woj

350........

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jayeff

I apologize for not replying sooner. Thank you for your responses and for showing your usual class by being the only sponsor on that list to take the trouble.

Putting Twisty's aside and looking at that list as a whole, discounts on that scale are somewhat like switching a vanilla engine out of a car and replacing it with a racing lump: hey, the car goes faster! In other words, although I'm sure you did put more thought into this than most others, weren't the results entirely predictable?

And I'm not sure I follow the leap from discounted prices to fraudulent foreign affiliates. Unless you discount surfer price without reducing payouts, why should discounted rates be any more a magnet than regular ones? If, for example, I were offered the option of a $30 sale with a 60% cut or one-time $35 and the option of a $25 sale with a 50% cut or one-time $20, wouldn't fraudulent webmasters actually be likely to stick with the higher rates? And if not, why should frauds increase?

I look at that list and see many sites which badly need to reduce their prices across the board and some probably should use discounts. But it is premature for the few quality sites such as Twisty's to be doing so now. Fighting on price should always be one of the last weapons to use and it's particularly dangerous for quality products and services because low price has other implications in consumers minds.

That apart, discounts, whether applied broadly to the product/service or to specific sellers, should be discounts and not effectively permanent price cuts. That again devalues what is being sold and when only specific sellers are rewarded through the front end, instead of by higher payouts, it places all other sellers at a permanent disadvantage. The impact on them is obvious and some are bound to react negatively. There are many more affiliates disadvantaged by these discounts, so in the long run how can they possibly benefit the sponsor?

I forget which sponsor it was and he is still currently offering the same rates regardless of the sales method used, but a couple of days ago I noticed someone with a code for "regular" sales and a different code for sales via hosted galleries. I thought this was quite smart because why shouldn't there be a lower payout for sales which cost more? Sponsors also have the option of removing people from PPS programs if the "quality" of their sales is sub-standard. Etc.

I suspect that the "serious porn consumer" from review sites is another engine-swap thing: of course they are if they read about sites instead of skipping through some free pics. But then why on earth offer special low prices to them (on a permanent basis)? Isn't the point of discounts to maximise sales increases, so if you do not want to offer them globally, wouldn't it make more sense to target the borderline customer rather than the ones most likely to buy?

Then I suggest you stick a sign on your forehead saying "mug me".

I have lost track of the number of battles I have lost over the years and some abandoned half way or never fought because the best outcome wouldn't have made the exercise worthwhile. But I have also had many apologies, lots of practical compensation and just once in a while actually effected change. My greatest "triumph" was fighting my way all the way up to Michael Dell, getting a color monitor free and now I have the name and number of a Dell exec in case of any future problems.

Standards, market conditions and the like will always tend downwards. The only reason that happens is because of people who say "I've accepted it".

karup

Rick, isn't it a way of buying a better score? I know you and people who support your point of view are gonna say that "price helps determine the score". Sure, that has some truth to it, but isn't it a review site's job to review the site as is? Would Consumer Reports ever allow Maytag to earn a better score with one of their refrigerators somehow or would they report on the refrigerator as is to their readers?

To remain perfectly ethical & honest, you should not let any single thing, such as reducing prices for your surfers, affect a site's score. And if you're going to continue to let sites buy a better score by offering your surfers discounts, you should notify your surfers of that because the score is no longer 100% genuine.

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Corona

You are just going to have to agree to disagree on this I think.

Their score is based on a number of factors. If those factors change it affects the score.

Add a bunch of well made exclusive content and your score goes up.

Add a bunch of shity plugins the score goes down.

The price goes down the score goes up.

And it is only a small part of the total score. It's not like the lower price is going to change a site from a score of 70 to 90.

MrPinks

I am going to be totally honest.Those discount prices are undercutting A SHITLOAD of affiliates. For the sponosrs to just offer those prices to TBP is unfair. Sure, TBP is a great site but I don't always see the need for everyone to bow down and kiss their ass every second. I feel screwed by those price adjustments and I'm sure a lot of affiliates would feel the same way if they knew what was going on. TBP says "We're not asking the affiliate program to do something special only for us." Bullshit. Your asking for a lower price so you can have an upper hand against other affiliates. Plain and simple.

jayeff

4 of the top 5 sites listed at TBP and something like 25% of their top 100 are all offered at discounts like these: $10 off Matts Models, Sapphic Erotica and many others; 50% off DVD Box, Download Pass, Porn Access and many others; etc. Currently 265 sites are offered at significant discounts.

