airbnb etsy uber case study

How Uber, Airbnb, and Etsy Attracted Their First 1,000 Customers

New businesses often struggle finding their first customers. The challenge is even more difficult with startups in the sharing economy that launch as platforms connecting independent service providers with consumers.

Take Uber. Its platform is two-sided, connecting people who need rides with people who have rides to offer. (Same idea as Airbnb, which connects people needing rooms with home-owners.) So to launch as a platform service, these companies need to find users on both the supply and demand sides.

“Poaching customers is something all competitors do in different ways”

“When you have a two-sided platform, you have to acquire both the customers and the services,” says Harvard Business School’s Thales Teixeira, Lumry Family Associate Professor of Business Administration.

“It’s the classic chicken-and-egg problem,” he says. You can’t have one without the other, but which one do you find first—the customer chicken or the service egg? “As a small company you cannot afford to focus on both with the same amount of effort. You may need to prioritize one side.”

Preparing to teach a new course on e-commerce marketing next spring, Teixeira made it his goal to find an answer. He studied three of the best-known and most successful startups—Uber, Etsy, and Airbnb—hoping to find some commonalities in how those businesses solved the dilemma.

Spoiler alert: it’s the egg that needs incubating.

As Teixeira reports in a new HBS case, Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers , all three platforms concentrated on getting the service side of the equation first, customers second. But there’s a catch. “It’s not just the chicken and the egg, you also want to select the right eggs,” explains Teixeira. “If you acquire the wrong eggs and ostriches come out, then you are in trouble. The chickens will run for the hills.”

LESSON ONE: THINK LIKE A CUSTOMER

From the beginning, it was clear to the founders of apartment-sharing site Airbnb that they’d need to find people willing to list their homes before finding people interesting in staying in them.

“If you don’t have a supply of houses and apartments, people are not going to come,” says Teixeira. The problem was, where to find people willing to let strangers stay in their places. It’s not like they could go around San Francisco knocking on doors.

Instead, founders Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia thought like customers themselves, trying to figure out where they would go if Airbnb didn’t exist. It didn’t take them long to figure out the answer: Craigslist. The entrepreneurs figured they could do a better job of making apartments appealing than the online classified site, but first they had to siphon away its customers. To do that, Chesky and Gebbia created software to hack Craigslist to extract the contact info of property owners, then sent them a pitch to list on Airbnb as well.

The strategy worked. With nothing to lose, property owners doubled their chances of finding a potential renter, and Airbnb had a ready supply of homes with which it could attract customers.

“Poaching customers is something all competitors do in different ways,” says Teixeira. “If you are a website and you are providing content to users publicly, others can grab that information.” It’s not enough to just take someone else’s customers, though, he warns—you’ve got to give them something better than they had before.

LESSON TWO: CREATE A BETTER EXPERIENCE

Once they had apartment owners on the hook, the Airbnb founders realized they had a problem: the subpar photos that property owners were taking for Craigslist on their iPhones would never work for customers looking for an alternative to a hotel.

“The first time a person goes on Airbnb, they are comparing the quality of photos to hotels that take glamorized shots,” says Teixeira. “They needed to compete at that level.”

In order to do that, Chesky and Gebbia did something that would never be scalable: hired professional photographers to go to property owners’ homes to take inviting pictures. The gambit worked, making the site much more attractive than the competition, and setting a standard for photography that later property owners rose to match in order to compete against other homes.

“The underlying principle of this is you should help your suppliers portray themselves in the best way possible, even if that is not scalable,” concludes Teixeira. “If you don’t have customers, there is nothing to scale.”

Ride-sharing app Uber pursued a similar strategy. Rather than starting out with Uber Pool or Uber X, in which drivers use their own cars, the company started with black cars driven by professional drivers. That way, they could ensure that customers would have a great experience virtually every time they used the service—and they could then rely on customers to spread the news of that experience by word of mouth. “That’s why you get the supply side first—if you get the right suppliers, the customers will experience their high quality service and then do the marketing for you,” says Teixeira.

Etsy also pursued a decidedly non-scalable strategy in finding the right eggs with which to launch its business. The platform, which serves as an online marketplace for craft vendors, started its business with an offline strategy: scouring craft fairs across the country to identify the best vendors at each, and pitching them on opening up an online store on the site. “They first brought their customers, and then they brought other artisans who followed the customers.” Once Etsy had the first-tier artisans on the site, the next tier naturally followed them.

LESSON THREE: SEQUENCING IS EVERYTHING

Uber and Airbnb were also smart about how they chose to expand, picking the right cities at the right time to maximize their success.

Since Uber’s main competition was taxi cab companies, the startup researched which cities had the biggest discrepancy between supply and demand for taxis. They then launched during times when that demand was likely to be the highest, for example during the holidays when people tend to stay out late partying. It also ran promotions during large concerts or sporting events, when big crowds of people all needed cabs at the same time, and an individual might be more likely to take a chance on an unfamiliar company named Uber.

In that way, the company acquired a large group of customers in one swoop. “First, they figured out how to get a bunch of customers all in one night, when the demand was high. Then, they made sure this first group of users had a great experience and brought in the next wave of customers via word-of-mouth,” says Teixeira. The company banked on the fact that once users realized how easy it was, it was only a matter of time before they started using it to go to work, then shopping for groceries, and so on.

Airbnb followed a similar strategy with its rollout, launching in Denver in 2008 to coincide with the lack of hotel space during the Democratic National Convention and adding new cities at times when they had major conventions or other events.

In addition to the obvious demand, the strategy has another benefit: “Your competitors don’t see you as a threat, since you are not taking away from their demand,” says Teixeira. By the time you have a foothold in the marketplace, it’s already too late for them to do anything about it.

Launching in situations of high demand and low supply also helps startups acquire the right type of customers—those early adopters who might be more forgiving of a company while it works out the kinks. After all, beggars can’t be choosers, and if you are thankful to even have a room during a conference, maybe you’ll forgive the lack of hand towels. The last thing a company wants during its early phases is negative word-of-mouth.

“You are still a startup,” says Teixeira. “You have to find people who are willing to accept your flaws and cut you some slack. Satisfying all their needs and wants is just not feasible at this early stage.”

Next Lesson: From 1,000 to 100,000,000

With early adopters in place, a company can start thinking about how to expand their customer base through more traditional means of marketing.

To tackle that problem, Teixeira wrote a sequel case study, Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Growing from One Thousand to One Million Customers , and is currently working on a third entry in the trilogy that will examine how a platform can go from one million to many millions of customers.

In each case the strategies are different. While word-of-mouth might work for the first thousand it’s not going to get you to a million. “You have to be more proactive and control the acquisition process, which word-of-mouth does not allow for.”

That’s where digital marketing can help, allowing companies to target specific customers through search ads or social media at a low cost.

“It’s highly targetable and you can do it on the cheap,” says Teixeira—adding that digital marketing also makes it easy for companies to rapidly iterate its advertising message, tweaking it to figure out what works best. “Only after passing the millionth customer can you go into advertising on traditional media. That’s when you need massive scale, so you go to mass marketing.”

As a company grows, it must consider the purpose of advertising in order to achieve the best effects in gaining new customers.

“Some tools are better for the beginning, some are better when you are bigger,” says Teixeira. “It’s not about, should I use digital marketing or word-of-mouth or TV ads. The question only makes sense when you say, 'I am at this stage, what approach should I take?' Only when you answer that question will you know what tool is most appropriate.”

In other words, he says, “You need the right size of eggs for each stage of your nest.”

Visit Thales Teixeira's website The Economics of Attention.

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Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Harvard Case Solution & Analysis

Home >> Harvard Case Study Analysis Solutions >> Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution

Introduction:

Startup companies usually compete against each other in order to increase their customers’ base.Over here,the issue is significantly more difficult with new businesses in the sharing economy , which have been launched as platforms in order to connect for providing independent services to customers.

Airbnb, Etsy and Uber have acquired thousands of customers in a very short period of time by using two-sided online platforms, which were determined among the most noteworthy developing web or online startups every where. These commercial centers tried to match the suppliers and demands of assets for rent, physical products or online services with clients.

Among the most well-known two-sided platform shaving rapid growth were Airbnb, Etsy and Uber. They offered short-lived property rentals, assembled merchandise, and auto rides, separately. As two-sided online markets developed to expand, there was a significant impact on the system, which attracted more customers, resulting in an increase in the suppliers for the company as they had to meet the demands of the customers.

If we consider Uber, then it could be said that its platform is two-sided, comparing people who need rides with people who have rides to offer and same idea for Airbnb, which associates people requiring rooms with property owners.In order to launch the platform services, these organizations need to discover clients on both the supply side as well as the demand side.

Therefore, the objective of the case is to determine the platform and marketing strategies of each company, which would increase the number of customers so as to increase the demand. Along with this, it is also important to know the risks and opportunities faced in two sided platform and therefore, strategies should be recommended for further growth to attract the customers by having as trong relationship for a long period.

1.     Are Airbnb, Etsy, and Uber’s strategy of short-term property rentals, handcrafted goods, and car rides, respectively likely to be profitable? Why and why not?

Airbnb strategy for renting the properties:

It is observed in the case that Airbnb, Etsy and Uber are making profits from their respective strategies , which include renting homes, handcrafted goods and car rides.

If we consider the information about Airbnb, then it can be said that it allows renting the properties and the businesses as the hosts allow the people to have extra time to use their income to payback their mortgages or loans or rents. Along with this, in 2012, the apartments San Francisco used the renting option to make payment for expenses.

In 2009, when Airbnb was at its initial growth stage, it started analyzing the factors, which did not increase their initial growth. The founders stayed at Airbnb’s  flats in order to analyze the reason for less booking rates. They recognized the low-quality photos as the main reason and chose to put time and cash in taking better photographs. This support led to the development and growth of renting apartments.

 Along with this, in order to increase the supply of the renting business, the company used email marketing and started to contact people who were listed on the craigslist, which better explains the features and benefits of renting the apartments.

Etsy Strategy for hand crafted goods:

At the point when customers are searching for one of a kind or uniquely crafted products,the Etsy provides trendy website for a business, which allows the customers to make and sell hand crafted or antique goods. With sellers making their own unique products and building their brands on the site, more than 75% of them consider Etsy shop a business.

