The rampant consolidation continues....
PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
111–120 of 195 posts
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've read that part of what they do is effectively steal affiliate referrals from other websites. Say you click on an affiliate referral link from a blog that takes you to retailers website. Normally that blog would get a cut of whatever you buy at that retailer. However, if you then use your Honey extension, their affiliate link takes over and gets credit for the sale. Honey can then give you a small discount that i…
They don't steal affiliate commissions. They capture the most valuable sales--i.e., those made with the immediate intent to purchase--and direct those purchasers to the cheapest site in exchange for a commission. It comes down to a question of what is more valuable to the seller. The blogger may have created the intent to purchase the product but Honey created the intent to purchase from the specific seller . And to…
If Honey is inserting themselves between the blogger and the seller and then pocketing the commission, how is this not “stealing/hijacking” the commission?
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
Couldn’t you basically start any website and pay users $200 and get as many users as you want?
That's literally what PayPal did. They gave users $20 if you created an account. Over time, they lowered it to $10 and then $5. The program cost them ~$70m, but let them grow at 7-10% / day. They went from 800k accounts in March of 2000 to 4m in September, and then 11m in September of 2001.
>but let them grow at 7-10% / day.
not seeing that math
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
They don't steal affiliate commissions. They capture the most valuable sales--i.e., those made with the immediate intent to purchase--and direct those purchasers to the cheapest site in exchange for a commission. It comes down to a question of what is more valuable to the seller. The blogger may have created the intent to purchase the product but Honey created the intent to purchase from the specific seller . And to…
If Honey is inserting themselves between the blogger and the seller and then pocketing the commission, how is this not “stealing/hijacking” the commission?
I have no special knowledge about Honey, but I think the distinction being made is that Honey redirects them to a _new_ seller that offers a cheaper price, essentially poaching the customer. The blog's affiliate never makes a sale in the first place so of course it never pays out.
For the blog, the outcome is the same as if you took the time to price shop manually and ended up picking a different retailer. Honey's just automating that process.
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is simply not true. I don't think anyone would pay $4 billion for a referral stealing chrome extension anyway
They're paying for the large existing userbase, regardless of how that large userbase was acquired.
Agreed. Most people just don’t understand how it could be so simple or how honey makes so much.
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#116How does Honey make money, aside from the obvious data collection? I know a few people who use it, and I've cautioned them in the past that I can't think of any savory business model that would make this profitable. Is there one? Is it just tracking purchases for advertisers, or is there some other monetization strategy I'm missing? Their main site says they make commissions, but I don't know how to square that with…
What they claim on their "About" page [1] is: > Our Business Model > We earn a commission from stores when you find savings. What we don't do is sell or share your data (you can read our Privacy Policy here) > We're building a better way to shop, one that saves you time and money, even if there's less in it for us. If this sounds like a new way of doing things, you're right. [1] https://www.joinhoney.com/about
In a way they did just sell all your data...
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#117In what world is Honey worth 4b?
Winnie the Pooh
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#118Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
They don't steal affiliate commissions. They capture the most valuable sales--i.e., those made with the immediate intent to purchase--and direct those purchasers to the cheapest site in exchange for a commission. It comes down to a question of what is more valuable to the seller. The blogger may have created the intent to purchase the product but Honey created the intent to purchase from the specific seller . And to…
If Honey is inserting themselves between the blogger and the seller and then pocketing the commission, how is this not “stealing/hijacking” the commission?
Honey isn't inserting themselves between the blogger and the seller automatically. The user is doing that when they use the Honey add-on after visiting the blogger's website.
This is no different then a user visiting a different website about the same product and clicking through the affiliate link on that new blogger's page before making the purchase.
Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B
#120CamelCamelCamel had no idea what it was worth, Retailmenot missed the boat, wikibuy can now market itself for 4B to Square or something.
Funnily enough, Retailmenot sued Honey recently: https://techcrunch.com/2018/06/27/retailmenot-sues-rival-hon...
“ According to RetailMeNot’s suit, Honey infringes on U.S. Patents 9,626,688; 9,639,853; 9,953,335; and 9,965,769, which detail technologies related to things like facilitating access to promotional offers, merchant offers and coupon codes.”
Gross!