Non Recurring Memberships - Maintaining A Balance?

[Lee]

So i know we have had a few discussions about non-recurring memberships as of late on the GWW Community however, i cant recall having seen any information about how we can maintain a healthy balance between surfers buying a non-recurring membership and remaining profitable.

We all know that affiliates dont get credited with new sales off non-recurring memberships so, how can they be used as a successfull marketing tool to ensure that we remain profitable?

Are non-recurring memberships worth offering at all or, do you think they are a bad thing?

Regards,

Lee

[Squirt]

Offering non recurring memberships at a higher premium is a good move for sites with limited or stale content.

I think you come from the school of no, what you call "leaks" no non recurring memberships, etc. etc. but the fact of the business we're in is that we need to be as flexible as possible to provide our customers, or potential customers, with as many options as possible.

Ok you landed on my site but don't like it, here are some alternatives for you. OR You know you're going to cancel within the first month so pay a bit more and don't worry about having to come back and cancel later.

The customers needs come first, without them none of us get paid.

[MWCren]

There are simply customers that will never buy a recurring membership. When recurring was a dirty little secret and some sites were not disclosing what you were buying or how you would be billed, people got burned, and some are still fearful of that process.

As long as the affiliate is getting credit for the initial sale, it is usually at a higher cost, and most likely a customer that wouldn't have joined without the one time option. It definitely beats the cheapo that buys a trial and cancels immediately for fear of rebilling.

[Paco]

Of course, they are great, for the member.
However, webmaster promoting the sponsor's site/s may not agree, especially once they've realize that they will not be paid the same for the sale, at least from those (sponsors) that pay out more than the price of the membership.

Example: Our flat rate subscriptions with exits are $29.95USD.
We pay webmasters $35.00 ($40.00 for 6th and on).
At the very least, we lose $5.00 on the initial sale ($10 for 6th, & on, SU).

Eliminating re-occurring charges has removed most of the potential of extra earnings for us, which will force us to drop payouts to something more realistic, like $20.00 for all SU, or maybe even lower!

[Lee]

Of course, they are great, for the member.
However, webmaster promoting the sponsor's site/s may not agree, especially once they've realize that they will not be paid the same for the sale, at least from those (sponsors) that pay out more than the price of the membership.

Example: Our flat rate subscriptions with exits are $29.95USD.
We pay webmasters $35.00 ($40.00 for 6th and on).
At the very least, we lose $5.00 on the initial sale ($10 for 6th, & on, SU).

Eliminating re-occurring charges has removed most of the potential of extra earnings for us, which will force us to drop payouts to something more realistic, like $20.00 for all SU, or maybe even lower!

That is exactly my point Paco!

It would seem that the obvious choice for program owners would be to lower payouts to affiliates on non-recurring memberships but, i can see a lot of affiliates would have a problem with that.

Likewise, the option of filling the members areas with upsells would offset the loss of income for the program owners however, again, affiliates would more than likely have problems with that.

So, as program owners and as affiliates, how can maintain the balance of profitability against affiliate payouts?

Regards,

Lee

[marcjacob]

you give affiliates the choice of consoles or no consoles, give them the choice of "no redbill" option or no - "no rebill" option.

also if you get the no rebill members, why not send them to a different members area filled with upsells and send the recurring to a clean members area. just mirror your members areas. if you have a good content management script this shouldnt take too much extra work.

[gaystoryman]

Maybe this is too convoluted or impracticle even but given how advanced some of these sites are, could it not be possible to generate a separate login/buy page for the affiliate where the leaks or alternative sign ups are ones of their choosing, so that they get their referral? At the same time it would require the site owner to sign up under that affiliates account so they too would then make revenue from the sale?

For example, let us say Lee has Foreskin Fantasy and I send him traffic with my ID and the surfer isn't interested. So on the option or popunders or whatever comes a page that lists let's say Corbin Fisher or Fratman. Lee isn't an affiliate, so he signs up under my account, thus he uses his affiliate ID and I still get the referral.. sure not the full whack, but then at least it is something which is always better than nothing.

any of this make ssense or just too impracticle?

[MWCren]

On a PPS program, I can see the problem. I would just jack the price of the one time membership option to be higher than your average PPS affiliate payout so you at least make a little from it. It would also drive them to a recurring signup as a lower cost alternative, if getting them into recurring is the goal.

If the difference between the recurring and one-time membership is less than $10, the ones that hate recurring will usually go for the one-time. So make them pay out the ass for the option of one-time billing.

[Paco]

you give affiliates the choice of consoles or no consoles, give them the choice of "no redbill" option or no - "no rebill" option.

also if you get the no rebill members, why not send them to a different members area filled with upsells and send the recurring to a clean members area. just mirror your members areas. if you have a good content management script this shouldnt take too much extra work.

Something similar was attempted by many with trial subscriptions. Now, I am not sure about the others (sponsors), but our trials members fled, quickly.
Also, I've never received so many threatening e-mails as I did during that big mistake (not one of mine as I hate the idea of limited access - the others here "thought" it was a good idea).

Some offer with or with out exits.
Some offer with or with out iPods.
Some offer payouts worth more than the value of the SU.
Some offer only rev-share.

We all have different ways of doing things.

