• Generally, we talk about Consumer and Enterprise products as being distinct from each other.

• But Dropbox, Github, etc. go both ways. So does email.

• Can you build a product that satisfies both consumer and enterprise users, in a simple, elegant way? Or will you inevitably lose focus trying to satisfy different sets of customers?

First I think it's important to make a clarification: Enterprise ≠ Business. Dropbox, as an example, is a company that serves both consumers and business, but I'd bet enterprise is actually very small for DB (enterprises being ~F500 businesses).

At the end of the day I think this comes down to focus. For any startup the challenge is how do you build your completely insane vision as quickly as possible. If you're in a market where that vision can serve both masters (Github being a very interesting example, though even they have an official - enterprise.github.com - enterprise edition) then it's great, but for most business the product would need to eventually split and that's hard.

Good point, Noah. Box better serves the enterprise market, I assume. Do you think Dropbox should have just focused on file sharing between friends (my buddies swap music all the day), or just focused on businesses (like Branch)? Will they eventually regret the decision to do both?

I don't know their business well enough to say. I do think it's interesting when you can serve two markets effectively at once. We, for one, use Dropbox internally exactly because it also serves us as consumers and it's much easier to manage. As we scale, we're going to need more permissions and other specifics that start to move you into the enterprise camp (and will likely move us towards Box or Google Drive).

I guess my question back is can you think of another business that is effectively serving both the enterprise market and the consumer market? Github is a really interesting example, I'd say it's too early on Dropbox ... Who else?

To Noah's point, I think that Dropbox (and, for that matter GitHub) can and do devote attention to the needs of businesses, but that's not quite the same thing as focusing on capital "E" Enterprise businesses.

Just from a product perspective (putting aside the much slower Enterprise sales and upgrade cycle, which can really affect product as well), focusing on Enterprise means taking on an additional layer of product requirements that aren't particularly driven by the actual users.

The time you spend adding device-level access permission, admin auditing reports or what-have-you, to meet EnterpriseCo's requirements, is time that can't go towards the parts of the product that users actually use.

Though following on from Noah's other statement, it'll be interesting to see what happens as some of the companies that "grew up" using the current crop of consumer-focused tools become enterprises themselves.

Enterprise was traditionally little to do with product and all about sales. Microsoft disrupted the enterprise via products originally designed for SMEs through business development (OEM) deals which were much more leveraged. All the time, these businesses were not product or design driven, but something does seem to be changing.

Yammer seemed groundbreaking, using the model of consumer tech. which is closest to business (freemium) and applying it to enterprise.

Consumer products are often better designed (Apple) than enterprise (SAP) but the progression from IBM -> Microsoft -> Yammer means that enterprise ones are getting minimalist easy to use tools that are less feature laden than 'professional' ones.

Noah, I think Google Apps are a great example, as well.

My hunch is satisfying both consumers and businesses breaks down once you hit a certain number of "seats." But if the value proposition is compelling to both friends and colleagues – sharing files, communicating, exchanging code, writing documents – then I don't see why a simple product can't satisfy both camps, up to a certain size.

There are tons of products that are used by both business users and consumers with little or no distinction between the uses—from Photoshop to Twitter (both of whom have businesspeople, if not product features, focused on the business customer).

So...is that really the distinction that's meaningful? I'm not sure.

@Ev I'd say that Twitter perfectly exemplified consumer (minimalist, primary use case to the forefront) vs Photoshop as a business product (many routes through system, large range of menus)

Twitter is like a car UI, anyone can get in and know how to drive it somewhere whereas Pshop is like the Space Shuttle with lots of buttons and dials.

But I agree, most people own a computer now, so business use is being driven by consumer expectations of ease of use. Consumer design is driving innovation and taking it to businesses rather than the other way round.

