it to the end, you must have learned a little bit more about Robinhood. This mobile trading app has become famous among millennials. More and more people are using this platform as they can buy or sell the stocks with ease and most importantly without any commission-free. As there are not many platforms that offer commission-free trading Robinhood has gained popularity. In the initial days, people were really sceptical about this platform as they don’t know whether it is safe or not.

But over time this platform has proven to be the best platform for stock trading and has grown its user base. Do you want to know more about such business models? Yes, then check out other business model articles in Postling to understand more about all major businesses and how they earn money. 

Letgo Business Model – How does Letgo Make Money

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Letgo is one of the biggest online marketplaces for selling and buying used items. The concept of a marketplace for secondhand items has been popular for years. However, there were only a few apps and sites such as Craigslist, eBay, OLX, Etsy etc. It has over 100 million downloads and 400 million listings as of 2020. It is America’s one of the giant marketplaces to trade used items from electronics, furniture, cars, to rent and sell houses. It also lets users list services.

Having its presence in 35 countries over the world, Letgo is known for its innovative features with the latest technology. In fact, it is one of the very few apps that uses AI for image recognition and helps people to list their items in less than 60 seconds. Most importantly, Letgo app is a free platform for both buyers and sellers. The app doesn’t even force its users to make payments through it even. 

In fact, it only works as a platform to connect buyers and sellers. The buyers and sellers can chat and meet in person to finish the deal.

Wondering how Letgo makes money if it is a free platform for both buyers and sellers? Well, this article walks you through the Letgo business model and how it makes money and how good is its revenue model. So, let’s get started! Before that let’s quickly look into what is Letgo to understand it better. Shall we?

What is Letgo?

Letgo is an online platform that lets sellers list their used or untouched products on the app and helps buyers to purchase the preowned products at affordable prices. Thus creating a circular economy where there is less waste. Moreover, it is quite easy to sell or buy items on the platform as it only requires a snap of the item to upload. The latest features of Letgo feature the ad and display it to nearby people (around 50-mile radius) for relevant searches.

Letgo is a recently developed app by Alec Oxenford, former CEO of OLX. It was founded in January 2015 targeting the US market and competing with the 1990’s companies, eBay and Craigslist.

A year after its launch, Letgo merged with another classified company (startup), known as Wallapop. Yet, it remained as a brand Letgo. The startup quickly attracted millions of users in just a year. It had over 10 million monthly active users according to Businesswire in just one year.

There are many reasons why Letgo has become so popular within less time. Of course, it introduced new features such as geo location, filters, reveal, chat etc. Also, it is available as a free platform on iOS and Android devices. Hence, there is no risk of losing their users at any time, no matter how many new apps are launched. Therefore the app is still one of the most-used platforms for trading preowned stuff. 

Read: Shopify Business Model – How does Shopify Make Money

Key Features of Letgo

Image recognition: This is one of the best features in Letgo. In fact, Letgo is the only app at times that fill the title, categories of the items by recognizing images once uploaded. Only a few buy and sell apps like Letgo uses artificial intelligence for enhancing user experience.

Geographic location: No flooding of irrelevant search results on Letgo. Its geographic location displays only nearby results less than a 50-mile radius. Moreover, users can filter results based on category, price and location.

Chat: Buyers and sellers can interact about the listing and pricing through the chat feature. Hence, no exchange of phone numbers is required. Both parties can talk about the deal on the chat itself and close the deal meeting in a public place.

Review: Buyers can leave comments or rate sellers which will show up on the seller’s profile. This feature helps other new buyers to choose genuine sellers.

Reveal Feature: Unlike many other buy and sell apps, Letgo has an advanced feature known as “Reveal”. It is a video listing for providing accurate and better information about the product to buyers. Sellers can use this feature, shoot a video of the product for fast selling.

Thus, Letgo offers many feel-good features on its platform for both buyers and sellers and growing its user base and income steadily. Okay, now let’s quickly jump into Letgo business model.

Business Model of Letgo

The business model of Letgo comprises three segments (let us call them models again). The three models make almost equal profits to the company. Let us look at those without any further ado.

In-App Targeted Ad Model

As you know Letgo is a free platform for buyers and sellers who are its key members, it has no other way but to show ads to make money. Moreover, it is a smart way to monetize its platform because the app has a free and solid flow of traffic. As it is a free platform, there is no fear of losing its users because people love the term “free”. Moreover, it doesn’t even force people to make transactions through its services, it just provides complete freedom as well as outstanding features for users to come back again and again. 

