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When people think about generating revenue and making money with blockchain technology, minds immediately jump to the prices of tokens like BTC and ETH that have characterized the last half a decade in the industry.
I’m not interested in any of that “crypto going to the moon” stuff. Instead, I will highlight a few ways blockchain technology can help businesses generate new revenue and save on costs. By doing so, I hope to show you the potential this unique technology has for unleashing greater efficiency, unlocking new opportunities, and shaking up the status quo.
Data management and ownership with blockchain technology
We live in a data-driven world, yet many people still need to understand how blockchain technology will fundamentally shake things up when it comes to data management and storage.
To understand the implications of blockchains for data management, think of public ledgers simply as databases. Businesses, governments, individual entrepreneurs, or anyone else can simply write data to the blockchain by paying nodes to process the transaction. Of course, this data is hashed, so only those with the private keys will be able to unpack and view it, but a time-stamped record of the transaction that wrote the data to the ledger will be visible to all.
Having all important data stored privately on one secure database would bring about obvious benefits to any enterprise. The costs associated with securely storing data are enormous, and writing to the Bitcoin blockchain is extremely cheap. It also eliminates the possibility of large-scale data breaches, which are estimated to cost $9.44 million per breach as of 2022, not including reputational costs.
However, cost savings are only one side of the coin. Thanks to blockchain technology, businesses will also have new ways to monetize their data. Whereas in today’s world, it’s simply harvested by mega-corporations in exchange for using their services and platforms, in a blockchain-powered world, anyone seeking to access any type of data will have to pay fees to do so should the owner decide so.
How might this work in practice? Imagine a company in the financial sector storing records on the blockchain. If another company, say a company that is training machine learning models to spot patterns in economic data, wishes to access the data to derive insights from it, the firm can grant access without giving away any details about clients for a micro-fee per record. This could apply to any industry, and even to individuals, without violating the privacy of anyone.
To understand more about how data can be stored on the public blockchain securely and how partial access to records can be granted to ensure privacy is maintained, check out Dr. Craig Wright’s The Bitcoin Masterclasses in London.
Micropayments and the business models they unleash
While many have been distracted by the meteoric price rise of BTC over the past decade, plenty still remembers that it was originally designed as a peer-to-peer electronic cash system that could facilitate micropayments on a global scale.
Micropayments are a big deal, enabling multiple new ways to generate revenue for businesses of all kinds. As well as the aforementioned ways to charge for access to data owned by the company, micropayments represent new ways to get paid in various sectors.
For example, companies involved in the entertainment sector can charge a few cents per play for things like songs. Subscription-based models like Spotify largely arose because it was impossible to make such small payments until Bitcoin came along.
While larger payments of a few dollars for things like movies are possible with credit cards currently, it’s easy to forget that only 22.1% of the world’s population has access to a credit card. In many countries, it’s tough to buy anything online with cards due to high incidences of fraud. Even in relatively rich countries like Saudi Arabia, only 25.4% of the population has a credit card, locking the majority out of online commerce. Blockchains that facilitate low-cost transactions can bring these people into the global economy and allow them to transact online, creating new customers for businesses.
While increasing the size of the customer base is always a good idea, there are other things blockchain-powered electronic cash systems can do. The ability to make micropayments allows forward-thinking enterprises to create new business models, disrupting incumbents and giving potential customers more choices. For example, paying tiny fees per interaction within games provides an alternative to the subscription model, allowing businesses to capture players who are either unable or unwilling to pay subscriptions or would find it cheaper to use the micropayment-based pay-to-play model.
Publishers, too, could utilize micropayments and blockchains in various ways. Charging for access to content online becomes much simpler and allows a business to drop the endless ads, cookie notices, and paywalls that have come to ruin the user experience online. Paying a few cents to read an article requiring no payment details is much more palatable than entering card details and being locked into an annual subscription.
These examples make the same essential point: blockchains and electronic cash give businesses new ways to grow their customer bases, build new business models, and provide an alternative way to get paid. Best of all, every financial transaction is time-stamped on immutable public blockchain, making bookkeeping much easier.
Cost reductions across every sector and industry
Those who own a business of any size will already know how much money that could otherwise be spent on productive, revenue-generating endeavors is chewed up by admin and other similar costs. Blockchains can help reduce these costs and consolidate various time-consuming processes, bringing about cost savings. As the famous steel tycoon Andrew Carnegie once said, “watch the costs, and the profits will take care of themselves.”
As we already touched upon, a scalable blockchain will make it possible for businesses to store all their essential data cheaply and securely in one database. This reduces costs associated with things like data storage, regulatory compliance, and potential fines for data breaches.
Likewise, blockchains can make business deals much more transparent to those on the inside. Seeing the real-time financial position of a company, what was moved, where, when, and by whom, and where any record is currently stored saves valuable time and resources that could be put to better use.
In short, blockchains make enterprises, government departments, and other forms of organization more transparent and efficient. A penny saved really is a penny earned, and with more capital freed up for investment, businesses can grow revenue from the savings blockchain technology enables.
Join us at the London Blockchain Conference to find out more
This is just scratching the surface of how blockchain technology can save businesses valuable resources and unlock new revenue streams. Public, scalable blockchains are multi-faceted tools that will impact every sector and industry. Understanding how they work and what they can do for your business early will give you a competitive advantage.
The London Blockchain Conference is happening between May 31 and June 2, and we’d love to see you there. It’s not just a BSV blockchain conference—we want to hear from everyone interested in legitimate and legal use cases for blockchain technology.
To secure your tickets or request a speaking slot at the world’s largest blockchain conference, visit the London Blockchain Conference website today!
Watch: London Blockchain Conference 2023 brings government enterprise onto the blockchain
New to blockchain? Check out CoinGeek’s Blockchain for Beginners section, the ultimate resource guide to learn more about blockchain technology.