AmateurFlix

This could be the start of a very disturbing trend

Price cutting never benefits any industry as a whole unless the prices are so far out of line to begin with that people aren't buying the products. Clearly that is not the case in this industry except for a VERY small percentage of customers.

Had they been negotiating for higher payouts no one would have likely complained.

Discounted prices give them an unfair advantage; the only way to remedey this fairly would be to give all affiliates the option to shortchange themselves like this, and no doubt many shortsighted webmasters would take the opportunity to do so. It might generate a marginal increase in revenue for the short term but in the long run it would fuck every affiliate and sponsor over. Conditioning customers to expecting more value for less money is a losing game for all involved. It is suited to more competitive fields where the products are largely identical than it is to porn where that is not the case.

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MrPinks

Exactly!

Just Jace

let me ask you this then..I am against the price cut just for the simple fact that TBP is ALSO asking for my normal affiliate payout, um...that is just silly for me, because if I have a 50% price cut I would end up with like $4.80 or some shit...hahahah

BUT.....what if the price cut was something small, say $3-4 off, just enough to make a surfer happy, but not enough to really piss off any affiliates...think that would work? Because like 10 people have icq'ed me since my last post about the price cut, telling me it was the best thing they did with any review site, but I am not about to take $4.80 per member that signs up from TBP

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MrPinks

Whoa, wait a minute. TBP gets a price cut AND normal affiliate payout?

rankscom

This statement is wrong. I'll post in a minute...

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Just Jace

you said earlier in this exact thread that you also took out affiliate payout from discounted pricing

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Just Jace

here you go

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Just Jace

from how he replied previously as you can see above, they give their surfer a discount and take out the revshare

which is why earlier in this thread I laughed like crazy and stated that I would make $4.80 off of a TBP discount signup...i don't care what world you are in, that woudl be the silliest thing I could possibly do

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MrPinks

I can see normal payouts on revshare. It's PPS that makes me wonder.

I still feel like this undercuts every other affiliate out there.

Just Jace

i don't see normal payouts being fine..$4.80 a member is NO WHERE near worth it for me...

I brought that up to like 3 other people and they all gave the same response "they would have to guarantee an certain amount of sign ups (1000+)for you getting $4.80 per member"

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Stephen

1) I ain't getting involved in this one, except to say that there's been great points made on both sides...

2) Thanks, Steve, for one of the best threads I've seen on this or any board

jayeff

Anything which provides even the smallest permanent front-end advantage to a single affiliate or only a small group, must be counterproductive for both the sponsors and all his other affiliates. How can it be otherwise? It is asking 1,000 people to sell an identical product, but 999 must sell at a higher price. Unless your product is significantly better than comparable ones which offer a level playing field, only terminally stupid affiliates are going to choose yours.

If you have price flexibility, its most productive use is to increase your overall sales. If you make a gift of such flexibility, giving it as permanent discounts solely to customers of particular outlets, the main beneficiaries will be the owners of those outlets.

JoeA

Just to say to Booble Bob and Sir Rodney..

Glad we sorted out our misunderstanding and all is ok again ..

There are still some good guys in this biz

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rankscom

Some Facts, Updates, & Opinions...

1. Affiliate payout is always restructured unless it's revshare. Usually programs will move us from PPS to revshare when a discount is provided. We've taken less revshare sometimes (50% instead of 60%), but it just depends on the situation.

2. We never ask for anything exclusive. If a program decides they do want to offer our users a better price, then they're free to do the same to any other affiliates they choose. They have the power, not us.

3. I totally understand programs who don't want to offer us this privelege. But lower membership prices have proven to be effective, and it would be a mistake if we let that opportunity fly by. Eventually I believe another review site would have beat us to the punch if we did nothing.

