Trials or No Trials? Feedback Appreciated...
 

Hey Gang...

Me and another webmaster were discussing whether or not to use trials. Personally, trials have worked out for me. I can see both sides of the coin for both having trials and not having trials though. I'm looking for feedback from both webmasters who run their own paysites along with webmasters who use promote sites. I'm curious to hear results from both concerning the money made from trials to conversions or if you simply make more cash with full sign-up.

Thanks to everyone who replies.

Pat M.

My point was if you have a trial these days the surfer can download a whole site ina day and then he dosent renew his membership.

And its also like saying...we dont feel like you gonna like our site when you using trials..

Instead of only having full memberships and say. WE KNOW YOU WILL LOVE THIS SITE.

Am I far off here or am I to go and get a few beers because im right?

Unlike Pat I had no luck with sponsors using trials if they are not per signup sponsors.

But pornaddict is a recurring one. So there is a difference

We've experimented with just full monthly memberships (no trials) at full price, partial memberships at $9.95 a week, 3 day trials at $2.95 and $3.95 and now we have free trials.

The Free trials increased our conversions by 10% over the paid trial conversions and chargebacks have not increased.

I have seen arguments that free trials don't work with partnership programs but that is not the case with us. Our members areas are packed and updated 6 days a week so I believe they see that it is well worth staying a member.

I know the argument that if you just offer the full monthly price (no trial) seems valid but in reality it doesn't work. You will always get a few people to sign up but you are probably looking at conversions around 1:3000 then and there is a much higher chargeback rate on monthlies.


As with anything else, different traffic sources will convert differently. The above figures are based o avg. traffic not pure SE or highly targetted traffic.

Cumsensei,

I've seen this argument before:

"My point was if you have a trial these days the surfer can download a whole site ina day and then he dosent renew his membership. "

"Unlike Pat I had no luck with sponsors using trials if they are not per signup sponsors. "


The million $$$ Q to you is this:

If the surfer who signs up for a trial "downloads the whole site in a day and cancels" explain to me how all the per signup sponsors stay in business paying out $35 or higher per trial. Don't use the argument that it's all upsells cause that's bullshit. :)

Well dude im not a paysite owner yet but I will be.
I dident say I was the expert here ;)

Im trying to learn this shit and respect your opinions dude.
And I say they sound good.

We where just talking and this is what I think sofar.
Im not saying its right or anything :)

I don't run a paysite, but w/ my experiences I prefer to use a sponsor who has no trial if they offer at least 75% original content. If it's just a run of the mill type cookie cutter, I like the trials that use PSU cuz they usually don't convert into an active member. Most surfers seem to know all the little tricks these days.

Cumsensei,

it's kewl. . . . . . :thumbsup

You're by far not the only one who's made that argument I just quoted yours as an example. Don't want you to be disillusioned by alot of the crap that gets posted. :)


eRock,

"I like the trials that use PSU cuz they usually don't convert into an active member."

Think about what you said there and refer to my comment above.

Holy fuck, I just put my trial back up 2 hours ago... I did some testing...

Last week, I did a test and I got rid of my $7.95 3 day trial, just had 1, 3 and 6mth billing. I noticed a slight decrease in signups. If they rebill you're getting more money, than just off a single billing. For ex, If a surfer joins for 1mth's access at $24.95, then that's all you get... if they rebill you get $34.90... an extra $10. It's a good feeling checking stats and seeing hundreds of dollars in rebills (for the day) which I had before I got rid of the trial. I just increased my pricing by 2 dollars, so it's now $9.95 for 3 days... I already had a few sign-ups.

If you update your site at least once a week (I do twice), then surfers tend to stick around. Most people aren't cheap and will stay in you offer quality shit.

I think that's the most I ever posted at once... I think I'm addicted to gfy:winkwink:

hahahaha funny shit

Yeah I read it. It makes plenty of sense. That's just in my experiences what I mentioned.

eRock,

ok.......