Etsy, which was established in 2005 and now has 1.5 million active sellers and 21.7 million active buyers as compared to its peers in the same economy. As indicated by the organization's late report, 86% of Etsy’s sellers are ladies, and numerous sellers are custodians with kids at home as most of the sellers work at home and run the business successfully...................

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Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Growing from One Thousand to One Million Customers

By: Thales S. Teixeira, Morgan Brown

By 2016, two-sided online platforms (or marketplaces) were pervasive among the highest growing internet startups around. These marketplaces sought to match suppliers of assets for rent, physical…

• Length: 14 page(s)
• Publication Date: Jun 7, 2016
• Discipline: Marketing
• Product #: 516108-PDF-ENG

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By 2016, two-sided online platforms (or marketplaces) were pervasive among the highest growing internet startups around. These marketplaces sought to match suppliers of assets for rent, physical products or services with customers demanding them. Among the most notable two-sided platforms in terms of their tremendous early growth were Airbnb, Etsy and Uber. They offered short-term property rentals, handcrafted goods, and car rides, respectively. As two-sided markets grew to scale, network effects kicked in as more consumers bred more suppliers and vice versa. But how did these platforms ride the second wave of growth? How did they grow from one thousand to one million customers?

Learning Objectives

The case is intended to teach how to acquire the first million customers and suppliers in two-sided marketplaces (or platforms).

Jun 7, 2016 (Revised: Jan 8, 2018)

Discipline:

Harvard Business School

516108-PDF-ENG

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What Airbnb, Uber and Etsy Can Teach You About Acquiring Your First Thousand Customers

The following is excerpted  from “Unlocking the Customer Value Chain: How Decoupling Drives Consumer Disruption” Copyright © 2019 by Thales S. Teixeira. Published by Currency, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.

Let’s consider how Airbnb acquired its first one thousand customers. In 2008, three friends—Brian Chesky, Joe Gebbia, and Nathan Blecharczyk—were living in San Francisco and working as designers. There was a big de­sign conference coming up in the city, and hotel space was limited. So, Chesky, Gebbia and Blecharczyk decided to try to make some extra money by renting out their loft. They set up a simple website featuring pictures of their loft, promising to provide a home-cooked breakfast to guests in the morning. That first weekend, three renters stayed with them, each paying $80 for the privilege. Shortly after that, Chesky, Gebbia and Blecharczyk began receiving emails from people around the world, and they knew they were on to something. Three months later, they launched their startup, timing it to coincide with the 2008 Democratic National Convention, held in San Fran­cisco. That event allowed them to secure multiple hosts and guests for their website.

Initially, the Airbnb site had very few listings. The founders weren’t sure how to overcome the chicken-and-egg problem. They needed accommodations—initially rooms and then entire houses—in order to attract individuals to browse the site. However, to get owners to cre­ate a listing of their properties, they needed consumer traffic—people looking to rent. Nobody would go to the trouble of listing or search­ing for rentals on a sparsely trafficked site. As it turned out, the sup­ply side was the harder side to grow: many people felt uncomfortable at first with the idea of opening their homes to strangers. Potential renters felt reluctant to take the first step and advertise their proper­ties far and wide. So, the founders decided to do this work for them. Airbnb offered users who listed properties on Airbnb the opportunity to post them to Craigslist as well, even though Craigslist offered no sanctioned way to do this. Airbnb also automated a way to contact property owners on Craigslist to ask them to post their listings on Airbnb.

In mobilizing Craigslist, Airbnb worked hard to distinguish it­self from the incumbent’s online classified listings. But Craigslist possessed an asset that Airbnb lacked: a massive user base. Airbnb knew that travelers who sought more than the standard hotel ex­perience clicked on Craigslist. Craigslist represented an attractive “feeder” for Airbnb because Airbnb’s listings tended to be more personal than listings for other properties on Craigslist, with better descriptions and photos. Standing out to Craigslist users, Airbnb’s more detailed listings lured them over to the Airbnb site. Once there, they tended to book directly through Airbnb the next time around.

Related: Create Brand Loyalty and Acquire Lifetime Customers in 3 Steps

Airbnb’s founders experimented with many tactics for attracting renters to their website, recognizing that what worked in one city or country might flop in another. In France, one of Airbnb’s first non-U.S. destinations, Airbnb employees set up an A/B test in sev­eral localities.

In half of the French cities or towns, they physically visited and promoted Airbnb using low-tech, non-scalable tactics. Teams of two or three people talked to the few users already in that market to understand conditions there. They threw parties and held information sessions, set up booths around town, posted flyers and obtained contact information from everyone they met who showed interest in hosting. They then followed up with more information, an offer to create a listing for prospective renters to review, and the like.

In the other half of French localities in the selection set, Airbnb targeted prospective hosts using Facebook ads, a standard online mass marketing customer acquisition approach. In the first set of cities and towns, Airbnb kept meticulous track of what it cost to send prospective hosts to the Airbnb website (including the cost of throwing parties, setting up booths and other “on the ground” activities) and the listings that resulted. They compared those costs to those of the Facebook ads, tracking the listings that resulted from each. It turned out that the cost per acquisition was five times lower in the cities and towns where Airbnb had deployed the low-tech, non-scalable tactics.  

By the summer of 2009, Airbnb was growing quickly in some local areas, but it hadn’t gained much traction in the important New York City market. To understand why, Gebbia and Chesky flew out and booked rooms and homes with 24 hosts (the two used their own service when traveling). The founders discovered that users weren’t presenting their listings on Airbnb very well.

As Gebbia noted, “The photos were really bad. People were using cam­era phones and taking Craigslist-quality pictures. Surprise! No one was booking because you couldn’t see what you were paying for.” Gebbia and Chesky generated a low-tech but effective solution to this problem. According to Chesky, “A web startup would say, ‘Let’s send emails, teach (users) professional photography, and test them.’ We said, ‘Screw that.’”

Chesky, Gebbia and Blecharczyk rented a $5,000 camera and went door to door, snapping professional pic­tures of as many New York listings as possible. This approach gen­erated two to three times as many bookings on New York listings. By the end of the month, Airbnb’s revenue in the city had doubled. Better-quality pictures from hosts prompted a flurry of other local hosts to step up their game and take better pictures of their proper­ties, or risk not renting them quickly. Importantly, it set the standard for quality photography that future property owners would have to match in order to compete.

By using such tactics to secure a minimal number of listings to their site early on, Airbnb founders bolstered their supply side. This allowed them to attract and sustain demand, which in turn slowly attracted an even greater supply of homes for rent. The flywheel of success started spinning—slowly at first, and then faster. The result, ultimately, was tremendous growth for Airbnb for years to come.

Airbnb’s story is especially interesting because the company didn’t generate demand solely on the basis of a new and innovative idea.

Many online businesses already offered short-term home accommodations, among them HomeAway, VRBO and Couchsurfing.  Yet only Airbnb grew its user base rapidly from zero to thousands, and then to millions—a testament to its prowess at cultivating its first customers.  

So what can entrepreneurs learn about early customer acquisi­tion from Airbnb and, by extension, from other fast-growing mar­ketplaces such as Etsy and Uber?

Analyzing Airbnb’s story, we can discern the following seven principles at work:  

“Buy” customers in bulk

Acquiring users one by one takes too much time. A small startup needs to acquire customers in bulk, as Airbnb did during oversubscribed conferences and by tapping into Craigslist’s user base. Uber and Etsy pursued this strategy as well early on. Uber made itself available to custom­ers at the conclusion of sports events and concerts, when masses of people sought rides. The founders of Etsy visited large crafts fairs to promote their site, signing up entire groups of artisans at each fair.

Don’t confront competitors directly

A startup must avoid putting itself in the crosshairs of established  incumbents. Don’t target their customers. Instead seek out customers they can’t or won’t serve. After concerts, more people need cabs than cab companies can handle. Likewise, when major events such as the Democratic National Convention come to town, hotels reach full capacity. Snatching up the excess demand in these instances allowed startups such as Uber and Airbnb to remain “under the radar” of the giants. By the time they had a foothold in the market, the giants had a hard time catching up.

Adopt non-scalable tactics

Large tech companies tend to obsess over pursuing scalable tactics. If a  tactic doesn’t work for thousands or millions of customers, these companies perceive it as a poor investment. Experts often recommend that startups behave similarly. Yet startups and large tech companies have different needs. Startups desperately need those first 10 customers, while large companies don’t care about adding just 10 more customers to their already enormous base.

By venturing out to people’s homes and hiring photographers to take professional pictures for hosts, as Airbnb did, or by sending people to fairs, as Etsy did, startup marketplaces facilitated the onboarding process. To launch a disruptive business, focus on tactics that seem to work and that yield insight into customers and their needs, no matter how small the impact might be at first. Scale becomes a concern later in a company’s lifecycle. If you lack customers early on, you have nothing to scale.

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Incubate your early customers (and start with the suppliers).

A startup’s initial customers help it enormously, and their relationship with the company is extremely fragile. One slip, and customers vanish. If they stay, as happened with Uber, Airbnb and Etsy, they will help you attract more users, creating a power­ful and indirect network effect as an engine for growth. If you are launching a two-sided marketplace, focus on acquiring supply-side customers before going after the demand side. Provide all customers with the best experience, regardless of whether you can do so profitably or in a scalable way. This early investment will yield dividends; as we’ll see, your first customers do more than just pay for your business to operate.

Use low-tech, offline tools

Tech startups tend to dismiss offline customer acquisition tools, such  as organizing events, cre­ating on-the-ground operations, or incentivizing users to talk to acquaintances about their services. Yet Airbnb’s deployment of such tools fueled its early growth. Only over time, as the company’s growth rate stabilized, did it switch to online customer acquisi­tion channels.

Favor operations over technology at first

Technology can help business processes to scale, but  it usually doesn’t allow them to get off the ground. For a disruptive business to succeed, it needs to work, plain and simple. Online marketplaces must match sup­ply and demand. Early on, you cannot expect technology alone to accomplish this difficult task. Uber went door-to-door to get its first drivers to sign up. Airbnb did the same for its renters, and when it convinced people to list their homes, its employees went out of their way to find a person to rent each home.

