Q Your Complaint is a European-based company that provides an online platform to users (hereafter “customers”) for posting complaints about products and services. The platform first verifies the authenticity of the complaint and then communicates with the seller/manufacturer/service provider firm (hereafter “firm”) to offer a solution for the complaint. After the firm’s response is received and the customer and the firm privately communicate about the issue, the platform asks for customer feedback, categorizes the solution offer as a success or failure, and publicizes that information on the platform. YourComplaint currently does not charge customers. The firms pay an annual fee for receiving detailed reports and a small fee for each complaint they access from the company YourComplaint charges firms for providing information on: • how well complaints were addressed; • what percent of the customers decide to churn; • if customers churned, to which competitor they switched, and • about which attributes of the products or services customers complain the most. YourComplaint is now planning to enter the U.S. market. The platform does not have any customer base in the U.S. Your team will write a report advocating the best way to gain the most market share, taking into consideration the following: • What would you suggest the platform do to solve the chicken-egg problem? • Would you suggest any platform design features to improve network effects? • Would you recommend any additional information that can be provided by YourComplaint to client firms? • What is your suggestion for the pricing/fee charging strategy? • What metrics would you use to measure the success of the platform as the platform evolves? Note: metrics may differ for different stages of the platform evolution.
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