- Jun 5, 2014
- 36,936
- 97,630
Founding Member
Please read this to the end before commenting.
Been thinking about this for literally a couple of years now, and still haven't made any decisions. While Gatorchatter is a passion of mine and something I'm extremely proud of, it's also a side business. The question has always been how to monetize the site without turning off the membership. Personally, I don't like ads and have never cared for throwing them in front of the members and guests, but that's simply how money is made on websites.
However, online ads have been under assault for years now, largely due to ad blockers and other factors. As a result, revenues have tailed off. Many websites have combated this by either setting up paywalls to access the material or forcing people to turn off their adblocker before they can access the site.
While I have toyed with making Gatorchatter an ad-free pay site, I've concluded that it isn't really a long-term option. The goal is to continue to have Gatorchatter grow (something it has steadily done since inception), and shutting out any non-paying membership would kill that growth and basically create a small country-club atmosphere.
The best solution is for mostly free content with options for paying for extras. Since sports is what Gatorchatter is all about (and where 80% of the activity is), the Main Sports Forum is always going to remain completely free (with ads, however). The question is, how many members would find it worth it to pay for everything else? When I say "everything else", I mean:
-No ads
-Access to the Lounge/Saloon/Political Forum
-Access to the Chatbox
The secondary question is would pulling those things like the Political Forum and the Chatbox away from non-paying members at this point cause people to leave? At the end of the day, if you don't have people, you don't have a forum.
Keep in mind rates would be extremely affordable, say $6 a month or $60 for a year (member option). There are hundreds of members and guests that check into Gatorchatter every single day of their lives. What is that worth to you? For example, I'm willing to give YouTube $10 a month to have an ad-free experience, because I view so many of their videos. Yet many people scoff, even though they'll happily pay twice that when ordering a damn pizza or buying a few Starbucks coffees.
Let me reiterate that no decision has been made. I'm just looking for honest opinions. I have no plans to sell the GCMB - I'd love to have it for the rest of my life.
I've created an anonymous poll that I am sincerely asking you to answer honestly. In other words, please don't claim in the poll you wouldn't be willing to pay for access to the extra features if you know you actually would.
I hope we can have a mature discussion about this.
Been thinking about this for literally a couple of years now, and still haven't made any decisions. While Gatorchatter is a passion of mine and something I'm extremely proud of, it's also a side business. The question has always been how to monetize the site without turning off the membership. Personally, I don't like ads and have never cared for throwing them in front of the members and guests, but that's simply how money is made on websites.
However, online ads have been under assault for years now, largely due to ad blockers and other factors. As a result, revenues have tailed off. Many websites have combated this by either setting up paywalls to access the material or forcing people to turn off their adblocker before they can access the site.
While I have toyed with making Gatorchatter an ad-free pay site, I've concluded that it isn't really a long-term option. The goal is to continue to have Gatorchatter grow (something it has steadily done since inception), and shutting out any non-paying membership would kill that growth and basically create a small country-club atmosphere.
The best solution is for mostly free content with options for paying for extras. Since sports is what Gatorchatter is all about (and where 80% of the activity is), the Main Sports Forum is always going to remain completely free (with ads, however). The question is, how many members would find it worth it to pay for everything else? When I say "everything else", I mean:
-No ads
-Access to the Lounge/Saloon/Political Forum
-Access to the Chatbox
The secondary question is would pulling those things like the Political Forum and the Chatbox away from non-paying members at this point cause people to leave? At the end of the day, if you don't have people, you don't have a forum.
Keep in mind rates would be extremely affordable, say $6 a month or $60 for a year (member option). There are hundreds of members and guests that check into Gatorchatter every single day of their lives. What is that worth to you? For example, I'm willing to give YouTube $10 a month to have an ad-free experience, because I view so many of their videos. Yet many people scoff, even though they'll happily pay twice that when ordering a damn pizza or buying a few Starbucks coffees.
Let me reiterate that no decision has been made. I'm just looking for honest opinions. I have no plans to sell the GCMB - I'd love to have it for the rest of my life.
I've created an anonymous poll that I am sincerely asking you to answer honestly. In other words, please don't claim in the poll you wouldn't be willing to pay for access to the extra features if you know you actually would.
I hope we can have a mature discussion about this.