There is that old saying, "Why buy the cow if you are getting the milk for free....."
http://www.gazeingazeout.net/blog/20...at-randy-blue/
That Would So Annoy Me!!
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There is that old saying, "Why buy the cow if you are getting the milk for free....."
http://www.gazeingazeout.net/blog/20...at-randy-blue/
That Would So Annoy Me!!
You know, im actually going to blame the sponsor here (Sorry Don) for this, bottom line, if they didnt give away that many pics, these idiots flooding the net with free porn wouldnt be able to give it away.
Just imagine how many other people are doing the same thing.
Free content from programs is supposed to offer the surfer a low quality teaser of what is inside the members area, a low quality teaser because if they want the good stuff, they are supposed to be paying for it.
Regards,
Lee
I've gotten on a couple of clients that were doing just that ... showing every pic of a gallery as large as they could with their post box width allotment. It's called tease, don't please the surfer. Get him interested enough to go look at the site!
I'll add 2-3 pix max when covering a new model update, and sometimes just one that is totally hot is all it takes.
There are some large affiliates that will not post anything from a sponsor unless they receive at least 6 images. Additionally, there are some that must have at least 9 and prefer 12. I agree totally that there is way too much free stuff out there with both affiliates and sponsors paying the price. We recently had an affiliate request access to the site which we gave for 24 hours. During that time, they lifted hundreds of images and credited a mini-manifest site which resulted in a few (3 sales). Two of three wrote to complain that the best stuff was already out on the 'preview site'. We have since clamped down on the large image updates for affiliates and are sending two small ones per week instead.
i noticed a post on queerclick that also had lots of photos from a site's recent update including a jizz shot
but lots of sponsors have allowed webmasters to give the farm away for a long time. in tgp galleries you see it all the time sometimes a whole scene being released in several galleries with the fucking action AND jizz shot
and letting webmasters in to pick out photos?
sorry
no
I'd email them 12 pics max, good variety, nice teasers, so they can get listed on TGPs. What more does a webmaster need
You know, for all the affiliates on Condom Cash that asked me for free content to promote the sites, since i removed the free content a few months back not 1 of them has complained and ive only received 1 request for content since i removed it too.
That being said, the content sets i gave out only had 16 pics in them and there were 2 or 3 'hardcore' shots in them the rest were just teaser pics and i dont think is howed any cum at all.
Regards,
Lee
:rain: I agree, too much is too much! I'm a affiliate and I don't even post nude pics!
With that much pictures, they can get a good jerk off and than, there is no need to pay for it. Juts plain stupid, I find it hard to make sales, those webmaster doesn't help at all!
Mario
Yup the problem is, once one sponsor starts doing it, they all follow suit because they think its the only way people can make money, its exactly what happened with TGPs and link lists when they became the type of site every webmaster owned, nowadays everyone owns a blog instead.
Regards,
Lee
Lee, you assume that we give entire photo sets to our affiliates to promote our site. You know what happens when you assume, don't you? ;)
I actually agree with you that free content is supposed to be a teaser. That's why we give 12 photos to our affiliates in hosted galleries or separate for them to make their own designs. And personally, I'm all about creativity and if people want to get a membership and choose a few alternate photos that will fit their angle better, I couldn't see why anyone would think that would be an issue. However, we do not encourage people to post entire galleries of our content.
So let me pose a question to you guys. How would you best handle a situation like this? Some of you have talked about "clamping down" and refusing content, but really, there has to be a happy medium so that your affiliates have the freedom to promote in a way that works well for them without harming potential sales?
And Lee, you have a great site and have been friend of mine for years, but I must say I'm a little disappointed that you chose to put the blame on my company without ever taking into consideration the fact that maybe we didn't actually give permission for a gallery like that to be posted. It's a little like shooting first and asking questions later.
I never stated you did that anywhere in my post. What i actually said was if you didnt give away that many pics, and i know you do, because places like JUB have ALWAYS got your content on thier blogs, granted not on the same scale as this particluar instance but you can go two or three days on JUB without seeing a page of hardcore Randy Blue content in a blog post.
