Business Model Score Criteria
How company is structured has a great deal to do with its susceptibility to behavior undermining the interests of the customer. The greater the transparency in a company's source of sustenance the easier it is to ascertain the full cost of doing business with that company.
There are always costs associated with running a business, whether it be charitable, for profit, or government sponsored; it takes some form of resource to produce something. whether it be time, money, raw materials or any combination of these; the costs must be covered or the product cannot continue to exist. The recipient user of the product (barring exceptions like gifts) bear these costs one way or another. One can only truly understand what they are paying for a product or service if they know how they are paying for it.
The business model score is very straight forward single criteria rating based on a determination for which of three business models the business falls under.
| Model | Score | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Direct | +1 | There is a clear understanding of cost associated with the product and who is footing the bill. The cost of using the product is straight forward to understand. |
| Temp Indirect | +0 | The customer must temporarily use the product with associated bidirectional advertisingMonodirectional advertising is when the ad is not interactive, such as a billboard or a classic television commercial. Bidirectional advertising is when the customer or potential customer (pottemer), can interact with the ad and unspecified data about the customer is cataloged by the advertiser. until some action to turn it off is taken. |
| Indirect | -1 | The customer must use the product with associated bidirectional advertisingMonodirectional advertising is when the ad is not interactive, such as a billboard or a classic television commercial. Bidirectional advertising is when the customer or potential customer (pottemer), can interact with the ad and unspecified data about the customer is cataloged by the advertiser. and has no option to turn it off. |
| Gossip | -2 | The business model is founded on harvesting personal communications data generated by users of the product. Costs to the user in terms of time, money, aggravation and loss of privacy are unknown. |