Therefore, it is one of the best platforms for advertisers to show their ads. So, users pay Letgo and display their ads (promoted listing) on the platform. Again, the platform never compromises the user experience. It only shows related targeted ads to its users.

Freemium Model

Letgo is available as a freemium model. Meaning, it is a free app to download for anybody in eligible countries. At the same time, it charges some money to access a few advanced features.

This freemium model has a feature called “bump up” that will let users rank their product on top for 7 days. This feature costs approximately $0.99 to $3.99 based on the product.

Thus Letgo makes money with this freemium model while also benefiting sellers to sell the item faster.

Read: Walmart Business Model – How Walmart makes money

Subscription Model

In addition to the freemium model, Letgo also introduced two premium subscription models to boost the speed of selling.

Super Boost Subscription

This is a monthly subscription plan in which the listing that has a high probability of selling is featured for 24 hours. Simply put, in Super Boost mode, Letgo selects one listing (which is likely to sell) each day and features it automatically.

Thus, sellers can simply get the subscription plan and upload pictures, Letgo takes care of the rest.

Letgo PRO Subscription

This model exclusively targets car dealers. When a user chooses this model, Letgo allows the user to list their cars. It then boosts the visibility of listing to 100 million users of the app. Additionally, it provides better insights and leads to the listing owners to target and make sales.

This model is available in three different plans: $99/month for upto 30 vehicles, $399/month for upto 70 vehicles and $599/month for upto 150 vehicles.

Investor Funding

Letgo, though facing tough competitions with already established companies, it was never short of finances. The company is backed by investors and is able to run its operations and cover expenses.

Letgo raised nearly $100 million in its first year of launch. Later, when it was merged with Wallapop (in 2016), it raised another $100 million.

As of August 2018, it raised over $500 million and has posted a total funding amount of $975 million.

Letgo Acquisition by OfferUp 2020

On March 25, 2020, OfferUp, one of the top online marketplace apps, announced the acquisition of Letgo. It raised $120 million in the latest funding round held in March. Thus it gained a 40% stake in the company and acquired it along with OLX Group. However, both apps remain as separate apps and function separately for the time being.

How Letgo Makes Money?

Letgo, a popular American based second-hand online marketplace, makes profits in multiple ways despite being a free platform.

As you can see above in the Letgo business model section, the company makes money through its 3 business models.

Advertising

It sells space on its platform and shows in-app ads, it makes a good deal of revenue from its advertisers, the same as Google or any other app does. However, as it doesn’t interrupt the user’s navigation or degrade the user experience, it is still able to keep its users (in fact, it is growing its user base). Thus it will always be the advertiser’s choice to publish ads.

Featuring Products

The second way it makes money is by featuring users’ listing on top (freemium model). This way it not only makes money but it also lets sellers sell their products faster for effective pricing.

Paid Subscription

As discussed above, Letgo charges sellers for letting them use advanced features such as Super Boost and Letgo PRO. Although frequent sellers opt for these plans, there is no doubt that there are thousands of sellers and car dealers who use it.

Additionally, Letgo earns money from funding to manage its costs and expenses. It has raised $975 million in funding to date. Its major investors are Accel, 14W, FJ Labs, Eight Roads Venture, Mangrove, Naspers, NextView, Northzone and Insight Venture Partners. 

However, it was acquired by OfferUp recently. Therefore, it became a part of OfferUp, both forming a powerful marketplace for selling and buying things.

Besides the merger, both apps function separately and users need to just download the new version of the app they use (this applies to both OfferUp and Letgo).

Future of Letgo

Letgo is one of the popular buy and sell platforms across many countries in the world. It has been continuously working to improve user experience and add new features in order to fight the competition. It had tough competition with other sites such as OLX, OfferUp, Carousell, one of the eCommerce giants eBay, etc. Moreover, after Facebook had introduced Facebook Marketplace, the competition has become even more onerous.

However, there is a chance for the story to change as OfferUp has acquired Letgo. The company is now a part of OfferUp. Thus the two popular buy and sell online marketplaces have joined together to share their strengths. This, in fact, results in a large user base, a huge number of sellers and buyers with a great positive user experience.

Bottom Line

So, that is how Letgo makes money. Within just 5 years, the company saw two acquisitions. Letgo acquired a startup within 1 year and a popular online marketplace app, OfferUp acquired Letgo this year.

However, the business model of Letgo before OfferUp acquired it generated good revenue. Hence, it’s strategies were good enough so that it made good profits to both manage its expenses and implement new features. Anyways, we should wait to see if OfferUp changes its business model in the future to make more profits.