"Reddit, the investors who bought the product" are in a difficult spot. And certainly haven't shown an overabundance of creativity in monetization approaches.
Suffice to say, you probably don't deserve a "front page of the Internet" tagline if your first display is a redirect request to your app.
Mod tools and the data on what works is the untapped resource.
Every other major data or tool set for moderation is behind an NDA.
As the saying goes: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it."
There must be some huge incentive for Reddit to push users toward the mobile app.
- Ad-Targeting: a mobile app has a lot of data points to create a unique "finger print" for each user.
- Conserving resources: a well designed mobile app can really save a lot of bandwidth and server resources for an online platform like Reddit.
(I also hate the pervasiveness of identifiable tracking but that's a whole different rant.)
You don't need to perfectly A:B test your two different offerings if that means preventing users from using the product in a way that best suits them. Stop putting shit behind "read more" buttons just because you want to see if people are actually reading your articles. Stop breaking things into multiple screens just so you can track your damn funnels. Better MAU _tracking_ (not even better MAU) does nothing for user experience and pursuing that at the expense of everything else is just plain foolish.
1. How well is this working for them 2. If the answer to 1. is "not very", how long will they stick to this strategy.
They've been going at it for a couple of years now, so I imagine they're approaching the moment when they have to reassess how well things are going.
I wonder if we'll see a change of direction any time soon.
From what we hear, the app isn't even that well designed. It seems that many users are still using unofficial clients because the app can feel heavy and sluggish, with only a barely acceptable UX.
There must be some huge incentive for Reddit to push users toward the mobile app. Most likely, the app allows for higher or more accurate monthly active user counts and enables more targeted advertising, both of which are critical to increasing advertising revenues.
Reddit is in a difficult spot because they're mostly an ad-supported business but their users are vehemently opposed to advertising and any forms of tracking. They have to tip-toe around all of the advertising and user tracking that they do. Strangely, their users mostly seem to give them a pass on the tracking. Their users are relatively trustworth, viewing Reddit as far more trustworthy of a company than Facbeook, despite the two companies having largely similar business models.