Well, OK. Advertising revenue is like trying to hold onto a shadow. The benefits are hard to measure and it is always a very optional part of anyone's business. In many instances I have had people just STOP the payments without a word about it. So income and spending projections based on that kind of income is just foolish of me to do.
MANY people have said that the core value, and in some instances the ONLY value of this site is the Board of Inquiry. Traffic patterns tend to largely support that hypothesis. So the difficulty I could see in the future with enough GUARANTEED (sort of) revenue to meet current and projected expenses, plus just flat out make this worth me doing, had to be based on charging for what people consider to be the real value of this site. When this is coupled with the fact that it would also greatly assist in weeding out the majority of false registrations taking part in conversations that have serious impact on the reputations of the people involved, there seemed little reason NOT to do it this way.
Why do you think that when you go to some sites you see banner ads EVERYWHERE on the pages? In some cases it is so bad that you have difficulty figuring out where the meat is really on that plate you are looking at. Why? Because the only way advertising in that manner will really work is by filling every possible space with income producing ads. That is the tradeoff you face. A whole BUNCH of smaller cheaper banner ads, or a smaller number of more expensive ones, which may not be attractive to many people because of the lack of real tangible returns.
Maybe I could change some things to make the ads more efficient. For instance I could eliminate that one huge 120x600 banner ad on the right hand margin and replace it with 10 120x60 banner ads. Would that work better? No way of telling without doing it, but I certainly would run the risk of losing those people who LIKE that big ad of theirs showing up here, and perhaps NO ONE would want any of those smaller ads. They just wouldn't catch the eye of the readers as well.
There are no guarantees in anything I try. All I can do is try to figure out what I think is the best in compromises and hope that I guessed right about it. If I guess wrong, and see this in time, then I can change things to see if I can make it better.
I just recently went to a brand new banner ad software system that I hope will make things easier and better for people to use (http://www.FaunaAds.com). It also takes quite a bit of the manual workload off of my shoulders as well managing the advertisements.
Now as to charging for people to use the classifieds section, when I converted over to the paid membership plan, that actually was restricted to paid members. But guess what? It basically DIED. Which I strongly suspected would happen. All of the suggestions for me to solely charge for that feature of this site just hit a wrong chord with me. My gut feeling was that it wouldn't work, and from what I saw in that brief period it was a pay for use only section, facts supported this suspicion I had. This was one of those incidents I spoke about where I caught a mistake in time to correct it before it became lethal.
So to any and all of you claiming that that is the route I SHOULD take, please, just forget about it. It is my opinion that it just will not work on this site. Plus it would have done absolutely nothing at all about the verification bar I wanted to put on posting rights within the Board of Inquiry. Perhaps some of you feel that you know better then me what is best for my site, and all I can say is well perhaps you do. You can always tell me "I told you so!" sometime in the future if this site folds up from my decisions. I will give you my forwarded address on the beach when that happens......
There, does that help a little bit? Sorry, but if you want to get into a long drawn out debate about this, I cannot help you. It is a done deal as far as I am concerned and not subject to review at this time. If conditions change down the road, I will be willing to address it again, but for now, it is done.
MANY people have said that the core value, and in some instances the ONLY value of this site is the Board of Inquiry. Traffic patterns tend to largely support that hypothesis. So the difficulty I could see in the future with enough GUARANTEED (sort of) revenue to meet current and projected expenses, plus just flat out make this worth me doing, had to be based on charging for what people consider to be the real value of this site. When this is coupled with the fact that it would also greatly assist in weeding out the majority of false registrations taking part in conversations that have serious impact on the reputations of the people involved, there seemed little reason NOT to do it this way.
Why do you think that when you go to some sites you see banner ads EVERYWHERE on the pages? In some cases it is so bad that you have difficulty figuring out where the meat is really on that plate you are looking at. Why? Because the only way advertising in that manner will really work is by filling every possible space with income producing ads. That is the tradeoff you face. A whole BUNCH of smaller cheaper banner ads, or a smaller number of more expensive ones, which may not be attractive to many people because of the lack of real tangible returns.
Maybe I could change some things to make the ads more efficient. For instance I could eliminate that one huge 120x600 banner ad on the right hand margin and replace it with 10 120x60 banner ads. Would that work better? No way of telling without doing it, but I certainly would run the risk of losing those people who LIKE that big ad of theirs showing up here, and perhaps NO ONE would want any of those smaller ads. They just wouldn't catch the eye of the readers as well.
There are no guarantees in anything I try. All I can do is try to figure out what I think is the best in compromises and hope that I guessed right about it. If I guess wrong, and see this in time, then I can change things to see if I can make it better.
I just recently went to a brand new banner ad software system that I hope will make things easier and better for people to use (http://www.FaunaAds.com). It also takes quite a bit of the manual workload off of my shoulders as well managing the advertisements.
Now as to charging for people to use the classifieds section, when I converted over to the paid membership plan, that actually was restricted to paid members. But guess what? It basically DIED. Which I strongly suspected would happen. All of the suggestions for me to solely charge for that feature of this site just hit a wrong chord with me. My gut feeling was that it wouldn't work, and from what I saw in that brief period it was a pay for use only section, facts supported this suspicion I had. This was one of those incidents I spoke about where I caught a mistake in time to correct it before it became lethal.
So to any and all of you claiming that that is the route I SHOULD take, please, just forget about it. It is my opinion that it just will not work on this site. Plus it would have done absolutely nothing at all about the verification bar I wanted to put on posting rights within the Board of Inquiry. Perhaps some of you feel that you know better then me what is best for my site, and all I can say is well perhaps you do. You can always tell me "I told you so!" sometime in the future if this site folds up from my decisions. I will give you my forwarded address on the beach when that happens......
There, does that help a little bit? Sorry, but if you want to get into a long drawn out debate about this, I cannot help you. It is a done deal as far as I am concerned and not subject to review at this time. If conditions change down the road, I will be willing to address it again, but for now, it is done.
