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Network Effects Aren't Enough HBR.ORG APRIL 2016 REPRINT R1604D SPOTLIGHT ON HOW PLATFORMS ARE RESHAPING BUSINESS Network Effects Aren’t Enough The hidden traps in building an online marketplace by Andrei Hagiu and Simon Rothman This document is authorized for use only by ALEXANDER DUCHAK ([email protected]). Copying or posting is an infringement of copyright. Please contact [email protected] or 800-988-0886 for additional copies. SPOTLIGHT ON HOW PLATFORMS ARE RESHAPING BUSINESS ARTWORK Vin Rathod, Aura (series) SPOTLIGHT 2012–2014, photograph This document is authorized for use only by ALEXANDER DUCHAK ([email protected]). Copying or posting is an infringement of copyright. Please contact [email protected] or 800-988-0886 for additional copies. FOR ARTICLE REPRINTS CALL 800-988-0886 OR 617-783-7500, OR VISIT HBR.ORG Network Effects Aren’t Enough The hidden traps in building an online marketplace BY ANDREI HAGIU AND SIMON ROTHMAN April 2016 Harvard Business Review 3 This document is authorized for use only by ALEXANDER DUCHAK ([email protected]). Copying or posting is an infringement of copyright. Please contact [email protected] or 800-988-0886 for additional copies. SPOTLIGHT ON HOW PLATFORMS ARE RESHAPING BUSINESS n many ways, online marketplaces are the perfect business model. Since they just facilitate Itransactions between suppliers and customers rather than take possession of or full responsibility for products or services, they have very low cost structures and very high gross margins—70% for eBay, 60% for Etsy. And network effects make them highly defensible. Alibaba, Craigslist, eBay, and Rakuten are more than 15 years old, but they still dominate their sectors. Little wonder that entrepreneurs and inves- network effects also create barriers to entry: Once tors are rushing to build the next eBay or Airbnb many buyers and sellers are using a marketplace, it or Uber for every imaginable product and service becomes harder for a rival to lure them away. As a category. In the past 10 years, the number of mar- result, entrepreneurs often mistakenly assume that ketplaces worth more than $1 billion has gone from they need to reach the exponential growth phase two—Craigslist and eBay—to more than a dozen in as quickly as possible. But a headlong rush to fast the United States, including Airbnb, Etsy, Groupon, growth is often unnecessary and can even backfire, GrubHub Seamless, Lending Club, Lyft, Prosper, for several reasons. Thumbtack, Uber, and Upwork. And that number is The importance of first-mover advantage expected to double by 2020, according to Greylock for marketplaces is overstated. Entrepreneurs Partners, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm where should really focus on being the first to create a one of us (Simon) is a partner. liquid market in their segment. The winning mar- Yet online marketplaces remain extremely diffi- ketplace is the first one to figure out how to enable cult to build. Most entrepreneurs see it as a chicken- mutually beneficial transactions between suppliers and-egg problem: To attain a critical mass of buyers, and buyers—not the first one out of the gate. Indeed, you need a critical mass of suppliers—but to attract many prominent marketplaces were not first mov- suppliers, you need a lot of buyers. This challenge ers: Airbnb was founded more than a decade after does indeed trip up many marketplaces. But even af- VRBO; Alibaba was a second mover in China after ter a marketplace has attracted a critical mass of both eBay; and Uber’s UberX copied Lyft’s peer-to-peer buyers and sellers, it’s far from smooth sailing. Our taxi business model. combined experience in evaluating, advising, and Why does being the first mover provide less of an investing in hundreds of marketplace businesses advantage than is commonly assumed? The reason (including several mentioned in this article) suggests is that chasing early growth before a marketplace has that other pitfalls can derail marketplaces: growing proved its value to both buyers and sellers leaves the too fast too early; fostering insufficient trust and business vulnerable to competition from later en- safety; resorting to sticks rather than carrots to deter trants. If either side’s users do not derive significant user disintermediation; and regulatory risk. In this value on a consistent basis, they will readily jump article, we discuss how to avoid those hazards. ship. But when buyers have access to a sufficient selection of products or services at attractive prices Growth and sellers earn attractive profits, neither side has Once marketplaces reach a critical inflection point, an incentive to go elsewhere, and strong network ef- network effects kick in and growth follows an ex- fects kick in rapidly: More buyers bring more sellers ponential, rather than linear, trajectory. These and vice versa. 4 Harvard Business Review April 2016 COPYRIGHT © 2016 HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL PUBLISHING CORPORATION. