Evernote Market: App Maker's Retail Strategy Pays Off

Cloud software company Evernote lets people store musings, links, photos, and other files with its popular personal management app. It has built a user base of about 85 million by pitching itself as a cooler, more effective organizer for creative minds than business-focused data management services such as Dropbox and Box. The problem for Evernote is that most users don’t pay for the basic service, which allows them 60 megabytes of uploads per month. It’s been relying largely on about 10,000 businesses to cough up $10 per user per month for subscriptions that come with “business notebooks” and other collaboration tools. The company says it has a total of 4.5 million paid users, including those business customers, trial subscriptions, and individuals who pay a $45 annual premium for such features as more capacity (about 1 gigabyte per month) and a better search engine.