Heck, I love to ask webmasters why they bother to promote so many other sponsors/sites, or why they do not keep trying strategies until they've exhausted every single tactic, but I'd never stoop to that!

How many webmasters do you think would go for this: until a referral (member) is fully done with us (cancelled and moved on), they are not paid out. Webmasters will receive payment after the exact worth of that referral has calculated.
Something like:

sign-up value - expenses (BW, support etc) + agreed % of up sells

if anything, THAT will create a more equal playing field. Problem is, WTF is going to accept that?

[Lee]

How many webmasters do you think would go for this: until a referral (member) is fully done with us (cancelled and moved on), they are not paid out. Webmasters will receive payment after the exact worth of that referral has calculated.
Something like:

sign-up value - expenses (BW, support etc) + agreed % of up sells

if anything, THAT will create a more equal playing field. Problem is, WTF is going to accept that?

That is kind of, not exactly, but kind of how the old 'active member' business model of payouts used to work, if a member renewed past the initial sale, the affiliate got paid, if they renewed again, they got paid a little more, so on and so forth.

Needless to say, i cant think of any sponsors that spring to mind immediately that are still using this payout model but, it WAS extremely profitable for the program owners.

The other business model that i really liked was the PPC business model, an affiliate sent traffic to a site and was paid a flat rate for each unique click, usually in the range of $0.03 to $0.10 per click and, if they didnt make a certain sales ratio on their traffic (usually below 1:400) they were automatically moved to the PPS business model.

The amount of affiliates i know (myself included) that utilized this payout option was huge, we could send all of our crappy traffic to a PPC sponsor and get paid more than we would by sending it directly to a PPS or revshare program. Unfortunately, people started abusing that payout model a lot and it seems to have died away

Regards,

Lee

[Paco]

Unfortunately, people started abusing that payout model a lot and it seems to have died away

Exactly! Greedy cheating bastards always ruin things for others. Heck, that is half the reason we pay more for physical goods at most stores (insurance costs etc).

Back in 98’, we paid ... get ready ... $35 & $40 for ALL trial memberships!
$0.00
$1.00
...
$4.95

It went fine until more and more webmasters started getting lazy and fucking around, forcing us to partly terminated the project (many honest DEDICATED webmasters still prosper from that deal)!

We also did the PPC thing, and yah, we noticed all that bunk traffic, you bastard - guilt by association (j/k).

We kicked around the idea of payouts based on a webmasters worth *ducking*, but the problem is, many seem to think they deserve what the hard working webmasters deserve.
It was something like:
traffic divided / earnings (sign-ups + up-sells) * 'X'
'X' = pre-designated percentage

We had hoped this would motivate many to work more, and harder, but the test piglets did not like!
Until many had the audacity to ask the outrageous: so, you'll apply a value to my traffic AND still pay me $35-40/trial SU.
He yah, and if you undo your zipper I'll suck yah till your rich, but only after I washed your dirty car, laundry and whatever else. Oh heck, while we're at it, I'll assume all your debts, too!

[Jasun]

We give affiliates the option of either recurring or PPS.. if they're selling more Non-recurring, I'll suggest they go with PPS and they get a much larger chunk of the memberships sold.

everyone's happy.

:jasun:

[Lee]

We kicked around the idea of payouts based on a webmasters worth *ducking*, but the problem is, many seem to think they deserve what the hard working webmasters deserve.
It was something like:
traffic divided / earnings (sign-ups + up-sells) * 'X'
'X' = pre-designated percentage

See you hit on another of my major pet peeves about the industry in its current state, every affiliate thinks they are worth as much as everyone else and, i hate to break it to them that they arent but, that is the truth.

An affiliate that converts at 1:1000 isnt worth as much to me as an affiliate that converts at 1:100 not from a conversion ratio point of view but from the standpoint where that 1:1000 affiliate just cost me 10 times more in bandwidth than the 1:100 affiliate did.

Likewise, AVS/AEN affiliates are worth more to me than TGPers and free site builders are because they traffic has already proven itself to be of the minority these days that whips their credit card out to pay for porn.

Also, an affiliate that uses my FHGs isnt worth as much to me as an affiliate that hosts their own galleries using their own content.. Again, they cost me money in bandwidth and, chances are, if they are using FHGs they dont know much about marketing so are just sending traffic blindly to my program.

In my honest opinion, signups (for affiliates) stopped being worth $30 payouts a long time ago the unfortunate thing is, because we've continued [as an industry] to pay $30 for a $2.95 trial signup for so long, we've pretty much fucked ourselves over in the long run because everyone automatically expects to be paid $30+ for each member they send.

Regards,

Lee

[djdez]

In NATS, you can simply turn off pricing option if the customer was sent under any program.

Example:

1. Surfers sent under revshare would have a one-month non reucrring option.

2. Surfers sent under PPS would NOT have a one-month non-recurring option.

However, we simply don't offer non-recurring membership less than 3 months. If someone wants a trial or a one-month membership then its going to be recurring regardless. If you want a non-recurring membership than buy a 3, 6 or 12 month membership.

[IdolKnights]

The amount of affiliates i know (myself included) that utilized this payout option was huge, we could send all of our crappy traffic to a PPC sponsor and get paid more than we would by sending it directly to a PPS or revshare program.

Unfortunately, people started abusing that payout model

Um...

Pot -> "Black" -> Kettle