The million $$$ Q to you is this:

If the surfer who signs up for a trial "downloads the whole site in a day and cancels" explain to me how all the per signup sponsors stay in business paying out $35 or higher per trial. Don't use the argument that it's all upsells cause that's bullshit.

Ummm...like I just said, "It makes plenty of sense. That's just in my experiences what I mentioned."
W/ my per active member sponsors the surfers rarely stick around after the trial. I don't know what happens w/ the PSU sponsors if the surfer sticks around or not.

Thanks to everyone who's posted replies so far (and fast). Like I mentioned in my previous post, having trials are working out great for me. It's playing the odds, but for a site that shoots the majority of it's own content, having a trial worked out well.

I figure I'd rather get 15 sign-ups a day at a trial of $9.95 a month and have half convert to a $24.95 then have 5 sign-ups a day at the full price of $24.95.

I'm still curious to hear more arguments on the topic, but so far... I haven't heard anything to sway me from keeping the trial.

Thanks everyone!

Pat M.
http://www.pornaddict.com

What I'm saying is this:

Everyone makes the argument that trials do better with per signup sponsors than partnerships. There is no difference in conversion ratios or retention ratios for a free trial partnership and a free trial per signup site so how does the per signup sponsor pay you $35 per trial if, as you say they don't convert?

Joe..

Your average sponsor that is paying $35 per sign up probably isn't experiencing better then a 20-30% retention on the average signup. So, how do they pay for it since the math obviously doesn't work out on that type of retention? It's complicated but simple at the same time.. Here are a few ways:

1) They whore the hell out of their exit traffic and don't share that revenue with their affiliates. Lots of paysites make as much money or more money with their exit traffic then they do with signups.

2) They supplement their income by collecting the surfer's E-Mail address before the guy gets to the join page - and spam the hell out of them... I'm sure if you dig on their site you'll find the terms and conditions that say they're opting in to a list. But, this way when 50 people get to the join page and only one buys all 50 start getting email advertisements. You can bet your life they don't revenue share on their email marketing!

3) Shaving. Well, neither myself or anyone else can substantiate who if anybody shaves with their program. However, there seems to be a consensus that this does occur in our industry.

4) If the affiliate tracking is based on cookies and a surfer has those turned off then the affiliate is not getting credit. This might be a 5-15% pickup for the average paysite affiliate program.

5) By ripping the surfer off. You'll notice that most of the per signup programs rebill at $39.95 - boy, what a great value for the surfer :winkwink:

That's pretty much it. Per signup programs are financed, in large part, by what is done creatively with all the traffic that doesn't purchase on the pay site. I'm not trying to be argumentative.. I just know that alot of this is what goes into making those programs economically feasible.

Cheers!

Brad

In my mind the argument about a surfer being able to download evrything and cancel has never help up. This is true I suppose if the site has a couple of 100 pics that never get updated, but then that type of site wont keep members anyway. A good paysite with pics & movies that get updated at least several times a week AND live feeds simply can't be donwloaded as more is being added all the time.

Regular updates and live feeds/streaming movies are the things that a paysite generally offer that a surfer can't get (easily or with any type of quality) for free. These as much as anything tend to keep the surfer coming back and often make them flash the platic in the 1st place.

Brad ,

All valid points you've stated.

I like this one:
1) They whore the hell out of their exit traffic and don't share that revenue with their affiliates. Lots of paysites make as much money or more money with their exit traffic then they do with signups.

that's why we decided to funnel our exit traffic through our Exclusive traffic pool. All traffic leaving any of our sites is shared exclusively with our affiliates so they can recycle the traffic for more sales.

Tipsy,

I agree. We do massive updating on our sites 6 days a week and we constantly tweak our members areas so the members have a constant flow of new photos, videos, feeds, etc. It has brought our conversion and retention numbers way up.

Speakin' of the whole downloading-the-whole-site thing..here's aperfect example. This guy is tellin' & showing surfers how to download the site...of course that's after they sign up for the free trial thru his link codes & cancel after they're done downloading.

http://www.bannedadultsites.com/freeporn/freeporn.html