Gay forums/events?

We've been organizing islandgathering(.com) for 6 years now.
Overtime we've reached quite a few 'gay' webmasters, some have become regular attendees.

A few 'gay' attendees talked to us about the 'why not a gay version of IG?'.

My opinion is that I don't understand why the gay community would want to be excluded from the straight community. Being European I probably have less 'gay fear' so looking for some feedback here.

Our reviews on our event are raving, simply a strong event to get business done. Should we work harder to get maybe another 10-20 'top' gay webmasters into the event or split off the gay community into it's own event?

Some reviews 2006:
gfy(.com)/showthread.php?t=667315[/url]

-F.

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Originally Posted by fabianb

Our reviews on our event are raving, simply a strong event to get business done.

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You will actually notice that all of the shows have a lot of rave reviews, whether they suck or not, the problem with rave reviews is that people post on the boards to impress.

Personally i dont see why we need to have other 'gay' events, we already have a successfull gay show put on by CCBill, offering more and more shows is going to be like what has happened with webmaster forums over the years, they all start competing with each other for the same small group of webmasters that dont post on the larger boards, making each of these 'new' boards more and more worthless to others.

The same is true for the shows, 5-8 years ago there was perhaps a show every 3-4 months, now there is a show every 3-4 weeks and everyone is 'showed' out, after all, there are only so many times you can see the same reps, trying to sell the same shit, at the same show, with the same sales talk.

Companies need to start realizing that we're at a point now in the industry where we're working with a minute amount of webmasters that arent clued up on what shows to attend, what boards to post on, what programs to use, etc. The pie can only be sliced up so many times before everyone starts fighting over the remaining peice.

Ask yourself, with 2 companies already wanting to cater to the gay market, CCBill and GayVN, two companies that are already well established in that market place, what makes you think you can mirror their successes, based on the fact that until this thread, ive never even seen mention of the Island Gathering on ANY of the gay marketing forums?

Regards,

Lee

Lee,

Some good comments.
Some remarks:
The straight business is about 8* the size of the gay market.
As a direct result of this straight oriented companies tend to have more staff/sales reps.
We never targeted to this group of people: ceo's and owners is what we're looking for.
Problem with events with too many people results in what you mentioned yourself: too much sales crap.
Cut the sales crap and now you have an owner talking to an owner. No way to back out from a deal here. I've been in too many situations myself where you come back from a show with '5 deals' but end of day they fall apart because sales rep doesn't follow up or doesn't get permission to carry through the deal.

Klixxx has been marketing to and with gay communities for a few years. I believe we where one of the first magazines to cross over from straight to gay which brings me back to one of my questions in my first post: why so little cross over in general?

->

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Originally Posted by fabianb

why so little cross over in general?

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As i said, if you dont know much about the gay side of the industry, if you did do a 'gay' Island Gathering it would probably fail.

For the record, there's a heap of cross-over from the straight side of the industry to the gay market, many sponsors over the past few years have launched versions of their programs specifically catering to gay marketers, XXXCash, TopBucks, AEBN, SilverCash, SICCash, the list goes on.

The cross-over is there, maybe you just havent noticed it as you were to busy looking for 'CEOs and owners' to spend their money?

Regards,

Lee

The problem with another gay-only show is that the gay market is small, so we end up seeing the same people over and over again.

We already have the ccbill Gay Phoenix Forum, and now we have the epoch/AVN crowd announcing that they're holding another gay conference during the same month (October). As you can see by the numbers in this poll http://forums.gaywidewebmasters.com/...highlight=show most webmasters here don't want another show, at least not in the same month.

Here's the problem as I see it. I'm an independent webmaster. I can't afford to fork out $3K to go to a show. And if I were to spend that kind of money, I want to make sure I'm going to the best one there is. So, if there are three gay shows and I'm confused about which one is going to be best for me, I'll probably just opt to go to none. I can't take the chance that I'm going to blow $3k on the wrong show.

