Nimbuzz revenue model revolves around advertising mostly
While it is all wonderful to sign up a million subscribers and get a second round of funding, I thought it might be a better idea to explore with Nimbuzz what their revenue model really is. I get the impression that for a while, it is based on advertising revenues. And I say that is probably wise!
Starting September this year, Nimbuzz expects to generate meaningful advertising revenues through its revenue sharing arrangement with a couple of large social networks. One of them happens to be the largest social network in Germany (not hard to guess which one). Users of these social networks will be able to communicate across their communities and various IM clouds using Nimbuzz’s web based client. Abril, a media company, will be supplying most of the ads.
One of the ways you could classify mobile VoIP companies is by their focus – or the lack of it – on value added services. Companies such as iSkoot and Truphone have been focussed mainly on generating revenues through voice calls, while as others like Fring and mig33 have put more efforts into the social networking aspect and apps. I would classify Nimbuzz somewhere in between these two types.
Nimbuzz has a consumer calling service in place. It is however not extending that in form of whitelable offerings to MNOs. It does some whitelabeling but not to sell its telephony capability. The whitelabeling is mainly for IM and Presence clients for MNOs. Nimbuzz has 3 such deals in place, one of which happens to be with an operator based in South East Asia. The revenue model is shared advertising and whitelable fees.
Nimbuzz has been a little late to the mobile VoIP market in my opinion. It offers a couple of nifty features that could compensate for that delay e.g. the Buzz feature that prompts an offline person to go online for a Nimbuzz session. Nimbuzz also uses GIPS codes (the ones Skype used during their early days).
