

According to Frederic Filloux’ Monday Note, average revenue per user (ARPU) is the most important metric of all.
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From The ARPUs of the Big Four Dwarf Everybody Else.
To put it another way, with its service business (music, apps, etc.) Apple is making 10x more than a decent publisher makes on advertising. And given the growth (+17 percent Y/Y), Horace Dediu does not exclude a service-related ARPU of $50 per device owner and per year in the near future.
My take: Amazon may be the king of ARPU, as Filloux dubs it, but Apple’s $194 per user is nothing to sneeze at.
While we’re comparing apple and oranges, here’s how Filloux says the New York Times stacks up against Google and Facebook:
In other words, for each dollar of digital ad growth between 2011–2018, the NYTimes took 32 cents, Google took $1.00 and Facebook took $3.70.
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