Case in point, top, front and center on the JUB home page today..
http://www.justusboys.com/reviews/ey...randyblue.html
You arent seriously telling me those images offer a 'tease' of what is inside Randy Blue? Thats high quality hardcore, the stuff surfers are supposed to be paying for.
The happy medium is removing free content altogether. Only 5yrs ago if we [affiliates] wanted to promote a site, we'd have to buy content to do so, unless you have an affiliate that has a proven track record of sales generation.Quote:
So let me pose a question to you guys. How would you best handle a situation like this? Some of you have talked about "clamping down" and refusing content, but really, there has to be a happy medium so that your affiliates have the freedom to promote in a way that works well for them without harming potential sales?
Don, likewise, you are a good friend and i value that friendship however, the fact that you guys do give content to anyone that asks for it, and even gives access to your members area so affiliates can choose their own content is pretty much the same thing as giving them permission to post all the content they can grab from your members area.Quote:
I'm a little disappointed that you chose to put the blame on my company without ever taking into consideration the fact that maybe we didn't actually give permission for a gallery like that to be posted.
Its like leaving the keys in your car with the engine running in the middle of L.A, its just begging for your car to be stolen, you didnt give permission for it to be stolen but you know (or should know) its going to happen $0.02
There is absolutely no reason ANY affiliate should be given access to a members area to get content, if they dont like the content they have been given, along with the rest of your affiliates, they need to go and buy some of their own, from somewhere like MaxPixels.
Regards,
Lee
Well, the way I see it is that if the affiliate gives away too much they are losing money as well. The entire idea to to tease the surfer enough to get him to click for more and actually visit the site...then ideally buy a membership. We make money and they make money.
I think that in this case they don't know what the fuck they are doing...the surfer is do being teased but is given the entire meal...so why go into the restaurant for dinner?
Most affiliates are much smarter than that.
Lee
Lee trust me, they really arent.
Most dont have a clue, and those that do have a clue will eventually result in giving full sets away because if they didnt, they'd never get any traffic.
Why do you think the minimum pic requirement on TGP galleries and link lists sites has steadily increased over the past few years from 10-20 to 50-100 minimum?
More free porn is perceived to mean more sales, and as we all know, that isnt the case at all but perception will win everytime.
Now TGP owners are also charging for submissions to their TGPs, so not only are we giving them 20+ hardcore images so they can maintain their traffic, we're paying them for the privillage of providing them with their content LOL
Regards,
Lee
Thanks, Lee.
The photo train left the station about 2 years ago. Photos are an appetizer in this day and age and only serve to wet the appetite for the meal which is video. If you think Randy Blue makes their money on the photos, then you are living in a online world that has passed you by. Video is where the money is and you can see the entire net moving that direction (You Tube, CNN Redesign, Google Video). People aren't jerking off to centerfolds anymore.
I admit I didn't go back and look at the site this thread originally referred to, I just picked it up on boardtracker and am headed out the door for the weekend, but theory and speculation on the post regarding us is trumped by hard data and that is what my opinion is based on. It is also the reason that Randy Blue gives us whatever we want in order to promote them. They can see what happens to sales from us when we post 6 pics, 12 pics, or 24 pics and make very informed decisions on if that is a good business practice for them. I assume you can guess the results. Those guys didn't just fall off the turnip truck last week. ;)
Hey Lee... what JUB wants, JUB gets! If JUB wants 15 pics from a photoset, I'll happily give it to them... no questions asked. If they want access to my member's area, no problem. And I certainly don't think that RandyBlue gallery on JUB gives too much away... not even close. It's 9 pics for god's sake. Sure, the pics are hardcore. But if some 2-pump chump can jack off to that gallery, he ain't ever going to buy a membership anywhere.
Oh lord.
So your personal crusade is to convince every affiliate program to stop giving out free content? Good luck with that!
