Muse from ADULT INDUSTRY?!?!

[noah977]

I have three muses, "in the works" right now. All are in the setup stages and not yet making money.

One muse, probably the most promising one, is in a small niche of the adult industry. This niche is currently serviced by only a few major companies who charge way too much and treat their customers very poorly. (The largest is bringing in over $1,000,000 a month with very little cost.) I would be thrilled to take 5% of the market with a smaller, but better serviced shop.

This niche is NOT PORN, but something else in the "adult world". (Don't ask, I'll never tell.)

To get started, I setup the site as a "free trial". I have over 1,000 people using my free trial. One of my challenges is how to convert them to paying. If I just flip the switch and start charging tomorrow, I'm afraid we'll lose a mass of our users. (The site gains value from a large user base. The more users, the more value.) I need to figure out a way to convert a solid percentage of the 1,000 trails to paying customers while retaining the non-payers. One ideas was to cripple the free trials in a way that would encourage people to upgrade to paying. Another was to start them out at $1 per month and then raise it a few dollars per month until they're at full price. Hoping that most people wouldn't mind a $1 charge to keep their account going.

Does anybody have any other ideas??


I'm curious if anyone has any experience with marketing in this industry. I would even consider partnering up with someone who could contribute the right value to the project.

[Enzo]

Hi - 1,000 users already is a great start!

Have you considered introducing a low cost niche/muse related ebook or product that will test how many of your users are willing to pay money (like the Ed 'Mr Creatine' Byrd Tim mentions in the book)?

You may also be able to use list of subscribers to inform/sell to them as an affiliate of relevant products and services via email? This could be pretty effective if you have a good relationship with your subscribers and if the products/services you sell as an affiliate are good - not sure if bombarding people with rubbish products will allow a consistent revenue stream.

I am no expert on advertising (I actually know almost nothing), but maybe there are some opportunities for banners etc on your site to help get to that TMI?

Hope this helps or allows other to add comments from their experiences that will help you further.

Cheers

Enzo :)

[rsmudge]

Livejournal.com used to be free and then they became for-pay. For their early adopter users they gave them a permanent/free account called an "early adopter" account. Once they flipped the switch and made the site for pay, getting such an account was impossible.

You could do this to reward your current base and allow yourself to start monetizing as the userbase grows.

[noah977]

Not a bad idea.

Right now, I have a few ideas that I need to think through.

The concept is to look at this from a "strategic pricing" viewpoint. Imagine if you gave everyone a truth serum and they would honestly tell you EXACTLY what your product was worth to them and the maximum amount they would pay. (Since we can't really do this, we have to create situations where people "self select" based on options presented to them.)

1) Give all the free-trial adopters a "free account"...
1a) Free account for 1 year
2a) Free account for life

2) Charge free-trial adopters a tiny fee every month - maybe $5. The normal monthly fee is $60, so $5 is really just a "token" payment. Traditional pricing theory is that people will value something that costs money, even a little bit. This would allow also me to separate the people who experience value from the site from the ones who never use it.

3) Make ALL "basic" accounts free, but limited and then charge for the "premium" account. The idea is that people will "self select" based on the value they receive from the account. Everyone can keep their free, but limited account, and the ones receiving value can pay for a "premium" account.

4) Ramp up their payments. "Since you're an early adopter, we're going to charge you $5 the first month, $10 the second, $15 the third, etc. until you're up to full price." I can see at what price level the demand drops off.


Now that I'm writing this, I thing a combination of strategies is best. Perhaps give them a "free" crippled account or the the lifetime rights to have a premium account at half price. This way:
1) I don't lose any of the masses that I need to keep the site moving
2) I can hopefully generate some revenue.
3) The early adopters feel special because they get a lifetime discount
4) I can measure what percentage of the current user base values the site.

BTW - I studied a lot of pricing theory back in school. It really should be a mandatory study for anyone considering their own muse. How you present the combination of price and value is one of the key components to a successful business. (The more academic of you might want to buy the "pricing bible" called "Strategy and Tactics of Pricing". - Note: I am NOT affiliated with the book in any way, just a fan.)

I'm available to answer some basic pricing questions if anyone wants to PM me.

[KevinHutto]

Noah,

I have experience in launches like this with membership sites and other content delivery methods... It really depends on what the continuity portion is and what the product is and a number of other factors. Send me a pm if you are interested. I can give you a better idea from the different niches i am in - i learned the hard way with a couple of them...

kevin

[TPapp]

Have you heard of plentyoffish.com? He has one of the top dating sites in the world and charges not a dime yet still pulls in $5,000,000 a year. Visit these links and they'll give you a good idea on how he does it, I'm not saying you have to do it his way but it's definitely worth a look:

Good article on him (http://www.inc.com/magazine/20090101/and-the-money-comes-rolling-in_Printer_Friendly.html)

His blog (http://plentyoffish.wordpress.com/)

Plentyoffish.com (http://www.plentyoffish.com/)

[Sven]

I think the lifetime free mebership would be a great idea if you show rank on the site. That could give status to those early adopters which would probably make staying commited very attractive.

[noah977]

All great suggestions.

The plentyoffish model is interesting. My only hesitation is that my market size is potentiallym much smaller than his. (My biggest competitor only has 10,000 members and they currently dominate the industry.)

So, while I might pick up a little extra revenue from ads, I don't see it as enough to support the entire business.

