Price and Traffic Sources
 

Any opinions on what kinds of traffic support different prices? I used to use a lot of gallery trade, link site, and search engine traffic. Now my affiliate program is growing, and that means TGP and other kinds of traffic.

I am wondering if that means my sites might be able to support higher prices, and make the affiliates more happy. However, unless it can raise the bottom line for me and my affiliates, I don't want to have higher prices reduce the sales.

Any thoughts?

No advice? Should I charge more if people are coming from the everyday porn world, instead of personal art sites and stuff?

I think you could raise the price from your 19.99 to 24.99 on your new kinds of traffic.

I was talking to another site owner and she does not do this either but here was a thought. Why not have two identical tours and run traffic to both. One which is tweaked every week to see how it ocnverts. I know there are a million variables but if you see traffic going to A converts at 1:600 and B is 1:800. Put B as the main tour and try a new one called C. You could test pricing wording etc. The key is having the 2 live at all times so if the week is really sucky then you see the drop happen to both tours.

The problem I see with multiple tours is similar to the problem I see with any testing... Statistical variability. My traffic, and sales, are still low (and variable) enough that the standard deviation will be a big percentage. I am not sure I could learn a lot from testing like that.

I am tempted to try raising some prices to $24.99, and/or remove the non-rebilling options. The current pricing seemed to be the best balance, when I introduced it, but things have changed. Though I don't think I would be able to actually offer different pricing based on the source of traffic.

at the very least, get rid of the 30 day non-recurring option. side note: ever type in blooddolls.com? holy shit the guy does not like verisign.

When I first added that, overall sales went up without rebills dropping noticably. At the time, it tested well and seemed like the right thing to do. However, that's one of the big things I am rethinking now.

The two main options I am considering... I would probably try this on one site at a time, to see how it goes.

Option 1: Remove the non-rebilling one-month, keeping only the longer one.

Option 2: Raise the non-rebilling price to $24.95, keep the rest the same.

What do you think?

bump

Unfortunately the only way to tell is to do it. I really don't see $24.95 from your current price being a problem. I would rather get more money of course but I highly doubt your conversions would go anywhere. A person interested in your site is willing to pay and $5 isn't a big deal.

Another way to look at it is this. You could have 20% less signups and break even. I really don't see a $5 jump knocking your sales down 20% and I would bet the difference wouldn't even be noticable.

And one more thing, people will say I'm crazy but there are certain numbers and range of numbers that look drastically different to people even when they aren't. Sort of like the stores saying $19.99 instead of $20.00. You can believe there is a reason behind that and I'm sure they have tested it to the max. When I sold on ebay full time I could change just the amount to odd cents and convert significantly better. One example is a product I sold for $4.95. I changed it to $4.88 and my sales almost doubled. I switched it back and forth a few times and it worked out just about the same each time.

At $24.95 you would still be at a great price in comparison and you have a niche site that is done very well. I would raise the price. Variable as your sales may be it would only take you a few days to a couple of weeks to see the difference. Good Luck. :winkwink:

Sounds like I should work out my options, and try it. I suspect that the affiliates would be much happier knowing the price was a bit higher, especially if conversions aren't hurt much.

i'd go with option 1. if your site does well with recurs, you don't want to have a pricing format that discourages people from signing up that way.

give it a reasonably long try :glugglug

I should add option 3...

Remove the non-rebilling option, *and* raise everything else in-line with a $24.95 price.