Square Ecosystem: a brief overview
Square ecosystem represents a growing ecosystem of financial services. Ecosystem of Square can be divided into two groups: seller ecosystem and cash ecosystem.
Square seller ecosystem is a cohesive commerce ecosystem that helps its sellers start, run, and grow their businesses. As illustrated in Figure 1 below, the core services for sellers are managed payments and points of sales products and services. Specific functionalities that contribute to these services include customer engagement platform, payroll invoices services, functionality to make appointments and capital management tools. Moreover, e-commerce and developer platforms, as well as, virtual terminal are important components of Square ecosystem on the Seller front.
Figure 1 Square Seller products and services
Square cash ecosystem, represented by Cash App comprises a wide range of financial products and services that are designed to help individuals manage their money. These include a cash card, instant discounts tool Boost. The strongest feature of Cash App that has no analogue in the market is the functionality to purchase Bitcoints and stocks in a simple, secure and hassle-free manner.
Figure 2 Square Cash App functionalities
The financial services and digital payments company is increasing the linkage between its seller and cash ecosystem in order to from strengthen its position in the market. For example, employers with seller account can pay their employees from seller revenues the next business day using Instant Payments feature when employees use Cash App.
There is still room for growth of Square ecosystem on both fronts – Seller and Cash App. Apart from connecting the both ecosystems. The finance sector disruptor can also scale each of them, as well as, engage in optimised cross-selling. Moreover, the developer platform can play an instrumental role in expanding the ecosystem for Square, through exposing Application Program Interface (API) to third party developers to adjust it to the needs of a wide range of businesses.
Square Inc. Report contains the above analysis of Square ecosystem. The report illustrates the application of the major analytical strategic frameworks in business studies such as SWOT, PESTEL, Porter’s Five Forces, Value Chain analysis, Ansoff Matrix and McKinsey 7S Model on Square. Moreover, the report contains analyses of Square leadership, business strategy, organizational structure and organizational culture. The report also comprises discussions of Square marketing strategy and addresses issues of corporate social responsibility.
