WhatsApp has hired Matt Idema, a Facebook executive who was leading product marketing for all the business products made by Facebook worldwide. This hire is suspected to lead WhatsApp into a completely different and contrasting direction than the current scenario. Facebook acquired the company in 2014 for $22 billion. The interesting part of the acquisition is the fact that WhatsApp does not make any money for Facebook. The company also decided to eliminate the subscription fee that WhatsApp charged the users after one year of free usage.
There are hints that the company is thinking about a mechanism to make money out of the massive userbase that WhatsApp commands all over the world. The decision of hire Idema hints towards a push in direction of monetization as reported by Recode. Even though his role has not yet been chalked out inside WhatsApp and it may not be the same as that of product marketing while working with Facebook. But it may very well fit in if rumours are true about WhatsApp working on adding ‘Business profile’ to the platform which will make it easier for businesses to operate and reach consumers beyond emails, calls and SMS.
This surely is a different way from the revenue stream that can be secured from straight up subscription fees, paid app models or advertisements that other companies and developers opt for. But developing a business side of the app and charging money will be a great way which won’t affect normal users. Another important thing to note is the fact that the company won’t really channel all the third-party messages or spam to you but in fact aims at making the addition more useful.
WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum had previously added, “Starting this year, we will test tools that allow you to use WhatsApp to communicate with businesses and organisations that you want to hear from. That could mean communicating with your bank about whether a recent transaction was fraudulent, or with an airline about a delayed flight. We all get these messages elsewhere today — through text messages and phone calls — so we want to test new tools to make this easier to do on WhatsApp, while still giving you an experience without third-party ads and spam.”
One important thing to note is that WhatsApp is heading in almost the same direction as that of Facebook Messenger with hints of impending ‘Bots’ and businesses and brands. The attempts at monetizing platforms are going in the same direction as that of adding Snapchat like features in all its platforms ranging from Instagram to Facebook Messenger and now WhatsApp.