What I'd prefer to see happen is for the big companies and sponsors of these shows to come together and help independent webmasters get to the shows. After all, wouldn't Condom Cash, for example, be more interested in talking to me than another program. Sure, there are deals to be made between programs, but don't you all want access to the independents who push traffic. Rather than spending thousands of dollars on a booth than doesn't get a lot of foot traffic, or thousands on stickers all over the hotel lobby floor screaming "Pussy Cash," or free limo service from the airport when free hotel shuttle already exists, it might be more effective if these big companies offered independent webmasters a monetary grant to help offset the costs.

If I didn't have to pay to get into the conference and if someone were to give me a grant of $500 or more to help offset my costs, there's a greater chance I good attend the show. And I'm sure a lot of other webmasters are in the same boat.

In order to ensure the sponsors feel that they're getting their money's worth out of it, the conference could set up an event somewhat like those 10-minute date parties. All the sponsors sit at individual tables, and all the grant recipients rotate from sponsor to sponsor, giving each one 10 minutes to pitch their product and talk one-on-one with the webmaster. To avoid abuse, you only get your $500 grant when the event is over and you can present a sheet that each sponsor has signed. Just a thought.

Lee's right, we don't need more shows, we need better shows. If you want to expose yourself and your group to the gay market, why not team up with ccbill's Gay Phoenix Forum and help make that show better.

I'm just a little guy, I don't necessarily need to talk to a CEO. And in fact, I've had more than one CEO screw me up the ass without lube or a condom, and I didn't even get to cum, so I'm not so sure your CEO argument holds much water with me. Give me access to people who can teach me how to push more traffic, build better galleries, and sell more memberships. That's what I need.

Michael

Lee,

No offense but I find the way you act and react on serious posts quite a joke.

topbucks, silvercash and other straight companies adding a few gay sites isn't a cross over. It's commercializing and tapping into a gay market.
Pretty much same happened 8 years ago with the 'fetish' market.
Huge difference between the real fetish sites and the commercial festish sites that came up after that.
it's pretty much the same as a 100% gay webmaster launching a 'teen pussy' program. Guaranteed his retention will be below average.

And for the record: I wasn't too busy with finding ceo's. I run a 150 staff company so I happen to know the frustrations of going to events and getting nothing done. This was also the reason I started the event to start with, same as we started klixxx that way and many other ventures.

What you could learn from people that run mainstream sites with millions of dollars in revenue is how to maximize this revenue and traffic. When I look at any of your sites I see at least 5 small procedures that are not in use on your sites but are in use by pretty much any straight operator. Probably would add 10-15% revenue on the fly, but I guess 10-15% doesn't mean all that much to you?

For the record: I posted here to have a constructive discussion, not to be bashed.

Michael:
Thanks for a long reply.

Some remarks:
In any business you have different layers of providers. You describe yourself as an 'independent webmaster'.
During IG we always have 10-20 people that are 100% comped by either us or a sponsor or I see a personal value in this person. The way we look at this is very simple: if I know you have X amount of traffic or X amount of other business and by inviting you we might end up doing $20k/yr in business it does pay off.
Very simple return on investment formula.

In your case: if your traffic volume would be big enough and this is known in the market changes are you would get an invite.
I agree with you that forking out a minimum of $3k doesn't make any sense to most people. To be educated on traffic etc. you don't need to fly to an island, you better stay home on go on the boards or come together with 3-4 other guys and create your own learning weekend (but invite at least one straight site webmaster;-) )
Once you grow your business and end up with e.g. 5-10 staff members your needs change. All of a sudden you don't have time anymore to look around and check what the competition is doing but you're busy managing your staff. Those people are the typical guys (and girls) we target.

In the old days CE(cash) brought together tons of mid size and smaller webmasters with almost monthly small events in cities around the US which seem to be what's missing these days.

I like your idea on the 10 minute sessions. I believe phoenix form had a 'passporte' to collect stamps. Not sure if there was any comp after finishing that.