I'm sure every affiliate program other than Condom Cash will gladly accept sales made by affiliates from blogs, TGPs, etc. that use sponsor content to make the sale.
On the other hand, I'll gladly accept sales made by affiliates using Maxpixels or Ounique content. But I guarantee that the sale will be harder to convert.
Why did the photo train leave the station though?
Go back and look at the link in the original post and tell me why, in a couple of years time, maybe even months, JUB is going to have to start offering more and more images on your blog posts.
Remember, more and more blog owners are doing the same thing that the guy in the original post is doing... Can you say without exception that you guys will NEVER start offering more than you do now in a blog post and if not, why not? What would make you have to increase the number of images you give away as a 'tease'? What would make you change from giving away images as a tease and have to start offering movies as a tease?
Regards,
Lee
You know...I was taking tours of sites for ideas and I noticed a site that gave a lot of content out but did it in BLACK AND WHITE!
I thought how fucking brilliant is that...it I really LOVE your content I am going to want to experience it as much as I can and that would be in color.
I almost signed up just to see that hot preview in color.
Lee
It doesnt matter, for the last 10+ years people have been using purchased content to sell memberships to sites that didnt have that exact same content set or model in the members area, it never hurt sales then and it doesnt hurt sales now unless you are promoting solo model sites then yeah, that just doesnt make sense $0.02
Can you not see the vicious circle we [the entire industry] has become caught in? 4 sample pics became to little, so we offered 10, 10 became to little, so we offered 20, 20 became to little so we offered 4 exclusive content pics, 4 became to little to we offered 10 exclusive content pics, the pic train left the station so we offered 10 second movie clips, 10 second movie clips became to small so we'll offer 30 seconds, 30 second movie clips became to small so we'll offer 1 minute movie clips, 1 minute movie clips will become to small so we'll offer 2 minute movie clips, 2 minute movie clips will become to small so we'll offer 1 minute exclusive content movie clips, 1 minute exclusive content movie clips will become to small so we'll offer 2 minute exclusive content movie clips, 2 minute exclusive content movie clips will become to small so well offer 1 exclusive content scene....
See a pattern there at all? I do, its been happening slowly but surely over the past 8 years and its going to continue until surfers are being given everything they want for free, we dont need to be increasing the quality or quantity of content being offered, we need to reduce the amounts and quality (in some form) otherwise it wont be long until every paysite needs to start giving away free DVDs with every membership.
Surfers are getting more and more demanding, and we're giving in to them.
It happened on the straight side of the industry a couple of years ago, now all those straight companies are launching their own gay programs and guess what, they are going to kill the gay porn marketplace just like they did the straight one, and we're going to contribute to it, because if we dont, they'll get all the traffic and sales.
More, higher quality, exclusive content being used a 'teasers' isnt the way to plan for our long term profitability.
Go in to your local ice-cream parlor and ask for a sample of every flavor they have on offer and walk out without buying anything. The next day, do the same thing, then the day after that and the day after that, how many times do you think you could get away with it before the owner gives you bigger samples of their ice-cream?
Now imagine if EVERY 'customer' did the same thing and nobody bought until they were being given waffle cones with 2 scoops of ice-cream in them, what would happen to the store?
Regards,
Lee
Actually that is something i have been thinking about over the past few weeks, and i think THAT even in large numbers of images, would be more motivation to signup to a site than to give out the same amount of color images :thumbsup:
The site owner wouldnt be substituting quality or the number of images, theyd just be giving out samples like you'd find at your local grocery store when they have a special event going on when they want to sell more deli meats, they give you one small slice :)
Regards,
Lee
Sorry but a recent experiment I've done seems to be disproving the "giving away the cow with the milk" theory. I promote a sponsor who regularly hands out 50 pics per guy. I have put up free galleries using most of this content (40 pics per guy, one guy per freesite). I've sold more memberships for this sponsor in a month than I have in two years of trying to promote them.
