Thomas M. Wagner

Converting freemium customers from free to premium - The role of the perceived premium fit in the case of music as a service

Freemium seems to be a promising solution for content providers to earn money now that Web 2.0 users feel entitled to free services and content services like Spotify generally accept this concept. Providers using freemium offer their service in free basic and paid premium versions. To prompt users to pay, a free version has fewer functions. However, no studies have yet investigated whether limiting features is the best strategy for converting users into paying customers, and, if so, how many functional differences there should be between free and premium versions. Therefore, our study aims to measure whether a free service’s limitations impact the evaluation of free and premium versions. Drawing on the Dual Mediation Hypothesis and the Elaboration Likelihood Model, we examined 317 freemium users’ survey responses. Our results indicate that companies providing freemium services can increase the probability of user conversion by providing a strong functional fit between their free and premium services.

The Advertising Effect of Free -- Do Free Basic Versions Promote Premium Versions within the Freemium Business Model of Music Services?

Freemium seems a promising solution for content providers to earn money in times of the free mentality of Web 2.0 users. Freemium services can be used both for free or with a paid subscription to obtain premium content. Nevertheless, freemiums success is limited. Especially Music as a Service (MaaS) providers, that provide music via streaming over the internet as a service, still make no profits, because earnings from advertisements and premium users are not sufficient to finance the free basic version of music listening. However, this free basic version is necessary to convert non-paying users into paying ones. This study tests whether the basic, free version of a freemium service is recognized as advertisement for the premium version and could therefore lead to conversion. Using a structural equation model based on the Dual Mediation Hypothesis, we developed a survey with 71 participants and found that there is no advertising effect.

IT-Sicherheit mit System

The present disclosure relates to synthetic peptides derived from the conserved region of the HTLVIII envelope proteins. These peptides are useful as reagents for immunoassays for detection of AIDS antibodies, as components of immunogenic compositions useful as vaccines, and for the production of anti-bodies selective to said envelope protein and methods for detecting the presence of AIDS antibodies in biological fluid samples.