OnlyFans has made a major strategy change away from adult content.
What is OnlyFans and what is the strategy behind this pivot?
OnlyFans is a site that lets people subscribe to people they are “fans” of. It has ~130 million users.
For the most part, OnlyFans creators tended to create adult content, but the service is not limited to that. There are high profile users, such as Cardi B.
OnlyFans announced today that they will ban pornographic content starting October 1, 2021.
Reasons why:
1) Pressure from banks and payment providers
2) Difficulty attracting investors for its target valuation of $1B
Implications:
On Bizfluence recently, we were discussing Reddit’s $10B valuation. Reddit in recent years has removed more provocative content subreddits, but many of the adult content subreddits remain. Another Bizfluencer pointed out that these communities on Reddit + plus the previous controversial ones may make it hard for Reddit to IPO.
OnlyFans appears to be facing pressure even earlier in the process.
Time will tell how successful this pivot will be, but after Verizon bought Tumblr and removed adult content, the results were disastrous. Yahoo bought Tumblr for $1.1B in 2013. In 2017, Verizon acquired Yahoo (which included Tumblr) for $4.5B and later sold Tumblr for <$20M.
Sources:
