http://goo.gl/q8Xucj

poor use of LMGTFY

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Eliot
blog thing - strava thing

I think the suffer score thing is pretty cool, I'd get it for that. Also the cool badge next to your name. Oh and to support a site I enjoy using and think is worth paying for.

There is plenty of premium features I use but this is the main reason. It would be a fair assumption that 99% of triathletes have a disposable income large enough to contribute the tiny amount that premium costs. The running costs of the site are huge so lets support it and allow it to grow and prosper.

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I learned a long time ago that the only pertinent information you offer is found within the last sentence.

For cycling, if you don't have a power meter, I don't see any reason why. Even if you do have a power meter, there are better options.

The only reason would be to support the website. I'm not sure how they are making their money really. I wonder how much they are making off of selling location data.

I don't think they are struggling with revenue. IIRC they have had quite a bit of investment they have revenue streams from selling merchandise as well as the premium stuff. I imagine they have more premium members than any other similar software by a very large amount. On top of all this it's effectively a rather large social media site that has millions of tied in users, if they're getting strapped for cash it's very easy for them to monetise this with advertising or a small fee to the end user.

Iain

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Training Full Time in 2015: http://www.triopensource.com
http://www.facebook.com/iaingillamracing http://www.twitter.com/iaingillam
https://www.youtube.com/...9JYCrOLP34Qtgp5w1WsA

I'm already supporting Strava by uploading my data, they promptly resell it.
http://www.engadget.com/...e-hopes-of-creating/


I'm no longer a premium member and I don't find it's worth the fee.

I've had premium for a couple of years. I am not exactly sure why I have it other than being a data junkie all the time. Like others have noted that without a power meter I really don't see any benefit to having premium. For logging and watching training trends I would rather use WKO (my primary application) or GC.

I love using Strava, but for me it just doesn't serve as much more than a social network site.

Their support forums are full of hundreds of good suggestions on how to make Strava a better tool for serious training, but they seem unwilling or incapable of implementing them. Most of it is really basic stuff such as giving people the option to choose "Moving Pace" or "Overall Pace" for running activities, woeful (and mandatory) correction of elevation data and the ability to view lap data on the Android app.

The impression that I get is that they want to keep things as simple as possible to make it a straightforward UX for the casual-user, which is ultimately is to the detriment of more serious users who actually care about the numbers that it's showing you. I still use it to share activities with friends, but certainly wouldn't pay for the Premium version until they can offer something more in these areas.

Agreed. Their unwillingness is definitely one of the reasons why I won't pay for service.

I dropped my RideWithGPS premium service for this very reason.

This is all I use it for. It is fun in the social-network sense to see what your friends are doing, how they are training, where they ride, etc. And the mild competition it provides.

As for training logs and actual performance analysis I use Training Peaks.

...which in itself wouldn't be so bad, but their horribly-flawed implementation of various ideas screws things up for people who do care about doing it correctly. (Of course, the same could be said for a lot of other sites out there.) The world would be better off if they just focussed on the social aspect, and leave analysis of training data to people who know what they are doing.

ETA: ...and now that I read the rest of your post, I see you said precisely the same thing in your last paragraph! Sorry 'bout that...

I want to believe that they can monetize this, but last year they secured a 4th round of funding. I'm no expert on venture capital but I do know that most start up businesses don't go into it planning to need four rounds of injecting capital (and dilution of shares) in order to get off the runway. I doubt there is a 5th round option anywhere and if they can't pull it off soon their remaining option is to be bought.

I've thought about it but have not pulled the trigger yet. You get a little more in the way of analysis. Its not great but if you are already a heavy Strava user, $5/mo is pretty cheap. Its pure vanity but I kind of want the filtered leader boards. Despite my complete lack of KOMs, I do think I might be a stud among the fat old guy crowd ;-)

As for the general use of Strava, I think it is great. Everyone in my cycling club is on it and it is a great way to keep up with what is going on. Its usually the first place I see friends' race results for bike races I am not at and I've found a bunch of new routes by seeing where others ride.

