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It seems to me that people care enough about it to pay for it.(just search "my background") and personally, given the right price, I would.

I'm asking this because I want to know when do people pay for complementary features. things that are not necessarily meaningless but doesn't affect the functionality.

so, would you pay for it? if yes, do you think it would make a sustainable business model?

just to clarify:

I wasn't talking about making custom backgrounds I was talking about twitter itself. in a freemium business model, you offer the basic Web service for free, while charging for special/complentary features. hypothetically speaking, what if twitter charged for the ability to change your profile background. Hope that made sense

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btw, check out my twitter background @raed_k :) – Raed Jul 5 '10 at 17:08
What type of special features? Also, bear in mind that Facebook could easily become a substitute of Twitter, if the latter decided to start charging. – A. Garcia Aug 17 '10 at 16:33

4 Answers

up vote 1 down vote

The answer depends on the price (and quality) of the background. I wouldn't pay $1000 for an amateur looking background, but I would pay $5 for a good quality background. Obviously these are two extremes, but the point is that it's hard to answer this question without having a price point.

Determining if this is a sustainable business model based on the little information you provided is impossible. If you are considering this as a business model I would recommend the following to you:

  1. Determine the market size
  2. Determine a price range those in the target market would be willing to pay
  3. Determine what your expenses will be

Once you have the answer to the above three, then you can make an informed decision on the viability of that business model.

Hope this helps!

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you totally miss understood me. I wasn't talking about making custom backgrounds I was talking about twitter itself. in a freemium business model, you offer the basic Web service for free, while charging for special/complentary features. hypothetically speaking, what if twitter charged for the ability to change your profile background. Hope that's clear and makes sense. – Raed Jul 5 '10 at 21:35
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Ok, thanks for the clarification. Regardless, my answer remains unchanged. My decison to pay for a Twitter background is based on the price, not the desiger. And the viability of the business model isn't really affected by the company. – Zuly Gonzalez♦ Jul 5 '10 at 23:04
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Yes, I would pay for a custom background.

I am not sure what you mean by a sustainable business model? For twitter? For someone who wants to create backgrounds?

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for twitter of course – Raed Jul 5 '10 at 20:48
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I would definitely pay for customized backgrounds if the feature set would be profitable. If they were to add something like clickable backgrounds where people can easily navigate to other sites or social profiles, I would see it as worth the money.

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I wouldn't pay for a customized background as long as it hasn't show to be worth it.

Just for having some clickable links is not worth the money. You already could place a link on your twitter profile, so IMHO it makes no sense to pay for a customized background.

Furthermore you could customize your background to some extend. Ok, you are not able to add links to it, but then use a different social media platform as well, where you could do so.

There are probably better ways to spend your money.

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