Michael
Yeah, that works really great for a blog entry. :crazy:
Example blog entry using Ounique photos...
"Uknakedmen has a really hot guy this week on their site. His name is Ben and he's an Irish lad with a hard trim body and a big cock. He kind looks like this guy here, except this guy is not Irish. In fact I have no idea where he's from. Oh, and you've probably seen this picture years ago a thousand times."
Oh yeah, that is really going to make sales go through the roof! :thumbsup:
Im not denying that fact, when it comes to sites that feature single models and thats all they talk about, but why should sponsors have to give out THOUSANDS of high quality uncensored images and movie clips anyway, whether its exclusive or licensed?
Why isnt 10-20 low quality teaser pics enough for webmasters to sell their sponsors sites any more? Its because of 1 of 2 reasons...
1) There is already to much free content out there.
2) Webmasters dont know how to sell their sponsors product.
I can sell site memberships using purely text ads, so can hundreds of thousands of other people, if they couldnt, places like Yahoo and Google wouldnt be making millions each year from their PPC services.... Services that dont have any 'preview' pics involved at all, the traffic goes directly to the sponsors sites.
If i want to use images or movies to sell a sponsors site, ill use my own content, that i purchased specifically for that purpose, not the same sponsor content that thousands of other webmasters have already diluted on their galleries and blog entries.
Regards,
Lee
Even if you don't provide affiliates with member-area access to snag the content they want, they can still post buttloads of content in one place just by providing an exhaustive linklist of every single hosted gallery you provide all from one easy-access page. Or set up a fansite style blog in which they only feature one model's galleries. It's frustrating, but I don't know if it does any good to argue that holding back content is going to solve the problem.
With small sites like ours trying to compete for exposure with big huge corporate sites with tons of affiliates and scads of free content, we have to do SOMETHING just to be seen by surfers. I have noticed that even some of our affiliates who (sometimes unintentionally because it's so common among tgp and blog promoters) abuse the free content by posting links to hundreds of our pics from one page wind up making sales that we wouldn't otherwise have. Maybe we assume too often that surfers seeing loads of a model's free content everywhere is a bad thing when in fact it is giving surfers' the perception that s/he is "famous" and he's missing out on something to have never joined his site (I'm coming at this from the perspective of someone who runs solo girl/guy/tranny sites).
Yes, I think we would make a lot more money if there wasn't more than a handful of free porn out there and it were the good old days but it's not and those days aren't coming back so for now it makes sense to focus on the positive and recognize that if our content is unique and our personalities shine through AND we have more to offer members (live shows, video, spycams, frequent updates, etc.) than they'll ever get from free galleries then we can get those freeloaders and supposed two-pump chumps to convert.
BTW, I would rather have members (and yes, they do become members, these relics of the past who still get off on pictures) who are aroused by striptease style photographs and even non-nude content than these desensitized guys who need to see people fucked through their ears and every accessible hole possible by foot-long monster-dicks in high definition in order to shoot a load. There are still a lot of people in the world who not only LIKE softcore and still images, but actually prefer it, particularly when it comes to certain niches and fetishes. Anyway, if a guy is looking to jerk off to a solo guy masturbating, if he has 40 photos from dressed to cumshot that he can download and watch in a slideshow, it's not all that much different from seeing a video. More than 20 pics really is way too much, I think, but again, what can you do except focus on the positive and make sure as a site owner you have a hook for getting them to want more.
I suppose it's possible that the more free content you give away, the more likely a freebie-surfer will download more of your content with your domain name stamped on them, will jerk off to it more often than other people's and develop a really positive association with it, and eventually be such a fan and so curious that he finally joins. In the mainstream world a surfer usually visits 9-11 times before purchasing something; I have always tried to apply that to our sites and not assume all porn purchases must be compulsive first-timers; if you work on branding and getting return visitors who become loyal and see that your sites are always fresh (and more dynamic than other sites) then eventually they will buy.