And even the astronauts on the Shuttle took their own laptops in favor of the onboard computer:

davidgalbraith.org

Again, I think there is an important enterprise versus business distinction here. Inside your average F500 you are given a laptop, not allowed to install anything and often limited in the sites that you can visit work. This is changing pretty quickly, but its still a slog for a lot of folks inside those organizations who have become used to using software that doesn't suck.

Re: Twitter specifically - I actually think there's something bigger at play. What social does for brands, and twitter isn't alone here, is take away the special boxes for brands 300x250 etc) and say you have the same tools and space to create content that consumers do. I wouldn't underestimate that shift in thinking, though, as everything prior was a special box.

Sorry about the jumble in the middle there. Speaking of musings on text boxes, tiny box + iPad seems to spell trouble for me. To clarify, I equate taking away special boxes to meaning you get no display ad space on these platforms which brands are used to throughout history (print ad is a special page, commercial a special interruption, etc.).

Photoshop was perhaps a bad example, since it's mostly business and just a few consumer users. Twitter is purely consumer -- except for the fact it's also used by businesses, F500 to mom-and-pop. It's a network, so maybe a different animal?

But look at Microsoft Word and Excel -- driven by business, but tons of consumer users, as well.

I think the distinction is around use cases, which drive functionality. If business and consumers have overlapping use cases, you can have both types of users -- in fact, you can't stop it if you try. (Extracting maximum value from big business users is another matter.)

There's also the (perhaps more important) matter of positioning. Can your product be used by all these types of users and still maintain a clear identity? Dropbox is easy file sharing, no matter who is using it.

The framing here is confusing me. I believe the line between enterprise and end user services is blurring because users (ie: people) are buying services themselves - routing around the enterprise IT dept. and its mandate. The blurring of enterprise is been driven by a trial & sales channel that is direct.

Example. With Chartbeat we saw individual users drive a ton of adoption within news/media companies. Whether it was TV, print, or radio organizations it was more often than not one individual who said im going to get this setup on the site. Once inside the products can spread laterally across the organization.

So I think more about the question: how can you accelerate this alternate channel for people to trial and use your products regardless of whether they are in or outside of an enterprise. The walls of the enterprise are becoming more and more permeable and technology is enabling users to accelerate this change.

@John do you think the freemium model in enterprises is something that will challenge armies of sales people? Are there specific instances where you think it doesn't work (maybe where the users in an organization have no influence over the purchasers, for example)?

I think it is pretty clear for most users whether they are using something for their job or for their personal use. Historically you mostly used products at work that your work purchased for you. And for a company to make that sale they had to market and sell mostly to the IT or purchasing departments. Usage was expected not earned. Now we see that in all products - personal and for work that usage had to be more earned than just required. So great products are starting to attract users for work and personal which increases the imperative on quality products. I think that is why they are most similar now...

Ben Horowitz wrote a relevant blog post – "Meet the New Enterprise Customer, He's a Lot Like the Old Enterprise Customer" – about this topic.

For its first 5 years, SeamlessWeb* (online food ordering) was used exclusively by businesses. It was an accounting tool that helped businesses allocate all their food costs to one place and avoid a miserable, receipt-laden reimbursement process. Users loved using the product at work and demanded that it be available for home delivery orders. When SW finally did open up to individual consumers, you can be sure that (new) user acquisition was an entirely different beast that required new resources. Corporate sales did corporate sales.

To answer the initial question, I think companies tend to focus first on one of the two sides. Over time, companies with overlapping use cases (everybody eats, loves flowers...) will experience demand from the "other side.” Opening up to that other side and building it out meaningfully will usually add complexity and require new resources. But I think the process can be looked at as a sign of a company's maturation moreso than a "loss of focus."

* SW is an interesting case b/c it went from enterprise/business to consumer. FreshDirect and H.Bloom took the more common route. And to John's point, I bet people would go into work and ask, "Why don't we have FD/HB here?"

I think another interesting side-question is at what point it makes sense to open up to both sides and how then to split resources.