I can't agree more with you on the booth space: 100% blowing money to show off with a big booth. End of day this turns into branding and return on investment is hard to measure. On top of that the traffic passing by has no idea who to talk to: the models or the people working the booth?

Grant:
Good idea. ;-)

F.

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Originally Posted by fabianb

topbucks, silvercash and other straight companies adding a few gay sites isn't a cross over. It's commercializing and tapping into a gay market.

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Im not talking about their paysites, im talking about their gay specific program options, again, if you had any knowledge of the gay industry as you claim to have you would know this.

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Pretty much same happened 8 years ago with the 'fetish' market.
Huge difference between the real fetish sites and the commercial festish sites that came up after that.

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No it didnt, i dont recall ANY program launching fetish specific front-ends to market to the specific fetish webmaster community, again, paysites have nothing to do with what we're talking about, we're talking about webmasters arent we?

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it's pretty much the same as a 100% gay webmaster launching a 'teen pussy' program. Guaranteed his retention will be below average.

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Again with the paysites.

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I wasn't too busy with finding ceo's. I run a 150 staff company so I happen to know the frustrations of going to events and getting nothing done. This was also the reason I started the event to start with, same as we started klixxx that way and many other ventures.

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Ah sorry, i took your quote to mean you only wanted to do business with ceo's not 'actual' webmasters, thats certainly how it read, my apologies if you didnt mean that.

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For the record: I posted here to have a constructive discussion, not to be bashed.

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For the record, you arent getting 'bashed' this isnt GFY. I thought up until your post above this was actually a pretty good business discussion.

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In your case: if your traffic volume would be big enough and this is known in the market changes are you would get an invite.

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So basically, you would only 'comp' someone that can benefit you, based on your opinion on how 'big' they are? That isnt what Michael meant, he meant that rather than focusing your event/s on the large guy, put the emphasis on those affiliates and webmasters that are new to the industry or theones that havent quite 'made it' yet. The ones that simply cant afford to waste thousands upon thousands of dollars going to a show.

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Once you grow your business and end up with e.g. 5-10 staff members your needs change. All of a sudden you don't have time anymore to look around and check what the competition is doing but you're busy managing your staff. Those people are the typical guys (and girls) we target.

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Thats called being complacent, just because you have staff to manage, that doesnt mean that you can forget about the industry happenings and leave it to your employees, in fact, thats a really snobbish way to think about things imho, any program can lose touch with the industry, its happened several times in the past 8 years, where is CE now? Where is MaxCash now? Their owners became complacent and their programs suffered because of it.

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In the old days CE(cash) brought together tons of mid size and smaller webmasters with almost monthly small events in cities around the US which seem to be what's missing these days.

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Again there are plenty of small webmaster gatherings in various cities around the US, there is a meeting of gay webmasters in L.A on a regular basis, there are meetings in New York on a regular basis, as i said, without meaning to cause offence, if you had been marketing 'with' gay webmasters, you'd know about these meetings.

Regards,

Lee

I'll say this...

the gay end of the business has come into it's own.

We've blossomed into a big man-eating Venus Fly trap, and we've come to the point where we can do this on our own. Many independent gay webmasters don't bother using the gay cross-over sites and just go with gay-run programs that produce better content and understand the needs of people advertizing to gay customers.

We know that as the straight side gets more and more crowded they're going to try to get us to come back and sit at the kid's table at shows.

We're not biting.

I don't mean to be hard on you, and I get it that the straight companies have no problem with us being gay. (well, for the most part)

But we've out-grown the need to have straight companies helping us out and inviting us to their shows.

:jasun:

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Originally Posted by fabianb

What you could learn from people that run mainstream sites with millions of dollars in revenue is how to maximize this revenue and traffic. When I look at any of your sites I see at least 5 small procedures that are not in use on your sites but are in use by pretty much any straight operator. Probably would add 10-15% revenue on the fly, but I guess 10-15% doesn't mean all that much to you?

