Courtesy of PamPam
“We see a trend of people sharing more in smaller circles and we see an opportunity for people to come together around these viewpoints, around these maps,” Jörges said.
On PamPam, maps are the content. And behind the content, there are creators.
PamPam sees its creators as “community creators,” Jaramillo explained. Even if they are promoting events or places, they are also typically trying to create communities or bring digital communities IRL.
Jaramillo also sees use cases for travel and lifestyle creators to use PamPam. For instance, a travel blogger could create a map of sites to see in a city; a lifestyle influencer could map out the best restaurants and events.
With roots working on YouTube ads, PamPam’s founders are also already considering creator monetization. In theory, creators could charge followers for access to a map or work with brands on sponsored maps, Jaramillo said.
But in the meantime, PamPam is focused on building its use case for everyday people, not just creators and curators.
“Everybody has the places in their lives that are important to them and that they would like to share out,” she said.
In the end, PamPam wants to help people “get out there and do things,” Jaramillo said. “Maps are super actionable.”
Bootstrapping a social startup
To date, PamPam has not raised venture capital, but was awarded $10,000 from a local Philadelphia grant and is bootstrapped by its founders.
The two-person team knows quite well that scaling a platform will take time and experimentation — two things venture capital doesn’t have a lot of leeway on.
Still, monetization is already on the agenda.
PamPam is ad-free and experimenting with a freemium model. In addition to a free version, it offers premium subscriptions with tiers of “Pro” at $12 per month and “Business” at $29 per month, which unlock benefits like the ability to expand maps with more destinations and optimize maps for broader reach.
“We want to make this a sustainable business,” Jaramillo said.