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Freemium 18#

The basic version of an offering is given away for free in the hope of eventually persuading the customers to pay for the premium version. The free offering is able to attract the highest volume of customers possible for the company. The generally smaller volume of paying ‘premium customers’ generate the revenue, which also cross-finances the free offering.


Apply this pattern to your own business and create your next innovative business model!

Examples: Iconic Cases

How they do it: Regular use of the LinkedIn platform is free and users can use the majority of the functions. However, LinkedIn offers various premium subscriptions allowing users to unlock even more functions or more intense use (e.g. unlimited profile searches).
Learn more about LinkedIn →

How they do it: A basic version with limited hosting space is offered to customers for free. However, customers then have the chance to purchase subscriptions for larger amounts of storage space.
Learn more about Dropbox →

How they do it: AWS gives away free ”credits” to use their service and set up ones infrastructure on the AWS cloud computers However as soon as the company’s product need grow and exceed the capacity covered by the free credits, it has to pay for the additional use.
Learn more about Amazon Web Services →

How they do it: A lot of apps in the Apple AppStore are accessible for free but then only allow using limited features or a trial period for the full version. To have access to the full version permamently, the user has to purchase a premium version.
Learn more about Apple iPhone/AppStore →

How they do it: Much of Skype’s service is free. Skype-to-Skype calls to other users are free of charge, while calls to landline telephones and mobile phones (over traditional telephone networks) are charged via a debit-based user account system called Skype Credit.
Learn more about Skype →



Apply this pattern to your own business and create your next innovative business model!