A platform manager must take the hand of a buyer and find a supplier so that a transaction can occur. Otherwise, buyers and suppliers might not match up, and they will never return to the platform. Any disruptive business seeking to attract customers must appeal to them one at a time. Only afterward can technology accelerate the process. 

See your business through your customer’s eyes

I’ve em­phasized the importance of viewing  disruption through your cus­tomer’s eyes. This holds doubly true for online marketplaces, with their disparate customer groups. The CEOs of Uber and Airbnb routinely used their services in order to see and experience what their buyers were experiencing. They also made sure they under­stood the challenges suppliers faced by driving a car or renting out a house. Any new business seeking to attract customers has to inhabit the customer’s point of view deeply, making operational adjustments so as to lower the effort, time and monetary costs that both types of customers pay.

“Unlocking the Customer Value Chain” is available tomorrow at fine booksellers and can be purchased via StartupNation.com.

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Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution & Answer

Home » Case Study Analysis Solutions » Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution

Etsy is involved in the creation of unique goods and most of the staff use their earnings in reinvestment of the business as Etsy also appears to draw entrepreneurs who do notwork a typical full time job;only 36% are full-time workers and others work separately or as part time job.

Etsy used a seller handbook as a strategy in order to increase its sales, which shows the best practices to create awareness among the sellers regarding the offerings to be provided to all customers. The seller handbook provides the comprehensive guide for existing customers as well as for new customers. Their motto was to make each buyer a permanent user.

Uber strategy for car ride:

Uber demographics adjust reasonably with the bigger sharing economy. Uber had part time drivers, who hadno past in driving and worked under 30 hours every week, and this statistic represents more than half of the drivers in the company.

Uber entirely changed the way in which the clients used to get the uber car. In the first place, Uber introduced an application for smartphones, which was coordinated with Google maps so that the client could perceive how far away the nearest cars were, set a meeting point on the screen, and then meet the driver there. A customer could even view their driver’s data, including evaluations.

Uber X, a lower-cost version of the service, was presented a year later and it comprised of afleet which were like taxi or black colored cars, whereas Uber Black drivers, offered high end services.  Compare and contrast the marketing strategies used by Airbnb, Etsy, and Uber

Airbnb marketing strategy:

Airbnb used the community building strategy, which is a typical approach to make a “viral circle” to offer money related remuneration for referrals. Airbnb made use of this system, as it offered rebates for clients, which attracted new visitors and hosts. Numerous advanced commercial centers succeeded by building active groups through their advertising. Airbnb particularly considered itself as a group commercial market place.

Along with this, Airbnb used Craigs list combination, which provided the listing information of the standard hotels as a massive customer base to target the customers.

In order to increase the supply, Airbnb used email marketing and contacted each individual personally to share the benefits of the renting apartments through the use of craigslist. On the other hand, in order to increase the demand, Airbnb convinced the craigslist users to advertise the renting properties.

Etsy marketing strategy:

Etsy used content marketing by developing the seller’s handbook, which provided the comprehensive guidelines to sell the goods effectively. The structure of Etsy is decentralized in which the users can connect on the internet with the central node in which the sellers and buyers can connect with each other. Etsy is an e-commerce site that serves as a marketing tool to sell the goods. Etsy is considered as the community of artists, creators and thinkers rather than just a marketplace.

Along with this, Etsy used affiliate marketing strategy in its revenue generation model, which led to better relationships with the customers through own marketing efforts.

Uber marketing strategy:

One of the key promoting techniques which they used was viral marketing/referral advertising where any Uber client can give out a particular code to a first time client and as a result, that client will get $20 in credit. This also worked better for their ambassadors. Usually,in specific events, uber is promoted through Instagram by including celebrities in their promotion, in order to attract clients in which Uber provides a code from which the new clients can get $20-$50 credit on their account.

They also used a mixture of customer acquisition strategy, however they considered word of mouth, in light of the fact that their services were great and ubiquitous and have been their best practice.

They made a commercial center therefore, it is essential that they advertise themselves to the supply side (drivers)as well as to the demand side (riders/clients). Their model worked well and that was the reason Uber is one of the best privately owned businesses in the world………………

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At Fern Fort University, we use Harvard Business Review (HBR) marketing principles and framework to analyze Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study. Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers is a Harvard Business Review case study written by Thales S. Teixeira, Morgan Brownfor the students of Sales & Marketing. The case study also include other relevant topics and learning material on – IT, Marketing Strategic Marketing Analysis of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study written by Thales S. Teixeira, Morgan Brown will comprise following sections –

• Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Description

Marketing Definition

Market potential analysis of airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers, market share potential analysis.

• Segmentation and Segment Attractiveness Analysis
• Competition and Competitiveness Analysis of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers
• Customer Value Analysis of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study

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Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Marketing Case Description

Sales & marketing case study | authors :: thales s. teixeira, morgan brown.

By 2016, two-sided online platforms (or marketplaces) were pervasive among the highest growing internet startups around. These marketplaces sought to match suppliers of assets for rent, physical products or services with customers demanding them. Among the most notable two-sided platforms in terms of their tremendous early growth were Airbnb, Etsy and Uber. They offered short-term property rentals, handcrafted goods, and car rides, respectively. As two-sided markets grew to scale, network effects kicked in as more consumers bred more suppliers and vice versa. But how did these platforms acquire their first customers, at the time when they had so few providers? How exactly did they go about acquiring their first thousand customers?

IT, Marketing

According to American Marketing Association – Marketing is a set of activities that a firm undertakes for creating, communicating, delivering, & exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.

Kotler explains - Marketing is a process by which organizations can create value for its potential and current customers and build strong customer relationships in order to capture value in return.

Market potential analysis comprises evaluating the overall market size of the related product that the firm is planning to launch. This will involve defining – Why the target market segment needs the product and how it will provide a solution to full its consumers’ needs. Market potential of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers products various on factors such as –

• Maturity of the market. In mature markets the profitability is often stable but the market potential is less as most of the players have already taken market share based on the segment they are serving. New players have to go for market share strategies in marketing.
• Technological competence of the existing players and culture of innovation and development in the industry.
• Untapped market sizes and barriers to both enter the market and serving the customers. Often companies can easily see the unfulfilled needs in the markets but they are difficult to serve as there are costly barriers.
• Define the core need that your product is serving and list out all the direct and indirect competitors in the market place. This will help not only in positioning of the product but also in defining or creating a segment better.
• Uncovering the current and untapped market sizes and barriers to serving the larger market. Analyze the areas that you need to sort out while launching the products to wider market and what are the challenges the firm will face in market place.
• Estimate the current stage in product life cycle and its implications for marketing decisions for the product.
• Understanding the buyer behavior model for Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customersindustry.
• Identifying the market share drivers relevant to Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers market.
• Segment Attractiveness Analysis – Our analysis will work out which are the most attractive segments and which are the one the firm should go ahead and target. We point out in great detail which segments will be most lucrative for the company to enter.
• Understanding the different needs and relative value of your offering by segment.
• Developing segment priorities and positioning the product based on the product need fit developed by the firm.

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Competition & Competitive Position Analysis

• Uncovering customer-based competitive positions for key rivals and firm’s offering. This will not only help in assessing the strengths and weaknesses of the competitors but also help in defining and positioning of the product.
• Developing a positioning and launching strategy. It will require not only distribution channel analysis but also promotion mix for the product.
• Strategic Marketing Planning — the process of developing and maintaining a strategic fit between the organization’s objectives and capabilities and the ever evolving marketing opportunities for its products.

Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers - Customer Value Analysis

Capturing customer value is essential to marketing efforts as it results in higher return in the form of both current & future sales, greater market share, and higher profits. By creating superior customer value, the organization can create highly satisfied customers who stay loyal and buy more. This, in turn, means greater long-run returns for the firm.

• The crucial role of customer perceived value in acquiring and retaining profitable customers. Product differentiation is often based on building on a value niche that a firm believes that is very important to the customer. This niche contributes to perceived value. If the perceived value is high then customer stay loyal to the product if not then she can switch to the competitor’s product.
• Graphically displaying value differences for deeper understanding and better internal communication. This helps is building a narrative that a customer can identify with. The better the insight more are the chances of connecting with the potential customers.
• Identifying and selecting actionable value creation options. This can help in increasing the customer lifetime value. Customer lifetime value is the value of the entire stream of purchases that the customer would make over a lifetime of patronage.

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Expert Commentary

Uber, Airbnb and consequences of the sharing economy: Research roundup

2015 selection of research that helps define, understand and analyze the sharing economy, those who participate in it and its economic impact.

Republish this article

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License .

by Joanna Penn and John Wihbey, The Journalist's Resource June 3, 2016

This <a target="_blank" href="https://journalistsresource.org/economics/airbnb-lyft-uber-bike-share-sharing-economy-research-roundup/">article</a> first appeared on <a target="_blank" href="https://journalistsresource.org">The Journalist's Resource</a> and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.<img src="https://journalistsresource.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/cropped-jr-favicon-150x150.png" style="width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;">

The leading businesses that are advancing the concept of the  “sharing economy”  are in many respects no longer insurgents and newcomers. The size and scale of Uber, Airbnb and several other firms now rival, or even surpass, those of some of the world’s largest businesses in transportation, hospitality and other sectors. As the economic power of these technology-driven firms grows, there continue to be regulatory and policy skirmishes on every possible front, across cities and towns spanning the United States , Europe and beyond.

While many municipalities and regions have accepted change as inevitable and have been eager to facilitate new efficiencies for consumers — Uber in particular has made a lot of regulatory headway  since 2015 — there have been cases, such as in Austin, Tex.  in May 2016, where policies have been in effect reversed to block these new forms of commerce. These fights are looking more and more like political campaigns . In any case, a  2015 report from the National League of Cities reviews regulatory policies and patterns across a variety of dimensions, from safety to innovation; a 2016 report from the European Parliament weighs the costs and benefits of non-participation in the sharing economy.

The Economics and Statistics Administration of the U.S. Commerce Department issued a report in June 2016 that attempts to define and map out the contours of this emerging business sector, labeling its participants “digital matching firms.”   That report defines this sector through the four following characteristics:

• They use information technology (IT systems), typically available via web-based platforms, such as mobile “apps” on Internet- enabled devices, to facilitate peer-to-peer transactions.
• They rely on user-based rating systems for quality control, ensuring a level of trust between consumers and service providers who have not previously met.
• They offer the workers who provide services via digital matching platforms flexibility in deciding their typical working hours.
• To the extent that tools and assets are necessary to provide a service, digital matching firms rely on the workers using their own.

