Marketing & Business Strategy
In class we explored different business models and considered which ones aligned most with our vision. There were three models we took into closer consideration, and we ended up deciding on a combination of two of them.
Business Models
As a business model, Aikido stands for offering something completely opposed and different to the image and mindset of the competition. It is meant to attract customers who prefer ideas and concepts opposed to the mainstream.
We believe that the big energy companies are missing this market opportunity and muddle the waters with too much information that the everyday user does not understand, making decision-making for renovations delayed and less efficient.
Barter is a business model based on exchange. Goods are given away to customers without actual costs and no transaction of money takes place. In return, the customer provides something of value to the company, often consisting of data.
We offer our users a platform that helps them save energy and costs, and alleviates their decision-making. In exchange, the users help the calculator improve by using it and thereby uploading data. The more customers we have, the more accurate our calculator becomes.
Pay Per Use is a business model where the usage of a service is measured and the customer pays on the basis of that calculation. Depending on effective consumption, the price differs, attracting customers who wish to benefit from additional flexibility.
We felt that making our calculator free would broaden our user group and lower the threshold for using our product. This was done with the essential consideration that a major part of our target group are people who struggle with the high cost of living, adding costs for the calculator seemed unethical.
We decided on a merge of features from the Aikido and the Barter model. Our platform has an active exchange with its users, helping them save energy and costs while they help us improve the platform with their data. This, coupled with our strong belief in equal opportunity and efficiency, separates us from the competition that often charges their users and doesn't necessarily provide clear information. Our platform is there to make decision-making for renovations faster and more energy- and cost-friendly for the user.
Where Barkido brought us and new insights on testing
In Milestone 2 we introduced Barkido, a mix of Barter and Aikido. Barter is where the user pays with their data and Aikido means positioning yourself against incumbents who confuse and charge. We still stand behind Barkido, but between milestone 2 and 3 we had to confront the question: if users never pay, who does and why would they?
We already had the answer indirectly from our own test data, but with this realisation we took a different angle. In wave 2, users rated the prototype 9.23/10 for ease of use but only 7.61/10 for value. Besides reading this as a messaging and trust problem, it also told us something about the business model. People enjoyed measuring their home, but measuring is not what people pay for. No one pays to read their thermostat, they pay to find a solution. The diagnostic tool should be a front door to a decision about renovation. Every successful comparison we studied works this way: DoctoLib's free search exists to fill doctors' calendars; mortgage calculators exist to sell mortgages. Our calculator existed, so far, to produce a results page. That is why every earlier monetisation conversation had felt forced.
Where the money goes and how it reaches us
We had to determine more specifically who has urgency and a budget in our ecosystem. Three key players were identified.
Tenants have always been central to our ecosystem and feel the most pain from the lack of renovations through higher bills. They cannot act on most renovation recommendations as insulation and heating works are the landlord's decision. So they will never pay. This is also in line with our philosophy: tenants are already paying too much and we want to bring costs down for them. That said, a tenant in a G-rated flat has real legal leverage. Since January 2025, G-rated homes cannot be re-let; tenants can demand works or rent reductions. Our tool makes them aware of this, turning them into a free pressure channel pointing at the people who can act.
Small landlords are the customers we had been missing. French law bans landlords from granting new leases on G-rated homes from 2025, F-rated from January 2028, and E-rated from 2034. Paris is the most affected: 326,000 Parisian homes are rated F or G, and over half are E or worse. This changes the angle of our selling point entirely. It is no longer about saving money on bills, it is about the right to rent out your apartment at all.
Renovation contractors are the main players who pay. Their biggest cost right now is finding customers, since cold-calling is banned in this sector. French contractors pay €15–40 for a standard energy-renovation lead and €80–120 for an exclusive, well-verified one. Our questionnaire produces leads that already know their DPE situation, their eligible subsidies and their budget. A match made in contractor heaven.
The model: who pays what, when, why
Users (tenants and landlords) pay €0. Barkido survives intact here. Charging the demand side would reduce demand to zero, and charging renters would go against our core values. Where it now differs is how contractors get involved.
Contractors pay in two forms. A lead fee set initially at €50, higher than the standard market rate but still undercutting competitors, raisable later. Or a success fee of 3–5% on signed works, which we prefer as a longer-term model. Since renovations rarely cost under €10,000 and Paris prices are above average, a single signed job could mean €300–500+ per conversion, many times more than a simple lead sale.
The main risks
Renovation constraints. Landlords in Paris are not always free to undertake the works they want. Renovating a facade in a copropriété brings real complexity. Our recommendations must stay within what is actually possible for each user's situation.
Regulatory shifts. Changes to how residences are rated have already led to thousands of apartments being re-labelled F/G as better, without any renovation taking place. The addressable market can shrink unpredictably.
Volume chicken-and-egg. We just started, and contractors will not pay for small volumes. Acquiring that volume as outlined in phase 2, before generating any revenue, is the most critical and most fragile step in the whole model.