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This document is authorized for use only by ALEXANDER DUCHAK ([email protected]). Copying or posting is an infringement of copyright. Please contact [email protected] or 800-988-0886 for additional copies. FOR ARTICLE REPRINTS CALL 800-988-0886 OR 617-783-7500, OR VISIT HBR.ORG Idea in Brief THE MISCONCEPTION OVERLOOKED CHALLENGES THE SOLUTION Most entrepreneurs believe that the key Growing too quickly can exacerbate Before scaling, marketplaces must lay challenge in building online marketplaces the flaws that are inevitable in any out a compelling value proposition for is to attract a critical mass of buyers and business model. Common approaches for buyers and sellers. They need to build sellers. But before or even after that hurdle establishing trust and safety rarely work trust and create incentives to keep them has been overcome, there are others on their own. Using sticks rather than on the platform. And they need to engage looming that can hurt, if not kill, these carrots to deter disintermediation can regulators as soon as their buyer-seller businesses. backfire. And regulatory issues can derail proposition is clear. a promising business. Groupon and LivingSocial—platforms where re- was an air mattress and a cooked breakfast. In most tailers sell discounted offerings to consumers—pro- cases, this was either not what travelers wanted or vide a cautionary tale. Both companies expanded not something hosts were willing to offer.) aggressively, attracting millions of users and thou- The wrong type of growth can hurt perfor- sands of merchants. Their success, however, was mance. Many marketplaces find it tempting to grow short-lived: Once merchants realized that Groupon through “power sellers”—those who have moved and LivingSocial discounts did not bring repeat cus- from selling as a hobby or source of supplemental tomers, they began to do business on many com- income to running a full-time business on the mar- peting deal sites. As a result, Groupon’s value fell ketplace. That’s because attracting a few power sell- from $18 billion at the time of its 2011 IPO to less ers is more cost-effective than attracting many non- than $2 billion today; LivingSocial filed for an IPO at professional sellers, and the former tend to be more $10 billion in 2011, withdrew, and was acquired by efficient at carrying out transactions than the latter. Amazon. By the end of 2014, it was worth less than However, growth through power sellers can be $250 million. undesirable. After building most of its early growth Growing too early puts stress on the busi- on power sellers, eBay discovered that their domi- ness model. A start-up’s initial business model nance forced it to make compromises that favored inevitably has flaws that must be fixed. But because those sellers but hurt the buyer experience. For growth for marketplaces can be so explosive, it puts example, power sellers demanded the ability to much more pressure on the business model than do “bulk listings” (to automate the listing of many does the more linear growth experienced by regular products), which was more efficient from the sellers’ product or service firms, amplifying the impact of point of view. This created problems for eBay: By the flaws and making them harder to fix. Indeed, try- skewing seller incentives toward commodity goods, ing to change the model while growing very fast in- bulk listings reduced the diversity of products of- creases the risk of a catastrophic breakdown. Thus, fered for sale, crowding out unique products and premature growth can actually reduce the prob- causing the quality of the average listing to go down. ability of reaching the inflection point that triggers Furthermore, bulk listings enabled power sellers exponential growth. For these reasons, marketplace entrepreneurs should resist the temptation to accelerate growth Growing too early before figuring out an optimal supply-demand fit— that is, when buyers are as happy to purchase the products or services as providers are to supply them. amplifies flaws This may mean waiting much longer than conven- tional companies do to scale a new offering. For ex- in the business ample, Airbnb took two years to figure out exactly how to allow individuals to rent their homes to com- model, making them plete strangers under conditions and at prices that satisfied both parties. (Recall that the initial service harder to fix. April 2016 Harvard Business Review 5 This document is authorized for use only by ALEXANDER DUCHAK ([email protected]). Copying or posting is an infringement of copyright. Please contact [email protected] or 800-988-0886 for additional copies. SPOTLIGHT ON HOW PLATFORMS ARE RESHAPING BUSINESS AIRBNB’S REMARKABLE GROWTH It didn’t take long for Airbnb to surpass conventional hotel chains in the number of rooms available worldwide to travelers. Its explosive growth and huge market cap are testaments to the outsize potential of online marketplaces.
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