The implications of the sharing economy — part of what has also been termed the “gig economy” — have of course been hotly debated in the news media, and the research world has been steadily weighing in with deeper analysis. One central area of argument relates to whether the sharing economy is simply bringing more wage-earning opportunities to more people, or whether its net effect is the displacement of traditionally secure jobs and the creation of a land of part-time, low-paid work. It’s a debate that continues to develop and play out, forcing reporters to weigh competing claims that vary in tone from boosterism to warnings of the new economy’s “dark side.”

While the conclusions about the overall effects of this sector are anything but clear, even as more data pour in, it is worth digging into the available literature and knowing the centers of research debate and lines of argument.

A January 2015 paper co-authored by Princeton’s Alan Krueger — the former Chairman of President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers — based on Uber’s internal data finds clear benefits for “driver-partners” and notes the new financial opportunities created for tens of thousands of workers. Those conclusions have been critiqued by, for example, the liberal-leaning Center for Economic and Policy Research. In any case, the Krueger paper also argues that “the availability of modern technology, like the Uber app, provides many advantages and lower prices for consumers compared with the traditional taxi cab dispatch system, and this has boosted demand for ride services, which, in turn, has increased total demand for workers with the requisite skills to work as for-hire drivers, potentially raising earnings for all workers with such skills.”

There is the distinct danger, on both sides, of overstating the case and the size of effects. A 2014 paper by Annette Bernhardt of University of California, Berkeley, signals a cautionary note about any claims of radical recent change being wrought across the U.S. economy:

[We] all share a strong intuition that the nature of work has fundamentally changed, contributing to the deterioration of labor standards. Yet at least with aggregate national data, it has been hard to find evidence of a strong, unambiguous shift toward nonstandard or contingent forms of work – especially in contrast to the dramatic increase in wage inequality. This is not to say that there have been no changes in the workplace. But as this paper has emphasized, for enforcement agencies and policymakers, it may be more fruitful to focus on specific industries and regions in assessing when and where pernicious forms of nonstandard work have grown, and which groups of workers have been most impacted.

It is also true that the rise of independent workers , and associated job insecurity, long predates the recent rise of the sharing economy, although their percentage of all U.S. workers is expected to grow from about one-third currently to 40% by 2020, according to some estimates.

A 2015 report from the Center for American Progress notes the heated debate in Britain over “zero hours contracts” and charges that highly insecure and contingent employment leads to the exploitation of workers. The report — co-authored by Harvard’s Lawrence Summers, a top official in both the Clinton and Obama administrations, and Ed Balls, a British Labour Party MP — notes that “technology has allowed a sharing economy to develop in the United States; many of these jobs offer flexibility to workers, many of whom are working a second job and using it to build income or are parents looking for flexible work schedules. At the same time, when these jobs are the only source of income for workers and they provide no benefits, that leaves workers or the state to pay these costs.”

Meanwhile, scholars such as Juliet Schor of Boston College have been examining how workers might regain bargaining power despite an increasingly app-based, decentralized system of distributed labor. “While the for-profit companies may be ‘acting badly,'” she writes in an October 2014 essay, “these new technologies of peer-to-peer economic activity are potentially powerful tools for building a social movement centered on genuine practices of sharing and cooperation in the production and consumption of goods and services. But achieving that potential will require democratizing the ownership and governance of the platforms.”

Fights over rules and regulations

In October 2014 the New York State Attorney General released a report into Airbnb’s operations that concluded that 72% of the site’s rentals violated state zoning regulations or other laws. The company’s business model is built around allowing people to rent out rooms or entire apartments on a short-term basis, and the report is the latest in a series of ongoing battles Airbnb is engaged in with regulators across the world.

Berlin has banned regular short-term rentals in the most popular parts of the city without prior permission from the authorities. Paris passed a law in February 2014 to allow city inspectors to check rental homes whose owners are suspected of renting them out to visitors illegally. Airbnb has countered with its own reports on the benefits of short-term stays on local housing markets, arguing that the company’s service benefits local economies .

Also known as collaborative consumption or peer-to-peer (P2P), the sharing economy challenges traditional notions of private ownership and is instead based on the shared production or consumption of goods and services. Its origins were in not-for-profit initiatives such as Wikipedia (2001) and Couchsurfing and Freecycle (both 2003). Advances in information technology enabled the creation of large-scale bike-share systems (the first was in Lyon, France, in 2005), and these have subsequently expanded to the United States and around the world.

Social media and mobile technology have enabled the latest expansion of the sharing economy and turned it into a big business : Airbnb allows individuals to share their homes, while Lyft and Uber transform private cars into common resources. All these are for-profit services, but they take only a fraction of the fees levied, passing the rest on to the owners: In 2013 it was estimated that revenues passing through the sharing economy into people’s wallets exceeded $3.5 billion , up 25% from the previous year. Airbnb has exceeded 10 million guest-stays since its launch and now has more than half a million properties listed. Meanwhile Uber has said that it is doubling its revenue every six months.

As a 2014 article in Harvard Business Review noted, the interests of sharing-economy firms and city governments are often aligned, but failing to engage early on with potential regulators can raise the suspicion that companies are trying to exploit loopholes rather than develop a legitimate business model. For example, courts in Frankfurt recently upheld a national ban on Uber, and the service has been banned in several Canadian cities as well. At the heart of many of these debates is whether Uber is, as it claims, operating as a pure technology company, providing a match-making service to willing participants, or whether it is operating in effect as an unlicensed taxi service, which was the conclusion of Calgary’s city council . Moreover, a Massachusetts class-action lawsuit asserts that Uber exploits its drivers, misclassifying them as independent contractors to avoid paying them as employees with the same benefits.

Examples from elsewhere in the world shows such fractious relationships with regulators need not be the norm. In February 2014, Amsterdam became the first city to pass so-called “Airbnb friendly” legislation . A law allowing short-term rentals by permanent San Francisco residents was finalized in October 2014, but requires them to collect city hotel taxes and imposes other restrictions. In London, 1970s regulations limiting short-term stays were scrapped , making it easier for Airbnb and others to operate in the city. The British government has even launched an initiative to make the U.K. the “global centre for [the] sharing economy.” Similarly, while some traditional operators have fought sharing start-ups , others have chosen to get in on the game themselves: In 2013 Avis paid half a billion dollars for the car-sharing service Zipcar, and Hertz has started a similar service.

Below are a range of additional academic articles that seek to define, understand and analyze the sharing economy, those who participate and its economic impact.

——————————

Latest research

“Owning, Using and Renting: Some Simple Economics of the ‘Sharing Economy'” Horton, John J.; Zeckhauser, Richard J. NBER Working Paper No. 22029, February 2016.

Abstract: “New Internet-based markets enable consumer/owners to rent out their durable goods when not using them. Such markets are modeled to determine ownership, rental rates, quantities, and surplus generated. Both the short run, before consumers can revise their ownership decisions, and the long run, in which they can, are examined to assess how these markets change ownership and consumption. The analysis examines bringing-to-market costs, such as labor costs and transaction costs, and considers the operating platform’s pricing problem. A survey of consumers broadly supports the modeling assumptions employed. For example, ownership is determined by individuals’ forward-looking assessments of planned usage.”

“Does the Sharing Economy Do Any Good?” Dillahunt, Tawanna, et al. Proceedings of the 19th ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing Companion, Pages 197-200, 2016.

Abstract: “Despite the benefits offered by sharing economy, researchers have identified several challenges preventing disadvantaged groups (e.g. low socioeconomic status, un(der)employed and/or users from emerging regions) from receiving the same level of benefits as those from advantaged populations. This panel brings researchers from the sharing economy and mobile crowdsourcing space whose research has identified unique challenges for underserved populations. We consider the opportunities offered by these platforms to disadvantaged communities and examine to what extent these platforms instead may recreate disadvantage, as well as the workarounds communities employ to make these platforms work for them. We examine the opportunities for the CSCW [Computer Supported Cooperative Work] community to address these challenges going forward.”

“The Sharing Economy: Reports from Stage One” Schor, Juliet B. Working paper, Boston College, November 2015.

Abstract: “The sharing economy has generated heated controversy as proponents claim it is bringing efficiency, opportunity and sociability and critics argue it is degrading labor, exacerbating inequality and commodifying daily life. Here we discuss findings from in-depth interviews with providers on three for-profit platforms (Airbnb, Relay Rides and TaskRabbit) and find a mixed picture. Providers are generally pleased with their earning possibilities although there is some evidence that conditions are eroding for providers of general labor services. With respect to sociability and commodification we also find a mixed picture.”

“Who Benefits from the ‘Sharing’ Economy of Airbnb?” Quattrone, Giovanni, et al. WWW ’16 Proceedings of the 25th International Conference on World Wide Web, Pages 1385-1394, 2016.

Abstract: “Sharing economy platforms have become extremely popular in the last few years, and they have changed the way in which we commute, travel, and borrow among many other activities. Despite their popularity among consumers, such companies are poorly regulated. For example, Airbnb, one of the most successful examples of sharing economy platform, is often criticized by regulators and policy makers. While, in theory, municipalities should regulate the emergence of Airbnb through evidence-based policy making, in practice, they engage in a false dichotomy: some municipalities allow the business without imposing any regulation, while others ban it altogether. That is because there is no evidence upon which to draft policies. Here we propose to gather evidence from the Web. After crawling Airbnb data for the entire city of London, we find out where and when Airbnb listings are offered and, by matching such listing information with census and hotel data, we determine the socio-economic conditions of the areas that actually benefit from the hospitality platform. The reality is more nuanced than one would expect, and it has changed over the years. Airbnb demand and offering have changed over time, and traditional regulations have not been able to respond to those changes. That is why, finally, we rely on our data analysis to envision regulations that are responsive to real-time demands, contributing to the emerging idea of ‘algorithmic regulation.'”

“Peeking Beneath the Hood of Uber” Chen, Le, et al. IMC ’15 Proceedings of the 2015 ACM Conference on Internet Measurement Conference, Pages 495-508, 2015.

