Just a random thought, but I really admire Seeking Alpha‘s cost structure over traditional content publishers like the Motley Fool. Their costs are significantly lower (usually free content from users) and you get a very deep database of obscure stocks where the traditional publishing model fails due to low reader interest and thus low revenue.
Since Seeking Alpha allows nearly anybody to publish on its website, quality can be hit or miss but I feel that given reader demand, quantity is more important than quality. Seeking Alpha’s platform approach leads todramatically higher readership and has a slight network effect. Even former Motley Fool writer, Whitney Tilson decided to publish his short thesis on Netflix on Seeking Alpha. Not only that, but Netflix CEO Reed Hastings actually responded to Whitney on Seeking Alpha (that would have helped out readership numbers!)
The Motley Fool does have premium services that Seeking Alpha does not, but premium stock services are a tough industry. You’ve got to really deliver to your readers to make it worth while and top quality analysts don’t come cheap. Anyways, there’s really no point to this article and I really enjoy both websites but I admire Seeking Alpha’s cost structure more.