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And this point bothered me as well. A lot of the tactics used on the straight side of the business just aren't of interest to many of us. I personally feel that the straight side of the business has soiled the entire market's reputation with their dirty tactics. Yes it may add another 10-15% to your revenue, but how many people does it piss off? How many people will never buy another porn membership because of these tactics?

Things like:

-Opening multiple pop-ups and exit consoles or opening a new one every time one is closed down. This kind of tactic has killed the usefulness of pop-ups and made them one of the most hated things on the web.

-Offering free porn by e-mail just to scam people's e-mail addresses, and then, selling those e-mail addresses to other spammers.

-Throwing up 10 original content sets of women fucking themselves with Coke bottles and promising the surfer "thousands of pictures." When the surfer gets inside they don't find thousands of pictures of woman using Coke bottles, but they find thousands of pictures of all kinds of other things that they necessarily didn't want.

-Calling content "exclusive" when it isn't.

I could go on, but those are just some of the tactics used on the straight side of the business that burn my ass. So yes, a lot of us on this side of the business don't engage in those tactics -- many do. But I think by and large the gay side of the business is cleaner, a little more ethical. We're more about long-term brand building than the flash and screw the surfer type of site so prevalent on the straight side of the business. Please don't litter this post with examples of gay scumbags. I know they exist and I'm sure there are plenty of them. But I just don't see a lot of the stand-up gay brands engaging in those kinds of tactics.

Maybe we should invite the straight side of the business to our conference to teach them how to maintain a solid brand without pissing off the surfer.

Michael

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Originally Posted by Lee

Im not talking about their paysites, im talking about their gay specific program options, again, if you had any knowledge of the gay industry as you claim to have you would know this.

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Lee, honestly, your demeanor on this board truly baffles me. We all know you love to listen to yourself talk (or, rather, read your own words on this site), but why must you constantly act like such a know-it-all? Can't you TRY actually being a little more diplomatic when people are posting thoughtful topics and trying to initiate discussions? I mean, really.

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Originally Posted by Jasun

But we've out-grown the need to have straight companies helping us out and inviting us to their shows.

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I know what you're saying, Jasun, but the problem with this is that you're looking at it as a gay-and-straight thing, where he is really just looking at it as a business thing.

Personally, I think that the gay and straight sides of this business have a LOT to learn from each other, because there are strenghts and weaknesses on both sides, and I think that a little more interaction between the two would be a lot more cool.

I think anytime you start to segregate businesses, you run the risk of falling into a rut of homogeny. And to perfectly honestly, that's already started to happen in the gay community. We're seeing WAY too many sites of the same nature and a lack of ingenuity in how to run gay businesses. It's become a very safe, very NON-creative zone where nobody is taking serious risks anymore. A lot of the leaders in this business are leaders only because they achieved financial success, not for any particular originality or cleverness in the products they are offering.

I would really like to see this business get shaken up again, so that people were kept on their toes a little more regularly. Because when I look around, I see an awful lot of complacency among gay webmasters, and honestly, I think some of them could use a little more input from outside sources.

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Originally Posted by XXXWriterDude

We all know you love to listen to yourself talk (or, rather, read your own words on this site)

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Says the guy who constantly writes about stuff he doesnt know about whilst posting links to the same articles he writes every chance he gets.

Ken, would anyone here actually know who you were if you didnt write for AVN? Furthermore, does any actually care about the stuff you write?

Regards,

Lee

[QUOTE=XXXWriterDude;181339]I know what you're saying, Jasun, but the problem with this is that you're looking at it as a gay-and-straight thing, where he is really just looking at it as a business thing.

Running a site or a company is a business. The ones that start off with one small site and grow are in this game for the money.

I believe UK statistics are somewhere around the number of 1:8 guys are gay, have gay feelings or would like to see gay porn. This for me was the reason 8 years ago to open gay sites even tho I am straight. It's just a business.

Once people stay in their comfort zone nothing is to be learned anymore.

