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Two-sided Market 52#

A two-sided market facilitates interactions between multiple interdependent groups of customers. The value of the platform increases as more groups or as more individual members of each group are using it. The two sides usually come from disparate groups, e.g., businesses and private interest groups.


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Examples: Iconic Cases

How they do it: The iTunes functions as a two-sided market with artists, producers or other rights-owners on the one side and customers / users on the other side.
Learn more about Apple iPod/iTunes →

How they do it: Airbnb offers a platform for everyone to offer their home, or experiences to guests. Airbnb’s focus lies purely on providing a reliable platform with safety mechanisms for both hosts and guests which simplifies the process of hosting and booking an accomodation.
Learn more about Airbnb →

How they do it: In the Amazon Kindle store, publishers, authors and other rights-owners can sell their content to Kindle users. Hence, Amazon is just providing the marketplace but does not have to provide the content itself.
Learn more about Amazon Kindle →

How they do it: The experience on the platform for the individual user increases with the amounts of interactions he can have with friends, peers, brands and other associations.
Learn more about Facebook →

How they do it: In Payback’s case the two groups of customers in the two-sided market a the private consumers and members of the loyalty program and the vendors who reward their customers purchases. Payback itself has access to the individual customer data and can earn money from the businesses participating in their program.
Learn more about Payback →



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

Start the ideation