4. Karups mentioned us being more clear to our users should be better informed about our discounts and the affect is has to our rankings. I've added an announcement to our site, and added an answer to our faqs. The discounts are not meant to mislead anyone.

5. If any affiliate programs felt we were hard-selling or pressuring them into offerring such a deal, I apologize. I hope nobody felt this way though. I want this to be an option for programs, nothing more than that.

6. This industry is an ever-changing business. Review sites or any resource trying to offer something unique and of high value to surfers must adapt to their needs. OUR users are smart, experienced, and value price more than any other traffic demographic I've seen. When we have our #1 site that costs $10/mo dominating the ranks (of most review sites), partner programs start to take notice and make changes. It won't be our discounts that ultimately decide if prices drops across the board, it's simple economics.

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MrPinks

I do agree with you that it wouldn't be worth it. This whole thing is pretty fucked up.

Just Jace

no offense TBP, but if I am giving YOUR surfers a discount on membership prices, that honestly shouold be payment enough. while you are not getting money off the deal, you are getting a shit ton of sufers coming back to your site on a consistant basis, and that alone is worth buckets of cash

no offense to your business model whatsoever, because apparerntly it is working, but I really can't believe people are being suckered into giving you a membership discount AND paying YOU to do it...hahahaha

sorry if I sound snide, but god damn, that really takes the cake

one more question, what kind of joins do you all guarantee for that discounted rate I am giving your surfers and pay cut I am giving myself?

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SteveLightspeed

I'm wondering if anyone has ever implemented the "wholesale pricing" idea I listed earlier? Would it be make the paysite market better or worse?

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rankscom

So you think we should not get paid at all if we structure a discount?

Shap said his signups doubled, and that was only a $5 discount. I'm not going to say this happens to all deals we make, but we can usually predict the type of results we will see (i wish we could guarantee). Nothing is permanent... if a program wants to remove the discount, then that's no problem.

Part of the benefit is definitely to offer an added value to our site. We're in this business to compete. The fact is we send a large volume of sales to a lot of sites (not every), and some of them are very happy to workout ways to produce even more.

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jayeff

There are a few sites which offer a range of price/commission options, but AFAIK nothing as flexible as you are suggesting. Which from an entirely selfish point of view is a shame, because personally I would jump at it.

But in the wider context, one problem is user credibility. Scotch whisky distillers for example, rather than reduce their price and become perceived as a non-premium product, label their excess production under one-time names and sell it cheaply. Philip Morris won't sell Marlboro cigarettes to anyone who reduces their prices too far, even though tax-free outlets and the like could easily discount more. Surfers will also get p*ssed with high profile sites which they see at one price on one site and another price somewhere else, because there is always the suspicion that if you keep looking, you will find it still cheaper.

Also, price competition is a very slippery slope, because anyone can do it and the eventual winner is always whoever has the deepest pockets. Further, what you are suggesting would be a boon for TGP operators who function on high-volume/low-margin and ideally suited to them. But theirs is probably the most expensive traffic to cater for (between wasteful click-throughs, hosted galleries, etc). Do you really want to give them a significant advantage over sites which are more expensive to run (such as review sites), yet may be more productive for you?

Discounts can be a useful tool, but their main value is when you can offer them periodically to everyone and for a length of time raise your profile across the 'Net and not just in a few corners of it. But when overused, they become like the car industry: who buys a regular car any more expecting to pay ticket price?

AmateurFlix

That would be terrible for affiliates and for the overall market IMO.

Keep in mind that as far as bargain hunters go, there aren't very many of them in the porn market unless someone is trying to create them...

Price is not a huge factor for the vast majority of buyers and never was, in fact this trend seems totally limited to review sites trying to pull something in order to gain bookmarkers ("Eventually I believe another review site would have beat us to the punch") and would be best kept limited to that market. Let them compete amongst themselves for an ever smaller portion of profits, don't make the rest of your affiliates take a beating.

I.E. Amateur-Facials just increased their prices by about 33% recently and saw no dip in ratios. http://www.gofuckyourself.com/showthread.php?t=623051

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sigspot......

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MrPinks

The more I think about this, the more pissed I get, and right now I'm fucking pissed. Sure it is competition but it is also unfair to all the other affiliates out there, including the many that don't know about this and the many that send their traffic to TBP. What this "special discount" is trying to do is create a monopoly on all other sites. Who in there right mind would buy something at whole price when they can get it for cheaper? This really screws every other affiliate out there. If another review site offered access to all sites for $1 when everyone else is charging full price, of course they are going to eat it up and sales will jump, just as they have for Twistys. This is very unfair and I am also upset at the programs that agreed to this. Sure it is good for them and TBP but what about the rest of us?

MrPinks

What a spit in the face to the rest of us. And to boast about it on your site is another thing.

"These special prices are one-of-a-kind. Since we produce a large volume of sales, we're able to make special deals and pass the savings on to you!"
I thought you were an honest site. This is a lie to your surfers. I, and many others offer those prices on Hustler and Vivid. Why lie? Total bullshit

Shap

Hey Mr Pinks drop me an email

jayeff

I feel exactly the same way. Until Thursday or Friday last week I didn't even know these discounts existed, never mind that the amounts being given away make regular pricing look like a bad joke. And I'm p*ssed less about any potential impact on my sales, than about the utter disregard these sponsors are showing the majority of their affiliates.

AmateurFlix

I totally agree with this.

This industry has been built upon the presumption of price protection for affiliates from day one. Everyone on a level playing field, the only bonuses are occasional increased payouts for successful affiliates.

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HairToStay

I mostly agree -- but -- there are many programs that pay some affiliates more in the hopes they will have more sales. Now, say I have a deal to get 60% of all sales and I do 10 sales a week. How would the guy who sends 50 sales a week getting 50% feel if he knew about it?

Some sites offer the option to price your tour the way you want it .... $1, $2.95, $5, etc and the payout is structured based on that. While technically this is the same thing as offering a discount -- asking a site to give a review a higher rating solely to make more sales AND a discount rate rubs me wrong as well.

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rankscom

Dude, wtf?

Most of the programs have set this up BECAUSE of the large volume of sales we have produced. Our deals are definitely "one of a kind", as far as I know. Sure, it's not "technically" 100% accurate because there are some programs (Hustler, Vivid, Pimproll, etc) that do have this built into the system already. But 95% or more have been due to our legwork to get these discounts. Do I need to spell out every last detail to our users? There's no intent to mislead anyone.

What's the real issue here? I don't get it.

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Shap

I see alot of people pissed off that TBP is getting special pricing. I have to ask one thing. Have you guys all gone out and asked for special pricing for your traffic? I believe Mr Pinks has. Amateur Flix have you? I'm not being a dick but you can't get mad at Rick for hustling killer deals for his surfers. If anything it was a very good move and he deserves credit for doing so.

Big hitters always get preferential treatment. Whether it be better pricing, higher payouts, allowed to spam, allowed to run pre checked cross sales. Our industry has always made exceptions for big hitters. In the grand scheme of things this seems to be a minor thing compared to the other shit everybody turns a blind eye to every single day.

jayeff

Everything else you mentioned produces extra rewards, not a sales edge.

Art Del Gado

I completely agree

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Shap

I could list examples all day long of times like this where big volume affiliates get preferential treatment. Our industry has so much garbage going on that treating certain affiliates a little diferrently seems like a minor thing. I'm not trying to piss people off but when i think back to the numerous posts i've made regarding alot of shady shit our industry allows and nobody had the balls to speak up and complain. Now all of a sudden when it's your competition or something you think is hitting your pockets it's a big deal. That sucks.

More people should be like Jayeff. He doesn't ONLY get involved in threads that directly concern him. He also posts in threads that need some logic and reasoning and threads that concern bigger issues in our industry. He is also always willing to explain why he feels a certain way and for that you have to respect him.

Shap

What about companies restricting content use to the majority of affiliates and giving their entire content (with little to no limit on number of pics used) to 1 or 2 affiliates? That would give certain affiliates an edge both sales and traffic wise right? Is that fair?