Abstract: “Recently, Uber has emerged as a leader in the “sharing economy”. Uber is a “ride sharing” service that matches willing drivers with customers looking for rides. However, unlike other open marketplaces (e.g., AirBnB), Uber is a black-box: they do not provide data about supply or demand, and prices are set dynamically by an opaque “surge pricing” algorithm. The lack of transparency has led to concerns about whether Uber artificially manipulate prices, and whether dynamic prices are fair to customers and drivers. In order to understand the impact of surge pricing on passengers and drivers, we present the first in-depth investigation of Uber. We gathered four weeks of data from Uber by emulating 43 copies of the Uber smartphone app and distributing them throughout downtown San Francisco (SF) and midtown Manhattan. Using our dataset, we are able to characterize the dynamics of Uber in SF and Manhattan, as well as identify key implementation details of Uber’s surge price algorithm. Our observations about Uber’s surge price algorithm raise important questions about the fairness and transparency of this system.”

What is the sharing economy and who participates?

“Avoiding the South Side and the Suburbs: The Geography of Mobile Crowdsourcing Markets” Jacob Thebault-Spieker; Loren Terveen; Brent Hecht. Urban Environments CSCW 2015, March 14-18, 2015, Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Abstract: “Mobile crowdsourcing markets (e.g., Gigwalk and TaskRabbit) offer crowdworkers tasks situated in the physical world (e.g., checking street signs, running household errands). The geographic nature of these tasks distinguishes these markets from online crowdsourcing markets and raises new, fundamental questions. We carried out a controlled study in the Chicago metropolitan area aimed at addressing two key questions: (1) What geographic factors influence whether a crowdworker will be willing to do a task? (2) What geographic factors influence how much compensation a crowdworker will demand in order to do a task? Quantitative modeling shows that travel distance to the location of the task and the socioeconomic status (SES) of the task area are important factors. Qualitative analysis enriches our modeling, with workers mentioning safety and difficulties getting to a location as key considerations. Our results suggest that lowSES areas are currently less able to take advantage of the benefits of mobile crowdsourcing markets. We discuss the implications of our study for these markets, as well as for ‘sharing economy’ phenomena like UberX, which have many properties in common with mobile crowdsourcing markets.”

“The Sharing Economy: Why People Participate in Collaborative Consumption” Hamari, Juho; Sjöklint, Mimmi; Ukkonen, Antti. Social Science Research Network, May 2013.

Abstract: “In recent years, [information and communications technologies] have afforded the rise of the so called ‘collaborative consumption’ (CC) — a form of consumption where people share consumption of goods and services online. CC has been expected to alleviate societal problems such as hyper-consumption, pollution, and poverty by lowering transaction costs related to coordination of economic activities within communities…. The motivation to participate in CC is often regarded as fuelled by the aspirations to do good, but at the same time CC offers participants possible economic benefits. In this paper we investigate the role of these intrinsic and extrinsic motivations in attitudes and participation. The study employs survey data (N=168) and structural equation modeling (SEM-PLS). The results show that, whereas intrinsic motivations strongly predict attitudes, they do not translate as well into usage intentions. Conversely, economic benefits predict use intentions but do not significantly influence attitude. Furthermore, the attitude-behavior gap seems to loom in the consumption behavior related to collaborative consumption; people perceive the activity positively and say good things about it, but they might not still participate in it themselves.”

“The Promise of the Sharing Economy among Disadvantaged Communities “ Tawanna R. Dillahunt; Amelia R. Malone. ACM Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI) 2015, April 18 – 23 2015, Seoul, Republic of Korea. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2702123.2702189

Abstract: “The digital-sharing economy presents opportunities for individuals to find temporary employment, generate extra income, increase reciprocity, enhance social interaction, and access resources not otherwise attainable. Although the sharing economy is profitable, little is known about its use among the unemployed or those struggling financially. This paper describes the results of a participatory-design based workshop to investigate the perception and feasibility of finding temporary employment and sharing spare resources using sharing-economy applications. Specifically, this study included 20 individuals seeking employment in a U.S. city suffering economic decline. We identify success factors of the digital-sharing economy to these populations, identify shortcomings and propose mitigation strategies based on prior research related to trust, social capital and theories of collective efficacy. Finally, we contribute new principles that may foster collaborative consumption within this population and identify new concepts for practical employment applications among these populations.”

“You Are What You Can Access: Sharing and Collaborative Consumption Online” Belk, Russell; Journal of Business Research , August 2014, Vol. 67, Issue 8, doi: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2013.10.001.

Abstract: “Sharing is a phenomenon as old as humankind, while collaborative consumption and the ‘sharing economy’ are phenomena born of the Internet age. This paper compares sharing and collaborative consumption and finds that both are growing in popularity today. Examples are given and an assessment is made of the reasons for the current growth in these practices and their implications for businesses still using traditional models of sales and ownership. The old wisdom that we are what we own may need modifying to consider forms of possession and uses that do not involve ownership.”

“When Is Ours Better Than Mine? A Framework for Understanding and Altering Participation in Commercial Sharing Systems” Lamberton, Cait Poynor; Rose, Randall L. Journal of Marketing , July 2012, Vol. 76, No. 4, 109-125.

Abstract: “Sharing systems are increasingly challenging sole ownership as the dominant means of obtaining product benefits, making up a market estimated at more than US$100 billion annually in 2010. Consumer options include cell phone minute-sharing plans, frequent-flyer-mile pools, bicycle-sharing programs, and automobile-sharing systems, among many others. However, marketing research has yet to provide a framework for understanding and managing these emergent systems. The authors conceptualize commercial sharing systems within a typology of shared goods. Using three studies, they demonstrate that beyond cost-related benefits of sharing, the perceived risk of scarcity related to sharing is a central determinant of its attractiveness. The results suggest that managers can use perceptions of personal and sharing partners’ usage patterns to affect risk perceptions and subsequent propensity to participate in a commercial sharing system.”

“Alternative Marketplaces in the 21st Century: Building Community Through Sharing Events” Albinsson, P. A.; Yasanthi Perera, B. Journal of Consumer Behaviour , July/August 2012, Vol. 11, Issue 4.

Abstract : “We examine alternative consumption including collaborative consumption, sharing, and unconsumption (i.e., postconsumption activities such as upcycling, reuse, recycling, etc.) at non-monetary-based private and public sharing events including Really Really Free Markets (RRFMs). These alternative marketplaces (RRFMs) were initially organized by the Anarchist Movement as a form of resistance to the capitalist economic model. However, many consumer groups now utilize this model to stage public sharing events as a means of raising awareness about various issues including sustainability and overconsumption. Participants bring, share, and take goods without any expectation of monetary or other exchange. There is limited research on collaborative consumption and sharing in non-monetary marketplaces. We address this gap by exploring alternative marketplaces, organized by consumers for consumers, utilizing qualitative research methods. Our findings indicate that a sense of community is both a driver of participation and an outcome of these events. Organizers and participants utilize these venues to share knowledge and possessions for various ideological and practical reasons. Our findings also indicate that these events challenge the entrenched notions of exchange and reciprocity. Our research contributes to the literature by highlighting the importance of community, collaboration, and changing consumer mindsets to the success of such sharing efforts.”

“Does Sharing Mean Caring? Regulating Innovation in the Sharing Economy” Ranchordas, Sofia, Tilburg Law School-Department of Public Law, Social Science Research Network, September 2014.

Abstract: “Sharing economy practices have become increasingly popular in the past years. From swapping systems, network transportation to private kitchens, sharing with strangers appears to be the new urban trend. Although Uber, Airbnb, and other online platforms have democratized the access to a number of services and facilities, multiple concerns have been raised as to the public safety, health and limited liability of these sharing economy practices. In addition, these innovative activities have been contested by professionals offering similar services that claim that sharing economy is opening the door to unfair competition. Regulators are at crossroads: on the one hand, innovation in sharing economy should not be stifled by excessive and outdated regulation; on the other, there is a real need to protect the users of these services from fraud, liability and unskilled service providers. This dilemma is far more complex than it seems since regulators are confronted here with an array of challenging questions: firstly, can these sharing economy practices be qualified as “innovations” worth protecting and encouraging? Secondly, should the regulation of these practices serve the same goals as the existing rules for the equivalent commercial services (e.g. taxi regulations)? Thirdly, how can regulation keep up with the evolving nature of these innovative practices? All these questions, come down to one simple problem: too little is known about the most socially effective ways of consistently regulating and promoting innovation.”

“The Social Logics of Sharing” John, Nicholas A. Communication Review, July 2013, Vol 16, Issue 3.

Abstract : “This article explores the concept of sharing in three distinct spheres: Web 2.0, whose constitutive activity is sharing (links, photos, status updates, and so on); ‘sharing economies’ of production and consumption; and intimate interpersonal relationships, in which the therapeutic ethos includes a cultural requirement that we share our emotions. It is argued that a range of distributive and communicative practices — not all of which are entirely new–are converging under the metaphor of sharing. Thus, practices in one sphere are conceptualized in terms of practices from other spheres. What all three spheres of sharing have in common are values such as equality, mutuality, honesty, openness, empathy, and an ethic of care. Moreover, they all challenge prevalent perceptions of the proper boundary between the public and the private.”

“Sharing Nicely: On Shareable Goods and the Emergence of Sharing as a Modality of Economic Production” Benkler, Yochai, Yale Law Journal , November 2004, Vol. 114, No. 2.

Abstract: “This essay offers a framework to explain large-scale effective practices of sharing private, excludable goods. It starts with case studies of carpooling and distributed computing as motivating problems. It then suggests a definition for shareable goods as goods that are “lumpy” and “mid-grained” in size, and explains why goods with these characteristics will have systematic overcapacity relative to the requirements of their owners. The Essay next uses comparative transaction costs analysis, focused on information characteristics in particular, combined with an analysis of diversity of motivations, to suggest when social sharing will be better than secondary markets at reallocating this overcapacity to non-owners who require the functionality. The essay concludes with broader observations about the attractiveness of sharing as a modality of economic production as compared to markets and to hierarchies such as firms and government. These observations include a particular emphasis on sharing practices among individuals who are strangers or weakly related; sharing’s relationship to technological change; and some implications for contemporary policy choices regarding wireless regulation, intellectual property, and communications network design.”

Shared accommodation

“Social Networking Technologies and the Moral Economy of Alternative Tourism: The Case of Couchsurfing.org” Molz, Jennie Germann. Annals of Tourism Research, October 2013, Vol. 43, 210-230.

Abstract: “The purpose of this study is to examine the role social networking technologies play in the moral economy of alternative tourism. The study takes as its empirical focus the online hospitality exchange network Couchsurfing. Using the concept of ‘moral affordances’, the analysis outlines the way Couchsurfing’s technical systems, software design, and search algorithms enable participants to engage in a moral economy based on the non-commodified provision of accommodation to strangers and personal relations of trust and intimacy. Findings suggest that these affordances are not isolated effects of the technologies themselves, but rather reflect a broader moral landscape in which alternative tourism is performed.”

“The Rise of the Sharing Economy: Estimating the Impact of Airbnb on the Hotel Industry” Zervas, Georgios; Proserpio, Davide and Byers, John; Boston U. School of Management Research Paper No. 2013-16, February 2014.

Abstract: “Airbnb is an online community marketplace facilitating short-term rentals ranging from shared accommodations to entire homes that has now contributed more than ten million worldwide bookings to the so-called sharing economy. Our work addresses a central question facing the hospitality industry: to what extent are Airbnb stays serving as substitutes for hotel stays, and what is the impact on the bottom line of affected hotels? Our focus is the state of Texas, where we identify Airbnb’s impact by exploiting significant spatiotemporal variation in the patterns of adoption across city-level markets. Using a dataset we collected spanning all Airbnb listings in Texas and a decade-long panel of quarterly tax revenue for all Texas hotels, we develop a nuanced estimate of Airbnb’s material impact on hotel revenues. Our baseline estimate is that a 1% increase in Airbnb listings in Texas results in a 0.05% decrease in quarterly hotel revenues, an estimate compounded by Airbnb’s rapid growth.… We find that the impacts are distributed unevenly across the industry, with lower-end hotels and hotels not catering to business travelers being the most affected. Finally, by simulating various regulatory interventions informed by current events, such as limiting Airbnb hosts to a single listing, we find only a moderate mitigating impact on hotel revenues.”

Shared transport

“Ride On! Mobility Business Models for the Sharing Economy” Cohen, Boyd; Kietzmann, Jan; Organization and Environment, September 2014, Vol. 7, No. 3.

Extract: “The P2P ride-sharing platforms like Uber and Lyft have opted for a seemingly infinitely scalable, pure, for-profit business model. As these ride-share platforms have no need to hire drivers or acquire vehicles, Uber and Lyft and others like them, rely on the power of social networking to scale their service. As evidenced by their rapid growth and high valuations, it is clear these ride-share companies have achieved some early success in maximizing value to their customers… However, the private ride-share operators, to date have opted to avoid interaction with local governments. As mentioned earlier, this has resulted in significant challenges to the longevity of their business models due to legal action and other threats posed by local governments and taxi operators. We suggest that this can be explained, in part, by the failure to consider more active engagement with local governments from the beginning. While the go-it-alone approach and avoiding local government and regulation has been a historical modus operandi in other sectors (Konefal, 2013), we suggest that shared mobility service providers would be better served by finding ways to collaborate with local governments if they want to achieve long-term viability. Not only would this entail adhering to regulations in areas such as vehicle and driver safety requirements but also seeking to optimize the citizen and environmental goals to achieve active city support. Any direct financial support, or incentives that promote the use of these P2P networks, such as embedding the ride-sharing data into transit applications, could result in a reduction in costs for riders.”

“Quantifying the Benefits of Vehicle Pooling with Shareability Networks” Santini, Paolo; Resta, Giovanni; Szell, Michael; et al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America , July 2014, Vol. 111 No 37.

Abstract: “Taxi services are a vital part of urban transportation, and a considerable contributor to traffic congestion and air pollution causing substantial adverse effects on human health. Sharing taxi trips is a possible way of reducing the negative impact of taxi services on cities, but this comes at the expense of passenger discomfort quantifiable in terms of a longer travel time. Due to computational challenges, taxi sharing has traditionally been approached on small scales, such as within airport perimeters, or with dynamical ad hoc heuristics. However, a mathematical framework for the systematic understanding of the tradeoff between collective benefits of sharing and individual passenger discomfort is lacking. Here we introduce the notion of shareability network, which allows us to model the collective benefits of sharing as a function of passenger inconvenience, and to efficiently compute optimal sharing strategies on massive datasets. We apply this framework to a dataset of millions of taxi trips taken in New York City, showing that with increasing but still relatively low passenger discomfort, cumulative trip length can be cut by 40% or more. This benefit comes with reductions in service cost, emissions, and with split fares, hinting toward a wide passenger acceptance of such a shared service. Simulation of a realistic online system demonstrates the feasibility of a shareable taxi service in New York City. Shareability as a function of trip density saturates fast, suggesting effectiveness of the taxi sharing system also in cities with much sparser taxi fleets or when willingness to share is low.”

“Access-Based Consumption: The Case for Car Sharing” Bardhi , Fleura ; Eckhardt, Giana M., Journal of Consumer Research , December 2012, Vol. 39, No. 4, 881-898.

Abstract: “ Access-based consumption, defined as transactions that can be market mediated but where no transfer of ownership takes place, is becoming increasingly popular, yet it is not well theorized. This study examines the nature of access as it contrasts to ownership and sharing, specifically the consumer-object, consumer-consumer, and consumer-marketer relationships. Six dimensions are identified to distinguish among the range of access-based consumptionscapes: temporality, anonymity, market mediation, consumer involvement, the type of accessed object, and political consumerism. Access-based consumption is examined in the context of car sharing via an interpretive study of Zipcar consumers. Four outcomes of these dimensions in the context of car sharing are identified: lack of identification, varying significance of use and sign value, negative reciprocity resulting in a big-brother model of governance, and a deterrence of brand community. The implications of our findings for understanding the nature of exchange, consumption, and brand community are discussed.”

“Understanding the Diffusion of Public Bikesharing Systems: Evidence from Europe and North America” Parkes, Stephen D; Marsden, Greg; Shaheen, Susan A.; and Cohen, Adam P., Journal of Transport Geography, July 2013, Vol. 31.

Abstract: “Since the mid-2000s, public bikesharing (also known as “bike hire”) has developed and spread into a new form of mobility in cities across the globe. This paper presents an analysis of the recent increase in the number of public bikesharing systems. Bikesharing is the shared use of a bicycle fleet, which is accessible to the public and serves as a form of public transportation. The initial system designs were pioneered in Europe and, after a series of technological innovations, appear to have matured into a system experiencing widespread adoption. There are also signs that the policy of public bikesharing systems is transferable and is being adopted in other contexts outside Europe. In public policy, the technologies that are transferred can be policies, technologies, ideals or systems. This paper seeks to describe the nature of these systems, how they have spread in time and space, how they have matured in different contexts, and why they have been adopted.”

“Bike Share: A Synthesis of the Literature” Fishman, Elliot; Washington, Simon; Haworth, Narelle. Transport Reviews , 2013, 33:2, 148-165. doi: 10.1080/01441647.2013.775612.

Abstract: “This paper begins by providing an overview of bike share programs, followed by a critical examination of the growing body of literature on these programs…. Several consistent themes have emerged within the growing body of research on bike share programs. Firstly, the importance bike share members place on convenience and value for money appears paramount in their motivation to sign up and use these programs. Secondly, and somewhat counter intuitively, scheme members are more likely to own and use private bicycles than nonmembers. Thirdly, users demonstrate a greater reluctance to wear helmets than private bicycle riders and helmets have acted as a deterrent in jurisdictions in which helmets are mandatory. Finally, and perhaps most importantly from a sustainable transport perspective, the majority of scheme users are substituting from sustainable modes of transport rather than the car.”

Online ratings and reputation

“Engineering Trust: Reciprocity in the Production of Reputation Information” Bolton, Gary; Greiner, Ben; and Okenfels, Axel, Management Science, December 2012, Vol. 59, Issue 2.

Absract: “Reciprocity in feedback giving distorts the production and content of reputation information in a market, hampering trust and trade efficiency. Guided by feedback patterns observed on eBay and other platforms, we run laboratory experiments to investigate how reciprocity can be managed by changes in the way feedback information flows through the system, leading to more accurate reputation information, more trust, and more efficient trade. We discuss the implications for theory building and for managing the redesign of market trust systems.”

“A Survey of Trust and Reputation Systems for Online Service Provision” Josang, Audun; Ismail, Roslan; and Boyd, Colin, Decision Support Systems, March 2007 Vol. 43, Issue 2.

Abstract: “Trust and reputation systems represent a significant trend in decision support for Internet mediated service provision. The basic idea is to let parties rate each other, for example after the completion of a transaction, and use the aggregated ratings about a given party to derive a trust or reputation score, which can assist other parties in deciding whether or not to transact with that party in the future. A natural side effect is that it also provides an incentive for good behaviour, and therefore tends to have a positive effect on market quality. Reputation systems can be called collaborative sanctioning systems to reflect their collaborative nature, and are related to collaborative filtering systems. Reputation systems are already being used in successful commercial online applications. There is also a rapidly growing literature around trust and reputation systems, but unfortunately this activity is not very coherent. The purpose of this article is to give an overview of existing and proposed systems that can be used to derive measures of trust and reputation for Internet transactions, to analyse the current trends and developments in this area, and to propose a research agenda for trust and reputation systems.”

Keywords: research roundup, technology, public bicycle, ride-sharing, ridesharing, bicycle-share systems, transportation, tourism, hotels , bikeshare

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Airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers description.

By 2016, two-sided online platforms (or marketplaces) were pervasive among the highest growing internet startups around. These marketplaces sought to match suppliers of assets for rent, physical products or services with customers demanding them. Among the most notable two-sided platforms in terms of their tremendous early growth were Airbnb, Etsy and Uber. They offered short-term property rentals, handcrafted goods, and car rides, respectively. As two-sided markets grew to scale, network effects kicked in as more consumers bred more suppliers and vice versa. But how did these platforms acquire their first customers, at the time when they had so few providers? How exactly did they go about acquiring their first thousand customers?

