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Takeaways from CONNECTIONS 2012: Keys to Success in Personal Cloud Services

Written by Brett L. Sappington, Director of Research

I have great hopes for the personal cloud. The industry has discussed uber-connectivity for consumers for years. Now that we are inching closer to reality, companies are testing various products, services, and business models.

During this week's CONNECTIONS 2012 conference, one of our panels examined this area and how companies could make money in "personal cloud" services. I led the discussion, with SugarSync, Primadesk, and Ihiji providing insight from their experience in the personal cloud marketplace. Several common points emerged revealing several keys to success in the personal cloud:

  • Storage is a commodity - your differentiation must be based on other services / benefits
  • Fremium is the driving business model for such a new marketplace - consumers have to become accustomed to the services before they will pay
  • Social marketing will be critical to growth - leverage social networking to maximize exposure, recommendations, and trials
  • Love your free users - they are your potential evangelists, not freeloaders

 

One potential concern for the industry in the future? Support issues. As consumers leverage personal cloud services, they will encounter technical problems with their various CE devices. If consumers cannot get up and running quickly, their experience will be poor, killing the opportunity to incent use (much less payment).

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