The Leaky Bucket : Managing user retention on social platforms

Sammanfattning: Social platforms have become a large part of today’s society and there is large scientific interests in what creates a successful social platform. There is plenty of research available on how to acquire users to a social platform, but there is significantly less available on how to retain users on a social platforms. It is easy to forget that acquiring users is only half the battle, users that do not return is of little use. Thus, there is demand for research on how to retain users on social platforms, which is something that are of interest of both developing and established social platforms. This study aim to answer two research questions: “What drives continued use of social platforms?” and “How can CRM and Gamification tools be used to retain users on social platforms?” The factors that are investigated in this paper were derived from current literature. Based on the literature review, a conceptual framework was built from existing theory. The conceptual framework was used as the starting point for our data collection. Data was collected in the form of ten interviews of students currently enrolled at instutiotions of higher education. Later, the primary data were contrasted with the secondary data in order to draw conclusions. The results suggests that previous research have neglected some externalities such as trends and context, and the fact that the drivers for use differ depending on the social platform in question. Finally, a revised conceptual model is presented, it is a modified version of the conceptual model, where the new findings are added in order to create an illustration of how our research added to the existing research on the subject. The findings can be used by management on social platforms to develop user retention strategies. Further, the findings from this study can be used as a foundation for future research on the topic.