Case Description Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Strategic managment tools used in case study analysis of airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers, step 1. problem identification in airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, step 2. external environment analysis - pestel / pest / step analysis of airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, step 3. industry specific / porter five forces analysis of airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, step 4. evaluating alternatives / swot analysis of airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, step 5. porter value chain analysis / vrio / vrin analysis airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, step 6. recommendations airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, step 7. basis of recommendations for airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study, quality & on time delivery.

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Case Analysis of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers is a Harvard Business (HBR) Case Study on Sales & Marketing , Texas Business School provides HBR case study assignment help for just $9. Texas Business School(TBS) case study solution is based on HBR Case Study Method framework, TBS expertise & global insights. Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers is designed and drafted in a manner to allow the HBR case study reader to analyze a real-world problem by putting reader into the position of the decision maker. Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study will help professionals, MBA, EMBA, and leaders to develop a broad and clear understanding of casecategory challenges. Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers will also provide insight into areas such as – wordlist , strategy, leadership, sales and marketing, and negotiations.

Case Study Solutions Background Work

Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study solution is focused on solving the strategic and operational challenges the protagonist of the case is facing. The challenges involve – evaluation of strategic options, key role of Sales & Marketing, leadership qualities of the protagonist, and dynamics of the external environment. The challenge in front of the protagonist, of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers, is to not only build a competitive position of the organization but also to sustain it over a period of time.

Strategic Management Tools Used in Case Study Solution

The Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study solution requires the MBA, EMBA, executive, professional to have a deep understanding of various strategic management tools such as SWOT Analysis, PESTEL Analysis / PEST Analysis / STEP Analysis, Porter Five Forces Analysis, Go To Market Strategy, BCG Matrix Analysis, Porter Value Chain Analysis, Ansoff Matrix Analysis, VRIO / VRIN and Marketing Mix Analysis.

Texas Business School Approach to Sales & Marketing Solutions

In the Texas Business School, Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study solution – following strategic tools are used - SWOT Analysis, PESTEL Analysis / PEST Analysis / STEP Analysis, Porter Five Forces Analysis, Go To Market Strategy, BCG Matrix Analysis, Porter Value Chain Analysis, Ansoff Matrix Analysis, VRIO / VRIN and Marketing Mix Analysis. We have additionally used the concept of supply chain management and leadership framework to build a comprehensive case study solution for the case – Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Step 1 – Problem Identification of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers - Harvard Business School Case Study

The first step to solve HBR Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study solution is to identify the problem present in the case. The problem statement of the case is provided in the beginning of the case where the protagonist is contemplating various options in the face of numerous challenges that Sided Etsy is facing right now. Even though the problem statement is essentially – “Sales & Marketing” challenge but it has impacted by others factors such as communication in the organization, uncertainty in the external environment, leadership in Sided Etsy, style of leadership and organization structure, marketing and sales, organizational behavior, strategy, internal politics, stakeholders priorities and more.

Step 2 – External Environment Analysis

Texas Business School approach of case study analysis – Conclusion, Reasons, Evidences - provides a framework to analyze every HBR case study. It requires conducting robust external environmental analysis to decipher evidences for the reasons presented in the Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers. The external environment analysis of Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers will ensure that we are keeping a tab on the macro-environment factors that are directly and indirectly impacting the business of the firm.

What is PESTEL Analysis? Briefly Explained

PESTEL stands for political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal factors that impact the external environment of firm in Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study. PESTEL analysis of " Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers" can help us understand why the organization is performing badly, what are the factors in the external environment that are impacting the performance of the organization, and how the organization can either manage or mitigate the impact of these external factors.

How to do PESTEL / PEST / STEP Analysis? What are the components of PESTEL Analysis?

As mentioned above PESTEL Analysis has six elements – political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal. All the six elements are explained in context with Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers macro-environment and how it impacts the businesses of the firm.

How to do PESTEL Analysis for Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

To do comprehensive PESTEL analysis of case study – Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers , we have researched numerous components under the six factors of PESTEL analysis.

Political Factors that Impact Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Political factors impact seven key decision making areas – economic environment, socio-cultural environment, rate of innovation & investment in research & development, environmental laws, legal requirements, and acceptance of new technologies.

Government policies have significant impact on the business environment of any country. The firm in “ Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers ” needs to navigate these policy decisions to create either an edge for itself or reduce the negative impact of the policy as far as possible.

Data safety laws – The countries in which Sided Etsy is operating, firms are required to store customer data within the premises of the country. Sided Etsy needs to restructure its IT policies to accommodate these changes. In the EU countries, firms are required to make special provision for privacy issues and other laws.

Competition Regulations – Numerous countries have strong competition laws both regarding the monopoly conditions and day to day fair business practices. Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers has numerous instances where the competition regulations aspects can be scrutinized.

Import restrictions on products – Before entering the new market, Sided Etsy in case study Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers" should look into the import restrictions that may be present in the prospective market.

Export restrictions on products – Apart from direct product export restrictions in field of technology and agriculture, a number of countries also have capital controls. Sided Etsy in case study “ Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers ” should look into these export restrictions policies.

Foreign Direct Investment Policies – Government policies favors local companies over international policies, Sided Etsy in case study “ Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers ” should understand in minute details regarding the Foreign Direct Investment policies of the prospective market.

Corporate Taxes – The rate of taxes is often used by governments to lure foreign direct investments or increase domestic investment in a certain sector. Corporate taxation can be divided into two categories – taxes on profits and taxes on operations. Taxes on profits number is important for companies that already have a sustainable business model, while taxes on operations is far more significant for companies that are looking to set up new plants or operations.

Tariffs – Chekout how much tariffs the firm needs to pay in the “ Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers ” case study. The level of tariffs will determine the viability of the business model that the firm is contemplating. If the tariffs are high then it will be extremely difficult to compete with the local competitors. But if the tariffs are between 5-10% then Sided Etsy can compete against other competitors.

Research and Development Subsidies and Policies – Governments often provide tax breaks and other incentives for companies to innovate in various sectors of priority. Managers at Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study have to assess whether their business can benefit from such government assistance and subsidies.

Consumer protection – Different countries have different consumer protection laws. Managers need to clarify not only the consumer protection laws in advance but also legal implications if the firm fails to meet any of them.

Political System and Its Implications – Different political systems have different approach to free market and entrepreneurship. Managers need to assess these factors even before entering the market.

Freedom of Press is critical for fair trade and transparency. Countries where freedom of press is not prevalent there are high chances of both political and commercial corruption.

Corruption level – Sided Etsy needs to assess the level of corruptions both at the official level and at the market level, even before entering a new market. To tackle the menace of corruption – a firm should have a clear SOP that provides managers at each level what to do when they encounter instances of either systematic corruption or bureaucrats looking to take bribes from the firm.

Independence of judiciary – It is critical for fair business practices. If a country doesn’t have independent judiciary then there is no point entry into such a country for business.

Government attitude towards trade unions – Different political systems and government have different attitude towards trade unions and collective bargaining. The firm needs to assess – its comfort dealing with the unions and regulations regarding unions in a given market or industry. If both are on the same page then it makes sense to enter, otherwise it doesn’t.

Economic Factors that Impact Airbnb, Etsy, Uber: Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Social factors that impact airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers, technological factors that impact airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers, environmental factors that impact airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers, legal factors that impact airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers, step 3 – industry specific analysis, what is porter five forces analysis, step 4 – swot analysis / internal environment analysis, step 5 – porter value chain / vrio / vrin analysis, step 6 – evaluating alternatives & recommendations, step 7 – basis for recommendations, references :: airbnb, etsy, uber: acquiring the first thousand customers case study solution.

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Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Analysis and Case Solution

Posted by Peter Williams on Aug-09-2018

Introduction of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution

The Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study is a Harvard Business Review case study, which presents a simulated practical experience to the reader allowing them to learn about real life problems in the business world. The Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case consisted of a central issue to the organization, which had to be identified, analysed and creative solutions had to be drawn to tackle the issue. This paper presents the solved Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case analysis and case solution. The method through which the analysis is done is mentioned, followed by the relevant tools used in finding the solution.

The case solution first identifies the central issue to the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case study, and the relevant stakeholders affected by this issue. This is known as the problem identification stage. After this, the relevant tools and models are used, which help in the case study analysis and case study solution. The tools used in identifying the solution consist of the SWOT Analysis, Porter Five Forces Analysis, PESTEL Analysis, VRIO analysis, Value Chain Analysis, BCG Matrix analysis, Ansoff Matrix analysis, and the Marketing Mix analysis. The solution consists of recommended strategies to overcome this central issue. It is a good idea to also propose alternative case study solutions, because if the main solution is not found feasible, then the alternative solutions could be implemented. Lastly, a good case study solution also includes an implementation plan for the recommendation strategies. This shows how through a step-by-step procedure as to how the central issue can be resolved.

Problem Identification of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution

Harvard Business Review cases involve a central problem that is being faced by the organization and these problems affect a number of stakeholders. In the problem identification stage, the problem faced by Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers is identified through reading of the case. This could be mentioned at the start of the reading, the middle or the end. At times in a case analysis, the problem may be clearly evident in the reading of the HBR case. At other times, finding the issue is the job of the person analysing the case. It is also important to understand what stakeholders are affected by the problem and how. The goals of the stakeholders and are the organization are also identified to ensure that the case study analysis are consistent with these.

Analysis of the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers HBR Case Study

The objective of the case should be focused on. This is doing the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution. This analysis can be proceeded in a step-by-step procedure to ensure that effective solutions are found.

• In the first step, a growth path of the company can be formulated that lays down its vision, mission and strategic aims. These can usually be developed using the company history is provided in the case. Company history is helpful in a Business Case study as it helps one understand what the scope of the solutions will be for the case study.
• The next step is of understanding the company; its people, their priorities and the overall culture. This can be done by using company history. It can also be done by looking at anecdotal instances of managers or employees that are usually included in an HBR case study description to give the reader a real feel of the situation.
• Lastly, a timeline of the issues and events in the case needs to be made. Arranging events in a timeline allows one to predict the next few events that are likely to take place. It also helps one in developing the case study solutions. The timeline also helps in understanding the continuous challenges that are being faced by the organisation.

SWOT analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

An important tool that helps in addressing the central issue of the case and coming up with Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers HBR case solution is the SWOT analysis.