Michael:
I think most of the issues you address are 1998.
A straight program has to compete hard these days to get the traffic and no way that '10 sets with some content' will retain and thus payouts will suck.
Simple economics these days.

I will give you some perfect example as to what bigger straight programs discuss:
averagedicks(.com). Design is 1998. Fonts are so small that they are almost impossible to read on a 17inch laptop.

Hit members button, try to login 5*.
No 'oops you're not a member yet?' screen. Very clean procedure.
Not a member click here to buy .. click here if you forgot your password.
Guess what? have to find a customersupport link with a big invite to cancel to retrieve a password.

Hit 'instant access'.
Damn .. I have a US credit card but I live in Panama.
Ccbill denies me. Where is your fail-over?
Your 'phone' option only allows to call from within the US.
In 2006 alone 20.000 Americans (with creditcard) move to Panama, small country but those Americans happen to live all over the world and they keep buying porn.

Join page: default to a $ 69.95/90day trial?
Why do you think straight programs run a $ 4.95 trial (with upsell button for full access? )

Every little tweak is worth a few points. This is what you can learn from bigger programs and for the record: many smaller niche players have excellent retention numbers, this is what the big boys started to understand. Smaller niche players play in their own little world but aren't aware of some of the procedures to add % points revenue.

Jasun:
It's a two way street. Many straight programs are afraid for gay (believe it or not). Tons of traffic deals to be done there ...
I know owners of very big programs that will not touch any gay traffic and at their scale they leave at least $500k/mo in revenue on the table. Simply adding a text link 'gay sites' to an exit console would do miracles for small/medium size gay operator.

Only AEBN offers it in a smart way to allow a surfer to browse back and forward between gay and staight movies and in both they offer bi-sex..

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Originally Posted by Lee

Says the guy who constantly writes about stuff he doesnt know about whilst posting links to the same articles he writes every chance he gets.

Ken, would anyone here actually know who you were if you didnt write for AVN? Furthermore, does any actually care about the stuff you write?

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Oh, Lee. Sigh. It's obvious you have absolutely no regard for anyone but yourself. The fact that you constantly stoop to such lows on your site proves this. The fact that you trot out my inexperience every chance you get without even considering my point also proves what an insecure, defensive person you are.

I've learned a LOT about this business from working at AVN and meeting a lot of webmasters. They've taught me a lot. True, I don't run my own site, but you don't have to run a site to know how it works, nor does one have to put their hand in a fire to know that it's going to hurt.

If people--or actually, if YOU--didn't care so much about what I write, then you wouldn't be sending me little IMs every time you launch a new site or have something else you want me to cover in the magazine. If you didn't think anyone was reading our magazine, you wouldn't bother. And if you didn't like the coverage, you wouldn't be asking me to give you some press. Which I've done, time and again, even though you're not an advertiser and trash AVN every single chance you get, because I CARE, and because I WANT to do it. But there you are, the very next day, trashing AVN yet again on the board, making wildly egregious judgments and predictions about stuff that YOU know nothing about. How many times have you said that AVN was desparate and failing as a business? How many times have you predicted the end of our magazine? How many times have you been WRONG?

I've never claimed to be anything other than a writer, nor have I ever referred to myself as some kind of expert and tossed my weight around as if I was better than everyone else. Can you say the same, Lee??? HONESTLY, can you say the same?

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Originally Posted by Lee

Says the guy who constantly writes about stuff he doesnt know about whilst posting links to the same articles he writes every chance he gets.

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P.S. Doesn't everybody post links here to stuff that they are doing? I post links here not to bring attention to myself, but to bring attention to the sites I am writing about, or things that I think are important and/or interesting to those who work in this business. Sure, I post the link to drive traffic back to the AVN site, but there's nothing wrong with that. Everyone does it. That's what this business is about. Hello. But I post the links first and foremost to SHARE.

As far as being the "same articles I write every chance I get," I write what I'm told to write. It's my job, Lee. I'm just doing it the best I can.