I'm sure they can monitize what they have and to some extent they have with the premium membership. I can't find too many figures on them (but haven't looked paricularly hard) but I did see something that suggested 20% of their population was premium. This was a while back but if it is similar today that's a sizeable amount of income. I'm not sure why they have gone for more rounds of funding. I can't imagine metro and premium are the main things they are going to rely on for income so I'm assuming they are building to something. I also would have thought if it was advertising they have enough critical mass of users to start that right away and skip the funding. But there a quite a few examples of mass appeal tech entities waiting long periods of time before generating income and being valued very highly primerily based on that mass appeal (facebook, whats app, snapchat etc.)

It feels to me like something that was set up with a focus firmly on generating cash (hence things like not being fussed about actual training metrics - not enough mass interest.)

Iain

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Training Full Time in 2015: http://www.triopensource.com
http://www.facebook.com/iaingillamracing http://www.twitter.com/iaingillam
https://www.youtube.com/...9JYCrOLP34Qtgp5w1WsA

That's very interesting. I was aware that they've had multiple rounds of investment from venture capitalists etc, but I didn't really know if that's normal or not.

I know they're still a small company, especially in the world of tech, but what exactly are their developers doing behind the scenes at the moment?! There have been no major updates to the site since the new "improved" run pages over two years ago. They seem to be focusing on guff like Strava Local, rather than actually implementing new features.

If I was an investor in Strava I'd be asking questions, because if you're standing still, you're moving backwards.

I've wondered for awhile now what their premium membership would look like at a lower price point, $20 perhaps. $70 just seems like a lot for annual fee for an app. At a lower price I'd probably hit the button to try premium. Nothing to support my view, just an opinion.

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"I think I've cracked the code. double letters are cheaters except for perfect squares (a, d, i, p and y). So Leddy isn't a cheater... "

From a news article last fall:

The company actually has three revenue streams; the largest is the premium subscription service. Strava also sells gadgets and gear through the app and shares anonymized data with municipalities for mapping and urban planning purposes.

That last one is interesting. They do have an incredibly large amount of data on the riding habits of a large segment of serious cyclist. Lots of entities would be interested in that data. Mapping is one thing but, Strava's data, even with the obvious holes, is likely the most accurate hard info on where, when and how serious cyclists ride. Lots of companies would be interested in that data, even if it was totally anonymous. e.g. any big bike manufacturer would probably cut a descent sized check for an annual subscription to that data base as they could use the data to as part of the number crunching they do to predict sales, do market trend studies, etc.

And, the sky is the limit if they ever start selling ads or loosen up on the anonymity of their data.

I'm using the premium version to compare where my competitors move ahead of me in time trial races.

Michael

I'd very much agree. I'm also quite interested in the fitness tracker direction and I'm wondering if they might jump into similar things as they surely have the largest collection of activity based data.

If fitness trackers and activity data starts being used more commonly in structured programs from major employers or by insurance companies as an option to lower health premiums then I'd imagine the data Strava has and the number of users it has would provide a good platform for a venture in that direction.

Iain

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Training Full Time in 2015: http://www.triopensource.com
http://www.facebook.com/iaingillamracing http://www.twitter.com/iaingillam
https://www.youtube.com/...9JYCrOLP34Qtgp5w1WsA

It's impossible to say without looking underneath the hood, but their funding history is certainly not atypical and nothing about it suggests that the company has been struggling, nor that they need the capital, nor that there's not more available if they want it. Again, it's hard to know, but the fact that they've raised 4 increasingly large rounds of funding actually suggests they're doing well.

I have biked so long now that I kind of got tired of the data overload that Training Peaks and software like it gave me. Strava is just enough data for me to check my fatigue, etc from rides and plan out my training. All of this is available with the Premium plan. For many, the data is not specific enough and they will hate it. But for me, the simplified data works.

But, unlike many others, I don't use Trainerroad, so all that money I would pay to that service I can use for Strava.

+1

Plus I use the service enough that paying something for it seems fair to me.

While the numbers are fairly small in the grand scheme of social media apps, Strava does have a nice collection of middle aged men with incomes over $100K/year who go to their site or the mobile app several times a day. That has to be worth something ;-)