Every founder in startupland right now is dying to replicate WhatsApp's $19 billion acquisition. If they say they're not, they're only kidding themselves.
The truth is, though the app is only about four years old, it took quite a bit of hard work and dedication to the company's core values to get it there. Realistically, every company – here in D.C. and beyond – could stand to learn a bit from the way WhatsApp operates and was able to attract the likes of Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook. Here are just a couple lessons startup founders can take away from this record acquisition:
Be Lean
Though WhatsApp processes about 50 billion messages each and every day, there's only 50 people working behind the app. And really, only 32 of those are engineers making sure the basically-free SMS service works smoothly. It's also widely known that the company hasn't spent any money on marketing efforts, leaving its massive growth to be a completely organic one.
Suffice it to say, WhatsApp is as lean as they come. Sure they took on $60 million in VC money, but that all came from one investor, and a great one at that.
Don't Jump the Gun
CEO Jan Koum was first contacted by Zuckerberg in 2012 about acquiring his company. Obviously it didn't happen. Zuck was persistent, though. Earlier this month, he had Koum over to his house for dinner and made another offer. For almost a week Koum weighed it and on Valentine's Day he finally agreed, interrupting Mr. Facebook's special dinner with his wife.
For nearly two years Koum walked around with the knowledge his company was worth billions, but never acted on it until the time was right. Late last year, Google reportedly offered WhatsApp $10 billion, and despite that pretty price tag, Koum still held off. Had he taken that offer, or even Facebook's earlier one, he'd be a lot less rich.
Good things come to those who wait. People said Snapchat was idiotic for rejecting Facebook's $3 billion acquisition offer. This shows, though, how a few months or maybe years of waiting until the right time can make a world of difference.
Think International
It's obvious with 450 million users that WhatsApp is huge. But much of that's beyond American borders. While we couldn't find a solid stat on the amount of international users, its obvious that WhatsApp is most popular in other markets. According to Jana, WhatsApp has the market locked up in places like India, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa. Another study by Onavo shows that while only about 7 percent of the American market last year used WhatsApp, a whopping 97 percent of Spaniards used it.
It's an easy concept that many often forget: there's more world outside of your own backyard. By extending WhatsApp to countries and languages internationally, it was able to explode its growth. Additionally, it's what made it such an attractive buy for Facebook, who really just wants to get more users around the world.
Put Your Customers First
WhatsApp costs $1 and displays zero adds. It could've sold out and offered an ad-heavy design to make money quicker. Instead, it wanted to make customers happy. Thus, they were able to acquire 450 million users in just more than four years – 50 million of those are said to have joined in the past few months.
By putting customer satisfaction first, WhatsApp cashed in big in the end. After all, money now is great, but for these big Internet acquisitions the only thing that matters is users. And with WhatsApp's approach, they were able to get tons of those.
Let Your Product Speak For Itself
Koum has all the right in the world to boast about his role as CEO of a $19 billion company. Instead, he shies away from the spotlight. On LinkedIn, he lists his role with WhatsApp as "QA Testing" and nowhere on his Twitter is CEO even mentioned.
Koum focused on the product, working under the hood and letting that speak for itself. Many founders in his position take the attention and run with it, but Koum stepped away from it to let WhatsApp stand on its own feet.
