Perhaps the most popular app of all is an irony in itself as it never had a proper business and revenue model. Well up until now. WhatsApp is planning to experiment with revenue models by introducing business chats that will help with the inflow of money to the organization while helping users to interact with businesses.
The messaging service that is used by almost 1 billion people worldwide, was founded in 2009 by Jan Koum and Brian Acton. The primary revenue for the company comes via 1 dollar charging of the service in certain countries. But apart from that it is practically free. The company is trying to develop an application programming interface (API) that will lead to personalized chats for users so that they can talk to banks about failed transactions or airplane authorities about a delayed flight. Last month, WhatsApp struck a deal with Y Combinator, which provides training and advice to startups that show potential, to have a small number of companies take part in an early trial, according to emails and messages posted on a Y Combinator forum.
Although the trial is still in its early stages, it seems to be hopeful. One particular feature that WhatsApp is keen on is that there be no spam clogging for the customer as with other forms of advertising and marketing. But certainly, such a venture will highly benefit the companies, introducing a plethora of the public and to WhatsApp which will finally start churning money. Whether or not it will be beneficial to the customer is yet to be seen.