Also, for personality sites like ours it doesn't make ANY sense for people to use bought content to promote us. I've never seen it be effective for any of our affiliates.
FYI: I wouldn't even have bothered posting except for needing to keep my account active. It's always fun to come to this board, though, and see these issues discussed in a rational and coherent way where on the straight webmaster boards the first person who even suggests too much free content is being given away is flamed to hell for being a heretic.
Hi Don,
First off, I want to say that Randyblue has been my best converting site and Blueloot by far the strongest sponsor ever since I signed up, somewhere in 2004. No other sponsor has ever come even near the amount of money I make with RB. Also the staff has always been professional and helpful, and I have only the fondest experiences regarding my job as an affiliate for RB. :playboy:
However, I think Blueloot is now really starting to give away too much free content to ALL webmasters. In the past, each webmaster got the 12 pics for every picture set, and if he proved to be reliable he was given the access to the site itself. I usually used this additional content to add about 2-3 pics to each set for the purpose of making free sites. I know full well that if anyone gives away the entire set, surfers are just going to jerk off to it and not join...
Only a few days ago I noticed that now every webmaster can get the entire picture set straight from the blueloot webmaster lounge. Just go to "Hosted galleries - Free pictures", select e.g. PPS, and "Gallery images - Download".Quote:
Lee, you assume that we give entire photo sets to our affiliates to promote our site. You know what happens when you assume, don't you? ;)
I actually agree with you that free content is supposed to be a teaser. That's why we give 12 photos to our affiliates in hosted galleries or separate for them to make their own designs. And personally, I'm all about creativity and if people want to get a membership and choose a few alternate photos that will fit their angle better, I couldn't see why anyone would think that would be an issue. However, we do not encourage people to post entire galleries of our content.
This will download ALL the pictures for the selected picture set, as if the webmaster logged into the RB members area and manually downloaded the entire set, pic by pic.
I am not sure if this was done on purpose or is some kind of a mistake?
I really think you should reconsider this, because there are many new affiliates that DO NOT understand that giving away complete picture sets will nullify their sales - and the sales of other affiliates.
I think it's much better to at least see if an affiliate understands the "teaser concept", and then give him the pass for the members area so that he can select a few more pics, or to make a different selection of the same set... but always making sure that it is a TEASER not giving away of the entire members area!
My RB sales went to down down since the 2nd week of July. It could be cause of this... I don't know.
Please reconsider the decision to give away entire picture sets to every new webmaster. I think it won't end up well for any of us.
I think I already expressed my opinion in the previous text. Your 12 pic selection was actually VERY good, and in most cases it didn't need to be "improved". The webmasters that can demonstrate they understand the "teaser concept" can be given the access to the members area of the site and then they can choose something extra.Quote:
So let me pose a question to you guys. How would you best handle a situation like this? Some of you have talked about "clamping down" and refusing content, but really, there has to be a happy medium so that your affiliates have the freedom to promote in a way that works well for them without harming potential sales?
Ben, thank you for your very thoughtful and well written post. I talked to my boss and as it turns out that was a glitch in our system. We had done an upgrade to our content management system a little while ago and whereas the system was supposed to give our affiliates 12 images, it was giving them the whole gallery. We were not even aware of this until, ironically, today. When I went to ask my boss about your message here, he was in the process of working on it and it's fixed now.
If you ever have a concern about our company or the way we run something I would encourage any of you to contact me directly. I'm always happy to help when I can. :)
Glad this thread helped you to find the glitch Don :)
Regards,
Lee
I'm glad that the issue has been resolved. It seemed really odd. Now let's hope that the sales will pick up again.
Btw. How have been the RB sales for other affiliates during July?
Quote:
We were not even aware of this until, ironically, today. When I went to ask my boss about your message here, he was in the process of working on it and it's fixed now.
Guess who was the little birdie who told him the thing needed to be checked into about an hour ago? (via ICQ)? :) :angel: :high:
i do think that was to many but 12 should be okay i think