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Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

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Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#11

Post by voisin »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #2

Earlier this year, Strava removed many of their free features. Previously, free users weren't really limited by the platform. Predictably, not many people subscribed. Forcing users to pay for popular features received a lot of public backlash at the time ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23228426 ) but in retrospect it appears to be the right choice. People never like losing access to free features, but losing p…

I don’t see the premium offerings as worth the cost for most casual athletes. I think they’d do better with advertising and corporate tie ins like the challenges.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#12

Post by redfern314 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #2

Earlier this year, Strava removed many of their free features. Previously, free users weren't really limited by the platform. Predictably, not many people subscribed. Forcing users to pay for popular features received a lot of public backlash at the time ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23228426 ) but in retrospect it appears to be the right choice. People never like losing access to free features, but losing p…

I personally didn't like this change because it removed the tiered nature of the paid platform. Previously, you could mix and match 3 feature packs, at $2/month each. Now, they've combined it into $5/month flat, regardless of how many features you use.

This may be the right answer for them (chasing the premium competitive market and all that, and maybe less tech debt with fewer tiers), but it caused me to drop my subscription. As a "casual" cyclist, I was willing to pay $2/month, but not $5/month, for the value I got out of the service.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#13

Post by count »

vemv wrote: post #5

As a mountain biker Strava feels just silly. It's a leaderboard for imaginary races that can be trivially cheated, be it via GPS idiosyncracies or by using an electric bike. I reckon the features oriented towards navigation/discovery are ok, but it's a crowded space with a relatively low barrier to entry. I wouldn't be surprised if one only can make marginal gains with those 110M, but with a high pressure for ROIng w…

I know a ton of people using Strava. They use it entirely for socializing runs/rides/swims. Friendly pressure, kudos, complaints about the humidity, etc. Literally none of them pay attention to the 'KOM/QOM' more than a 'haha, check that out' bit. It's a hardware vendor neutral (looking at you GarminConnect) way of socializing with fellow athletes, and is super popular for that.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#14

Post by nradov »

voisin wrote: post #9
vemv wrote: post #5

As a mountain biker Strava feels just silly. It's a leaderboard for imaginary races that can be trivially cheated, be it via GPS idiosyncracies or by using an electric bike. I reckon the features oriented towards navigation/discovery are ok, but it's a crowded space with a relatively low barrier to entry. I wouldn't be surprised if one only can make marginal gains with those 110M, but with a high pressure for ROIng w…

I find the discovery features frustrating. They focus on Segments of runs rather than complete routes. Compare to AllTrails for best in class IMHO.

Strava does have a curated list of complete routes for selected cities.

https://www.strava.com/local

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#16

Post by cranekam »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #2

Earlier this year, Strava removed many of their free features. Previously, free users weren't really limited by the platform. Predictably, not many people subscribed. Forcing users to pay for popular features received a lot of public backlash at the time ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23228426 ) but in retrospect it appears to be the right choice. People never like losing access to free features, but losing p…

Yes, Strava's main mistake IMO was not differentiating enough between free and premium versions. I am a long time subscriber because I like the social aspects of Strava but I almost never use the premium features. The basic free plan does almost all of what I need.

The most annoying part of Strava's changes this year was removing access to segment leaderboards from their API (https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2020/05/strava-cuts-off-leaderbo...). This broke a bunch of 3rd party apps, including some that seem completely innocuous. For instance, I used an app that displayed a list of segments for mountain passes in the Alps and the number of times each had been crossed so far this year. The goal of this was to help people figure out when it was possible to cross a pass (which might be well before the road is officially open), but now that's broken.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#17

Post by riderhj7 »

I’ve never been a huge fan of Strava. The segments feel really messy to me. Go for a ride/run and in popular areas you can get hundreds of irrelevant segments.

I primarily use Garmin connect now with Strava serving more as a backup. Sad that Endomondo died when it was acquired.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#18

Post by emerged »

count wrote: post #13
vemv wrote: post #5

As a mountain biker Strava feels just silly. It's a leaderboard for imaginary races that can be trivially cheated, be it via GPS idiosyncracies or by using an electric bike. I reckon the features oriented towards navigation/discovery are ok, but it's a crowded space with a relatively low barrier to entry. I wouldn't be surprised if one only can make marginal gains with those 110M, but with a high pressure for ROIng w…

I know a ton of people using Strava. They use it entirely for socializing runs/rides/swims. Friendly pressure, kudos, complaints about the humidity, etc. Literally none of them pay attention to the 'KOM/QOM' more than a 'haha, check that out' bit. It's a hardware vendor neutral (looking at you GarminConnect) way of socializing with fellow athletes, and is super popular for that.

Can confirm, I use it daily and like giving and receiving kudos, sharing photos of my rides and seeing other people's photos. It's fun and provides motivation.

The KOM stuff is mostly useful to measure your own progress vs other riders you know or at least have some confidence aren't cheating.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#19

Post by ogre_codes »

Wonnk13 wrote: post #8
vemv wrote: post #5

As a mountain biker Strava feels just silly. It's a leaderboard for imaginary races that can be trivially cheated, be it via GPS idiosyncracies or by using an electric bike. I reckon the features oriented towards navigation/discovery are ok, but it's a crowded space with a relatively low barrier to entry. I wouldn't be surprised if one only can make marginal gains with those 110M, but with a high pressure for ROIng w…

It blows my mind that after a decade of user data, they still can't automatically detect when someone accidentally uploads a bike ride as a run activity. Like yea, kudo phil for knocking out those... 3 minute miles for two hours. \rant

One of my big frustrations. They can't even figure out that I put my bike on the roof of the car and drove away. My heart rate goes down, yet I'm going 40-60 miles per hour... and Strava still thinks I'm riding my bike. They rely on other users to flag my activity as bogus because I busted some random KOM.

It should be reasonably straight forward to suggest auto-cropping, particularly when I start and stop a ride in the same place. This is one of the reasons I gave up Strava, they were solving for issues I don't have (I don't need a bike/ social network), and ignoring the big obvious ones I do.

Re: Strava raises $110M, growth rate of 2M new users per month in 2020

#20

Post by CarelessExpert »

vemv wrote: post #5

As a mountain biker Strava feels just silly. It's a leaderboard for imaginary races that can be trivially cheated, be it via GPS idiosyncracies or by using an electric bike. I reckon the features oriented towards navigation/discovery are ok, but it's a crowded space with a relatively low barrier to entry. I wouldn't be surprised if one only can make marginal gains with those 110M, but with a high pressure for ROIng w…

> As a mountain biker Strava feels just silly.

And this remark feels unconstructive.

As a touring cyclist I absolutely love Strava. The tracking and logging is excellent, the community aspects are fun, and overall I find the product very easy to use.

Do I think it's worth a 100M investment? I'm not sure. I wouldn't have expected Peloton or Mirror to exist. But there's clearly a demand for social fitness products and who am I to argue against the market?

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