Turning your bright idea into an app that will resonate with customers is no easy feat.
In today’s crowded market, ‘there’s an app for that’ has ceased to be a catch cry. Rather, it’s the reality across the consumer sphere and many vertical markets within the B2B space.
There are more than seven million apps available across the Android and IOS platforms and the number of downloads worldwide hit 255 billion in 2022.
Notwithstanding, there are always opportunities for start-ups that are able to identify a gap in the market and develop a compelling digital value proposition, one which users are willing to pay for.
Homegrown SaaS success stories that have hit the big time in recent years include graphic design platform Canva and Tanda, a locally developed payroll, rostering and HR app that’s found favour with scores of large customers in the retail, hospitality and healthcare sectors.
Managing the monetisation challenge
How best to monetise their offering is the sixty-four-million-dollar question for the founders and leaders of app businesses that find themselves on a promising growth trajectory.
Free and freemium based pricing has helped many new vendors reach critical mass at speed. Others, having determined there’s already a willing, cashed-up market for their product, have opted for tiered subscription pricing from the get-go.
For many start-ups, determining the optimum monetisation model is a matter of trial and error. Most see the benefit in offering customers some form of choice – to make a one-off, outright purchase or pay monthly on subscription, for example.
Whichever way your organisation chooses to go to market, your monetisation strategy should be underpinned by software that can capture usage patterns and translate that data into timely, accurate customer invoices.
Start-ups that fail to acquire this essential infrastructure early on may unwittingly sabotage their chances of long-term success.
Today’s customers set high standards for their suppliers and issuing inaccurate or opaque invoices is a sure way to damage your brand and business. Do it too often and your buyers will likely take their business to a competitor, even if the solution that organisation is offering is technically inferior to your own.
Building on solid foundations
That’s where cloud-based revenue management technology comes into the picture. It’s a strategic digital asset that will provide full quote-to-cash support for whatever monetisation model or models you choose to adopt for your app.
The sophisticated data analysis capability it provides will enable you to achieve the visibility you need over pricing and billing, and to evaluate the effectiveness of your monetisation model on a monthly, weekly, even daily basis.
If you’re serious about scaling your start-up, you’ll look for a revenue management platform that integrates seamlessly with best of breed ERP platforms and the other solutions in your technology stack too.
Real-time insights that can make a real difference to growth
The right platform will also enable you to generate reports that unpack the customer journey and shed light on the ways in which buyers are interacting with your offering.
Knowledge is power and these insights can be used to make data driven decisions that will optimise your offering and satisfy customers’ evolving requirements.
Meanwhile, your fledgling enterprise will achieve sustainable profitability sooner if you run a tight ship; minimising revenue leakage and bad debts wherever you can.
Revenue management technology can assist you to achieve this end, by delivering unprecedented insight into billing anomalies, payments patterns and other factors that can adversely impact the financial health of a growing business.
Striving for success
Turning an app into a sustainable, successful business is no easy feat and individuals who’ve achieved it are in a tiny minority. Underpinning your monetisation strategy with revenue management technology that delivers the data you need to bill customers accurately and on time, will increase your chances of joining their ranks.
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