• The SWOT analysis is a strategic management tool that lists down in the form of a matrix, an organisation's internal strengths and weaknesses, and external opportunities and threats. It helps in the strategic analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers.
• Once this listing has been done, a clearer picture can be developed in regards to how strategies will be formed to address the main problem. For example, strengths will be used as an advantage in solving the issue.

Therefore, the SWOT analysis is a helpful tool in coming up with the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Study answers. One does not need to remain restricted to using the traditional SWOT analysis, but the advanced TOWS matrix or weighted average SWOT analysis can also be used.

Porter Five Forces Analysis for Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Another helpful tool in finding the case solutions is of Porter's Five Forces analysis. This is also a strategic tool that is used to analyse the competitive environment of the industry in which Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers operates in. Analysis of the industry is important as businesses do not work in isolation in real life, but are affected by the business environment of the industry that they operate in. Harvard Business case studies represent real-life situations, and therefore, an analysis of the industry's competitive environment needs to be carried out to come up with more holistic case study solutions. In Porter's Five Forces analysis, the industry is analysed along 5 dimensions.

• These are the threats that the industry faces due to new entrants.
• It includes the threat of substitute products.
• It includes the bargaining power of buyers in the industry.
• It includes the bargaining power of suppliers in an industry.
• Lastly, the overall rivalry or competition within the industry is analysed.

This tool helps one understand the relative powers of the major players in the industry and its overall competitive dynamics. Actionable and practical solutions can then be developed by keeping these factors into perspective.

PESTEL Analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Another helpful tool that should be used in finding the case study solutions is the PESTEL analysis. This also looks at the external business environment of the organisation helps in finding case study Analysis to real-life business issues as in HBR cases.

• The PESTEL analysis particularly looks at the macro environmental factors that affect the industry. These are the political, environmental, social, technological, environmental and legal (regulatory) factors affecting the industry.
• Factors within each of these 6 should be listed down, and analysis should be made as to how these affect the organisation under question.
• These factors are also responsible for the future growth and challenges within the industry. Hence, they should be taken into consideration when coming up with the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case solution.

VRIO Analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

This is an analysis carried out to know about the internal strengths and capabilities of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers. Under the VRIO analysis, the following steps are carried out:

• The internal resources of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers are listed down.
• Each of these resources are assessed in terms of the value it brings to the organization.
• Each resource is assessed in terms of how rare it is. A rare resource is one that is not commonly used by competitors.
• Each resource is assessed whether it could be imitated by competition easily or not.
• Lastly, each resource is assessed in terms of whether the organization can use it to an advantage or not.

The analysis done on the 4 dimensions; Value, Rareness, Imitability, and Organization. If a resource is high on all of these 4, then it brings long-term competitive advantage. If a resource is high on Value, Rareness, and Imitability, then it brings an unused competitive advantage. If a resource is high on Value and Rareness, then it only brings temporary competitive advantage. If a resource is only valuable, then it’s a competitive parity. If it’s none, then it can be regarded as a competitive disadvantage.

Value Chain Analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

The Value chain analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers helps in identifying the activities of an organization, and how these add value in terms of cost reduction and differentiation. This tool is used in the case study analysis as follows:

• The firm’s primary and support activities are listed down.
• Identifying the importance of these activities in the cost of the product and the differentiation they produce.
• Lastly, differentiation or cost reduction strategies are to be used for each of these activities to increase the overall value provided by these activities.

Recognizing value creating activities and enhancing the value that they create allow Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers to increase its competitive advantage.

BCG Matrix of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

The BCG Matrix is an important tool in deciding whether an organization should invest or divest in its strategic business units. The matrix involves placing the strategic business units of a business in one of four categories; question marks, stars, dogs and cash cows. The placement in these categories depends on the relative market share of the organization and the market growth of these strategic business units. The steps to be followed in this analysis is as follows:

• Identify the relative market share of each strategic business unit.
• Identify the market growth of each strategic business unit.
• Place these strategic business units in one of four categories. Question Marks are those strategic business units with high market share and low market growth rate. Stars are those strategic business units with high market share and high market growth rate. Cash Cows are those strategic business units with high market share and low market growth rate. Dogs are those strategic business units with low market share and low growth rate.
• Relevant strategies should be implemented for each strategic business unit depending on its position in the matrix.

The strategies identified from the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers BCG matrix and included in the case pdf. These are either to further develop the product, penetrate the market, develop the market, diversification, investing or divesting.

Ansoff Matrix of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Ansoff Matrix is an important strategic tool to come up with future strategies for Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers in the case solution. It helps decide whether an organization should pursue future expansion in new markets and products or should it focus on existing markets and products.

• The organization can penetrate into existing markets with its existing products. This is known as market penetration strategy.
• The organization can develop new products for the existing market. This is known as product development strategy.
• The organization can enter new markets with its existing products. This is known as market development strategy.
• The organization can enter into new markets with new products. This is known as a diversification strategy.

The choice of strategy depends on the analysis of the previous tools used and the level of risk the organization is willing to take.

Marketing Mix of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers needs to bring out certain responses from the market that it targets. To do so, it will need to use the marketing mix, which serves as a tool in helping bring out responses from the market. The 4 elements of the marketing mix are Product, Price, Place and Promotions. The following steps are required to carry out a marketing mix analysis and include this in the case study analysis.

• Analyse the company’s products and devise strategies to improve the product offering of the company.
• Analyse the company’s price points and devise strategies that could be based on competition, value or cost.
• Analyse the company’s promotion mix. This includes the advertisement, public relations, personal selling, sales promotion, and direct marketing. Strategies will be devised which makes use of a few or all of these elements.
• Analyse the company’s distribution and reach. Strategies can be devised to improve the availability of the company’s products.

Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Blue Ocean Strategy

The strategies devised and included in the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case memo should have a blue ocean strategy. A blue ocean strategy is a strategy that involves firms seeking uncontested market spaces, which makes the competition of the company irrelevant. It involves coming up with new and unique products or ideas through innovation. This gives the organization a competitive advantage over other firms, unlike a red ocean strategy.

Competitors analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers

The PESTEL analysis discussed previously looked at the macro environmental factors affecting business, but not the microenvironmental factors. One of the microenvironmental factors are competitors, which are addressed by a competitor analysis. The Competitors analysis of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers looks at the direct and indirect competitors within the industry that it operates in.

• This involves a detailed analysis of their actions and how these would affect the future strategies of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers.
• It involves looking at the current market share of the company and its competitors.
• It should compare the marketing mix elements of competitors, their supply chain, human resources, financial strength etc.
• It also should look at the potential opportunities and threats that these competitors pose on the company.

Organisation of the Analysis into Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Study Solution

Once various tools have been used to analyse the case, the findings of this analysis need to be incorporated into practical and actionable solutions. These solutions will also be the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case answers. These are usually in the form of strategies that the organisation can adopt. The following step-by-step procedure can be used to organise the Harvard Business case solution and recommendations:

• The first step of the solution is to come up with a corporate level strategy for the organisation. This part consists of solutions that address issues faced by the organisation on a strategic level. This could include suggestions, changes or recommendations to the company's vision, mission and its strategic objectives. It can include recommendations on how the organisation can work towards achieving these strategic objectives. Furthermore, it needs to be explained how the stated recommendations will help in solving the main issue mentioned in the case and where the company will stand in the future as a result of these.
• The second step of the solution is to come up with a business level strategy. The HBR case studies may present issues faced by a part of the organisation. For example, the issues may be stated for marketing and the role of a marketing manager needs to be assumed. So, recommendations and suggestions need to address the strategy of the marketing department in this case. Therefore, the strategic objectives of this business unit (Marketing) will be laid down in the solutions and recommendations will be made as to how to achieve these objectives. Similar would be the case for any other business unit or department such as human resources, finance, IT etc. The important thing to note here is that the business level strategy needs to be aligned with the overall corporate strategy of the organisation. For example, if one suggests the organisation to focus on differentiation for competitive advantage as a corporate level strategy, then it can't be recommended for the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Study Solution that the business unit should focus on costs.
• The third step is not compulsory but depends from case to case. In some HBR case studies, one may be required to analyse an issue at a department. This issue may be analysed for a manager or employee as well. In these cases, recommendations need to be made for these people. The solution may state that objectives that these people need to achieve and how these objectives would be achieved.

The case study analysis and solution, and Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case answers should be written down in the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case memo, clearly identifying which part shows what. The Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case should be in a professional format, presenting points clearly that are well understood by the reader.

Alternate solution to the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers HBR case study

It is important to have more than one solution to the case study. This is the alternate solution that would be implemented if the original proposed solution is found infeasible or impossible due to a change in circumstances. The alternate solution for Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers is presented in the same way as the original solution, where it consists of a corporate level strategy, business level strategy and other recommendations.

Implementation of Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Case Solution

The case study does not end at just providing recommendations to the issues at hand. One is also required to provide how these recommendations would be implemented. This is shown through a proper implementation framework. A detailed implementation framework helps in distinguishing between an average and an above average case study answer. A good implementation framework shows the proposed plan and how the organisations' resources would be used to achieve the objectives. It also lays down the changes needed to be made as well as the assumptions in the process.

• A proper implementation framework shows that one has clearly understood the case study and the main issue within it.
• It shows that one has been clarified with the HBR fundamentals on the topic.
• It shows that the details provided in the case have been properly analysed.
• It shows that one has developed an ability to prioritise recommendations and how these could be successfully implemented.
• The implementation framework also helps by removing out any recommendations that are not practical or actionable as these could not be implemented. Therefore, the implementation framework ensures that the solution to the Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers Harvard case is complete and properly answered.

Recommendations and Action Plan for Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers case analysis

For Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers, based on the SWOT Analysis, Porter Five Forces Analysis, PESTEL Analysis, VRIO analysis, Value Chain Analysis, BCG Matrix analysis, Ansoff Matrix analysis, and the Marketing Mix analysis, the recommendations and action plan are as follows:

• Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers should focus on making use of its strengths identified from the VRIO analysis to make the most of the opportunities identified from the PESTEL.
• Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers should enhance the value creating activities within its value chain.
• Airbnb Etsy Uber Acquiring the First Thousand Customers should invest in its stars and cash cows, while getting rid of the dogs identified from the BCG Matrix analysis.
• To achieve its overall corporate and business level objectives, it should make use of the marketing mix tools to obtain desired results from its target market.

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