Stay Away From Subscriptions
Shoemoney recently made a post about the benefits of subscription-based revenue on forums.
This has obviously worked very well for Shoemoney and I have no doubt he makes a killing every month from his subscriptions. However, I won’t be introducing subscriptions on my forums anytime soon and you probably shouldn’t either. Here’s why:
It will turn several new members away
This is true even if you offer free content, but require a subscription to gain access to “premium content.” If users find another site similar to yours where 100% of the content is free, they will be more apt to join and contribute there.
It equates to more work for you, that only a small percentage of your members will enjoy
I know that Shoemoney says that he doesn’t promise anything to his subscribers, but you can bet that if they didn’t feel it was worth paying for they would cancel their membership. You have to constantly provide more value to those paying customers which means that any new innovations you have should only be available to them. Have a great idea? Awesome! But only 10% of your site’s visitors will have the chance to use it.
It makes your site less likely to spread through word of mouth
Imagine the following conversation between two people at a bar:
Person 1: “Hey, I just found this cool forum that you should check out!”
Person 2: “ORLY? What’s the URL?”
Person 1: “It’s www.coolforum.com. You have to pay to see the good stuff though.”
Person 2 (already forgetting the URL): “Oh. Do you want another beer?”
The truth is, when people hear that they have to pay for something that they’re used to getting for free (like information on the internet) they easily become disinterested.
It may destroy your community
Several forums have a community-feel to them that is difficult to describe and even more difficult to create. If you have a forum where members have become friends, introducing a subscription is a quick way to kill that vibe.
It gives you competition a leg to stand on
If I knew that there were only a few forums in a particular niche and they all required subscriptions do you know what I would do? That’s right: start a completely free forum and try to steal their members away.
Now I know that it’s very hard to make money from PPC ads on forums because your loyal members become completely blind to the ads. However, here are a couple ways to make some money without hitting up your members:
Sponsored Boards
I find that selling sponsored boards to other companies in my vertical works well. Charge a monthly fee to the advertiser for their own board where they can talk about their products and company news. The community will join in the discussion and if the advertiser decides to not pay, the board disappears. I actually got this idea from syndk8.
Start A Store
You can start an online store where you sell items related to your niche, or just have affiliate links if you don’t want to manage the orders. You’d be surprised at how many of your members will buy items from you because you’ve built their trust.
What are some other ways people are using to monetize forums without charging members?
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Hey man . . .
there is a MAY here .. in every case ..
A forum that has some good premium content in it - usually doesn’t target for such people to join.
they target those who really needs the info and would join for a small life-time membership or whatever they impose.
i completely disagree with you in this matter.