Shap

The truth is competition is fierce. Everybody wants an edge. If you go to an affiliate program and say hey give me a discount and i'll send you an extra 2 sales a month. Guess what they'll laugh you away. BUT if you say hey man i've got an idea that i think will bring in an extra 100 to 250 signups a month. Wanna give it a try? I'll tell you right now if the idea is legal 99% of affiliate programs will do it.

DaddyHalbucks

TBP has produced something of value, for sponsors and surfers alike. Sponsors get gobs of traffic. Surfers get informed decisions, and good deals. Everyone wins.

I don't see why TBP should be bashed for their success.

It seems to be a straight up business.

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Shap

Absolutely. I believe TBP has done nothing but show how a good businessman does business. The thread has turned into a question of are the companies offering discounts to Rick doing something wrong. Nobody else on that list has the balls to step up so I'm stuck defending myself here LOL.

Shap

The interesting thing is I'm the guy that gave the smallest discount and I'm the only one here discussing it. lol.

rankscom

Just want to be clear... We're not saying sites will get a higher rating because they're doing us a favor, the higher scores result in a small increase in the price/value score due to a price change. Doesn't matter how the price changed (special discount or not), we'll still update the score/review accordingly.

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SteveLightspeed

Hey Shap

Can I have a free Twisty's user/pass? No real reason, I just wanna rub one out. (hey, at least I'm being honest about it)

Steve Lightspeed

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AmateurFlix

No, nor would I. My traffic isn't so shitty (rather I haven't made it so shitty by my own doings) that I need to reduce prices and in the process fuck over other affiliates and sponsors just to generate a sale. I have consistently advocated sponsors RAISING prices across the board because that seems better for the industry as a whole, not trying to appease the lowest common denominator.

But WTF do I know, I'm just some idiot selling a good amount of one year memberships at times for $150 or so each to TGP traffic.

That's where I disagree. This practice is bad for every other affiliate and for the industry as a whole because it affects consumer pricing expectations.

It likely won't affect my traffic unless this practice would become so widespread as to affect EVERY other affiliate, which is why it's better to voice concern over this now before it gets carried away. ATM it seems like only one (or a small number) of affiliates are causing this problem.

Like jayeff said, every other method produces extra rewards, not a sales edge.

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Shap

Emailing you now

jayeff

The main reason I have respected your posts over the years is the same reason why I "get involved", as you put it. Which is that in the long run, narrow issues are largely irrelevant: the environment in which one does business is what matters most by far. You frequently seem to understand that.

When I opened my first business, it was in an industry - although you couldn't really call it that back then - where competition was dealt with mainly by bricks or worse through office windows. Fortunately it was the tail end of that era and I was backed by some of the most unpleasant people in London at the time, so apart from one attack on my home, I got through that easily enough.

Next we moved into a phase of buying work. I recall having to pay several thousand dollars to one aircraft company executive, simply to talk to him. Four years later I lost that contract to someone who paid him more. I won other contracts playing the same game.

I dealt with that crap because I had to in order to stay in business at all back then, but it was like a bunch of kids stealing each other's lunch money. You won one day and lost the next. I knew from day one, that until we started behaving like professionals and began to focus on the market instead of each other, no-one was going to make any really serious, long-term money. That business is now part of Deutsche Poste.

Socks

It seems there's vast differences in people's views of "simple economics" in this case. Essentially there's no contracts here, so it's in the hands of the program owners. If the program owners stand strong, then you have to adapt.

We know surfers are willing to pay high prices, but maybe what you offer at those price points changes. And in what business shouldn't you pay more for a better product? Abby Winters comes to mind, but there are quite a few sites that offer more content for more money, and have several entry points. Many programs have been toying with limited trials over the past year, same idea I guess, you get what you pay for.

Also it's not like we didn't think of this 4 years ago, it's just we never implemented it! It's a kind of logical stepping stone for review sites in general I think, TBP has done a great job of pushing it forward. Where it's leading is anyone's guess though.

If programs start losing money, or start losing affiliates, they'll see it's not working. If it does work, then I guess Rick is right.

MrPinks

"Have you guys all gone out and asked for special pricing for your traffic? I believe Mr Pinks has."

Nope, never had, at least that I can remember, but I guess I should start now.