The case of the aspiring Ola-Uber killer
BluSmart cab service started as an aspiring Ola-Uber killer promising to solve all the issues which customers faced with Ola and Uber.
When they began their operations, an important feature of their marketing campaign was that they will not indulge in differential peak hour pricing.
In fact, this was a key point which differentiated them from the likes of Ola and Uber. Another key feature was no cancellation policy.
But they have recently changed their pricing structure and now they charge differential peak hour prices.
I am not saying it is bad, but in the long run, the need for profitability requires every company to go the same route. Blusmart is no different.
Ola and Uber also started to be as customer friendly as possible but the requirement of profitability forced them to take tough decisions.
But these startups themselves set unrealistic service expectations by burning investor’s money, and then once the money is over and the pressure of profitability kicks in, they go back on everything they promised.
The worse thing is that they always know that this would happen. In fact they plan to do this after acquiring good user base.
This strategy may be good for quickly acquiring new users, but I think even if a company has good amount of funds, they should not over-promise in terms of services.
Being true from day one will result in better organic growth and user loyalty. Otherwise soon people may start criticizing BluSmart the same way they now do for Ola and Uber.
And one day some new startup will emerge again promising to solve the issues faced by the customers with BluSmart.
And the cycle goes on.