[JKohlbach]

How about a free basic account for the current members, and as a way of growing your user base, give these members 10-20% royalty for new referrals. Who better to promote your service than the current users right?

If it's some sort of participatory service (my assumption), give free viewing rights away to the new customers (not the existing ones) and charge for everything else.

Also, go for the premium service and make the gap enticing. It's alot easier to sell another 50% on top of the basic membership price. So I would recommend three levels of pricing. Viewing, Basic, and Premium. Everyone gets some value from your service!

[BlueBanana]

Not possible to inform the list that you are in the midst of creating a paid site for your product. Refferrals, comments, feedback, etc would greatly be appreciated in trade for a 6 months more of free service. Create the 2nd site similar to yours. or even create a member login, giving you current list access. The more they show the new paying customers the worthiness of your product. you keep giving added months.

Your list is very important. You may find new add on payment products to sell to them. Building that trust will bring the deserved money back 10 fold. You know you will find something to market to that current list. Shoot I have no idea what your product is, but I sure am interested in signing to your list. lol.

List sales help. Check out Joe Vitales list. www.mrfire.com join his list, read his info. And you will see how easy upgrading sales and keeping your list happy is. Sales and site help, he is pretty good. His products I mean.

[noah977]

BlueBanana,

Good suggestion. I like your basic idea. I can let the "original free" members keep earning more free time in return for contributing value to the site. (comments, blogs, forum posts, etc. Guess I could make some automated "points" system.)

[JKohlbach]

Hmm.. all i can say to this now is two things:

1. Don't make it too complicated; and
2. It's easier to sell to people you're already doing business with.

[Emily.L.P.]

Hi everyone,

Great forum. Gives me much needed inspiration and is also a good source of information.

I'm still in the conceptualizing phases of my muse, but I have a fairly well-defined concept for a novel product geared (removed).

The market is saturated with video productions and spanking images. My product is neither of those; it is unique and potentially very marketable.

I am about to start the testing phase and am considering whether to gear my product toward men or women. The product could theoretically be purchased by either partner, but I think specifically targeting it to the spanker or spankee makes it more marketable.

I'm not sure how to gather information about who is more likely to purchase such a product. I was thinking about email membership sites and asking if they had any statistics on the gender of their visitors or members.

Any other ideas as to how I could get such info, or even whether it's needed?

I'm planning on hiring a web designer from Elance in about two weeks. My page is too messy to go live (attesting to my non-existent web development skills). However, I will make it live and keep it that way for the next week or so, in case people would like to take a look: (removed). You can see that here I am targeting the male partner.

I already know that the site isn't adequate, but feel free to critique other aspects if you wish. I welcome any comments or suggestions on the forum or through PM.

Thanks!

Laia

[badhank]

I am about to start the testing phase and am considering whether to gear my product toward men or women. The product could theoretically be purchased by either partner, but I think specifically targeting it to the spanker or spankee makes it more marketable.

While i dont know much about this specifically, should you not target the "dominant" person in the interaction. It would also give us a better idea of how to help you if we had some samples and trial accounts to check out ;) ;) ;)

[JKohlbach]

Emily,

The only way to know for sure is to split test it. Try making two pages, one to the spanker and one to the spankee.

And there is a sentence I never thought i'd write. :)

[Emily.L.P.]

Thanks Badhank and JKohlbach :)

On a related note, does anyone know of any software-building program that would allow me to build my own software that is visually appealing and allows for some degree of complexity?

:cool:

[dvdwlsh]

Does anyone know of any software-building program that would allow me to build my own software that is visually appealing and allows for some degree of complexity?

Emily, just spent a few minutes reading every line of your site copy and figuring out who your audience is. At face value, I'd say you are onto something ultra-niche and highly profitable, assuming your prospects take discipline and behaviour as seriously as your copy conveys. I'm personally not in your niche, so I'd ask you possibly the most critical question for your testing...

Does your target couple take this lifestyle seriously enough to add a somewhat invasive tool into their day-to-day life?

If you represent your target market, perhaps you can answer it with accuracy. In the software/web app world, we're seeing a flood of tools come out that are technology-for-technology's-sake and are essentially solutions in search of a problem. Is the perceived "distance discipline" aspect a real enough issue for your buyer that they would seek a solution?

If you can objectively answer these questions, either yourself or through a brief testing phase phase, here's what I'd say you do next...

Forget building the actual software right away -- that will slow you down and you run the risk of creating something without the market you expect. Before building, I'd engage a user-interface/application designer (not developer) to create 2-3 visual concepts that show a few aspects of your tool. Make it look like a finished, developed tool and make it beautiful.

Add these to your upcoming website design and see what volume of test-orders or interest you receive. If it justifies the often costly development phase, you at least know you have a market waiting for it.

If you want to see what I mean, go to any serious site that sells niche software. Notice the use of screenshots or visuals and experience what feelings that evokes. You don't care if they've written a single line of code until after you've purchased/downloaded it (at which point, the existence of an actual product clearly matters).

A few quick examples...

Things (http://culturedcode.com/things/) Awaken (http://embraceware.com/products/awaken/) Highrise (http://www.highrisehq.com/?source=footer)


David

[Emily.L.P.]

David,

Thanks so much for your insights. They were very helpful to me. I've been unsure as to exactly how to proceed through the development testing phase with this. The concept is novel, so there's not a lot of transparent data out there about the potential market and how to target it.

The next steps you've outlined definitely help me establish some much-needed clarity on how to move forward.

:cool: