Principles and strategies of Dropbox

Founded in 2006, Dropbox is a venture-backed Silicon Valley startup providing online storage and backup services to millions of customers using a “freemium” (free + premium offers) business model. This case recounts Dropbox’s trajectory through mid-2010, when founder/CEO Drew Houston must make strategic decision about new product features, how to target enterprise (business) customers, and whether to pursue distribution deals with smartphone manufacturers. Specific Questions/Assignment to Address in your Dropbox Case Write-Up: Play the role of a marketing consultant, using the principles and strategies of Dropbox (e.g., freemium) to advise a new online survey platform called Shah’s Surveytastic Surveys. Surveytastic seeks to enable its users to do all kinds of online data collection for purposes such as of market research, customer satisfaction, concept testing, employee evaluations, and product evaluations. This company seeks to become a major player in the corporate world. However, that is no easy task. The company CEO decides that it might be a good idea to offer its services to universities (particularly really good universities like UTSC and Rotman School of Management where undergrads and MBA students who will graduate and become famous corporate executives in the future). The hope is to gain the credibility in the academic marketplace in order to attract corporate customers. How can you apply the freemium strategy to help Surveytastic make money in the long-term? VERY VERY VERY Helpful Hints for this Question! I want you to apply to principles of freemium pricing in a new way. Universities typically have a tighter technology budget, so it is probably not wise to think of them as the revenue generators directly. However, the students go on to the corporate world, where there is a much higher technology budget and where word of mouth is important. Can you leverage freemium strategies across customer groups (Universities and corporate clients) rather than within the same customer like in Dropbox? Also, keep in mind that there is no direct need to do analyses on Dropbox (no need for the company VP, competitor analysis, etc.), but rather APPLY the principles that you learned from Dropbox. This assignment will help develop your ability to apply concepts/lessons from the course and from the cases to other companies in the future.