Thoughts on CCBill's new toy? (Caution, biz thread)
 

I'm really torn on the ability to bill international customers "higher" rates in their own currency because of the decline of the dollar.

On one hand, any added revenue would be nice.
On the other hand, I'm concerned that a sudden 50% price increase (after holding prices steady for years) would dissuade regular international customers (and I have a ton of them) from joining.
And on the other other hand, I'm wondering if I'm actually getting *more* international joins (I haven't tried to break that down) because the site is "cheaper" for them now and they're more willing to sign up. If that's the case, it would mean that I'm still getting the same dollar amount for their joins, just more joins, meaning more dollars in my pocket - so maybe the fall of the dollar is actually a good thing for total revenue?

Any thoughts?

If I see the same money I dont know if its worth it if it scares people away but who knows if it stops someone from buying.

Most international surfers are aware of the exchange rate and switching to their own currency would put them off and make them look elsewhere imo.

One of the examples a guy from ccbill used to justify it is wrong, he said dell charge the same number in $ as they would in £ for example, but this is incorrect if an item is $5000 in america it is £2500 in the uk, not £5000.

well, i would check to see how many returning customers you have versus new ones, be good data to look at

and you can always set up a script to have returning users enter in an email address, you query a database to see if they are a returning member, and if so, send them to the signup page with the old price points, if not, they proceed to the signup page with the special pricing

Why not just slightly raise the rate and test the waters.

If you are based in the US I would not convert to other currencies. Exporting is where it is at if you are in the US. Our products are dirt cheap now. Paysites are a form of exporting and your memberships are looking tastier at the newer lower prices. Would I be wrong in that thinking?

I just enabled mine without hesitation.....More money for me.

It's nice being in a micro-niche...

That is an *excellent* idea :thumbsup

But how many returning type-in customers do you have who've joined many times before at the old price point? That's the key question in my mind...

Sounds like a basic economics question. If there is a presence of substitutes i.e. the demand for your site is elastic then charging a higher price will drive those surfers to a competitor. If you have a very specialized niche which is far more inelastic then you could bump up the price and still convert/retain.

Just a thought...
-A

Very true...and it's one of the things that factored into my thinking - there are substitutes, but I've always competed more than successfully with them based on a slightly lower price point ($1, believe it or not lol) plus better content. But their content is "satisfactory" to most people so I'm worried a sharp price increase would make a major difference in return signups.

We dropped it after a short test.

But test it out for sure.

The exclusive content / specialized niche argument is moot in this equation because you should already have that considered into your price now.

I am going to say no for now. IMO I am better off letting them have a deal. Cheaper is always better for retention (revshare) based on my experiences.

I see a huge increase in Euro joins lately. I'm sure it's because of the higher value of the Euro over the USD.

If it ain't broke don't fix it.

CCBill should know what they are doing though, that's what makes me want to try it because I doubt they would promote something that would hurt their bottom line.

i heard about this in phoenix.
thought it over.
enabled today.

personally I think CCBill would have served its customers much better by implementing direct deposit

but hey what do I know

Well the two topics are completely unrelated...but thanks for trying :thumbsup

i think I'll just keep charging dollars for now. I'm still paying in USD for plugins, hosting and domains.

It doesn't matter.....they'll pay anyway....My prices have gone from 19.95 to 24.95 to 29.95.....I could charge 34.95 and still get away with it...30 euros is a very fair price for all that they get in my members area.

your surfers will just figure they were on crack when they saw the prices the last time, and would enter their information and submit ;)

Exactly. I get pissed when I see a good ccbill program in a microniche offering a $3 trial or a $12 membership. Total waste. I know 90% of the ones who sign up for the trial would have jumped on $29.95.

this is what's crazy....something told me to check my stats because I felt that I got my first european sale.....I did but it's in Great Brittain and I see that they don't match the pound up with the dollar like they do the euro....So the FIRST suggestion that I have is that the pound is set up the same way.

Off of a 29.95 sale:

£15.79(GBP) for 00030 days followed by £15.79(GBP) every 30 days.

I could have made near $50 on this sale alone.