Subscription rates/group licensure
Jerry Ash
My intention is to end the $25 introductory subscription rate with the
publication of the September issue (Sept. 15). The rate will be $50
annual. In advance, I would of course welcome your thoughts on this
and, assuming we go ahead with the full rate, I would encourage you to
let your networks know time's about up!
Again, I've been thinking about this a lot and from past experience I
don't think the amount either motivates or deters. If a person wants
to subscribe they'll pay a reasonable price. If they don't they won't.
By the way, I've been influenced a great deal by an article I've
obtained -- an interview by the "kid blogger" (July issue) with a
young adult who made $140,000 last year with his tech blog. One ah-ha
is his advice to diversify sources of income. He depends on
advertising, but does not want to be too heavily dependent on his
biggest advertiser (Bayer). So, he has two levels of access to his
blog -- free and premium. The preemies pay a subscription for a higher
level of service. He makes money off of products and services.
Of course, I compared Smart People to that. We have a two-level
audience -- those who get access to the open articles (cover story
plus one from each section), and those who subscribe and gain access
the whole magazine. We don't have advertisers yet, but the higher our
hits go on the webpage the more likely we are to make ad sales. Those
numbers are looking good, but the subscriber numbers have a long way
to go.
Boris has been talking about giving less away, thinking if we give too
much, we can't make the sale. Boris is an experienced marketing guy,
so I listen.
There is a dichotomy of purpose between building circulation and
charging money. It pulls you both ways -- a chicken or egg thing. Give
it a way free and the numbers go up. But unless you can monetize by
converting those numbers to cash, you're back to the public service
thing and your growth is severely limited.
Of course, we talked about this before we launched -- which business
model, based on free or fee. But when I think about the blogging
success of Carl Ocab's interview (diversify income) I think "yes,
people will buy information on the Internet, but we need diverse
sources of income."
As luck would have it (I mentioned this before) one of our larger
group told me about his experience with licensure, not just for
software but for access to information. The inference was that we
could offer Smart People to organizations through licensure.
This concept has grown and I am having some very good response from an
organization in the US (we are talking about co-marketing) which may
lead to the development of Smart People licenses for small, medium and
large organizations. If that happens, then we have diversified our
business model from individual subscriptions to include group
licenses. And by licensing groups, we will be accomplishing both
monetization and circulation.
Whether or not the co-marketing partnership comes to pass, I'm pumped
on marketing licenses to organizations and beginning to think about
strategies.
Well, lots to think about. Looking for your thoughts and collaboration.
Jerry
boris jaeger
> publication of the September issue (Sept. 15). The rate will be $50
> annual. In advance, I would of course welcome your thoughts on this
> and, assuming we go ahead with the full rate, I would encourage you to
> let your networks know time's about up!
initiative in order to convince people to subscribe for the cheap
rate. BUT again, your mailing list will not bring success. Go for the
groups already available on the web (e.g. see the bunch of groups I'm
a member of in my linkedin profile http://www.linkedin.com/in/borisjaeger).
There are many, many more. BUT prevent just cross-posting the same
message again and again. We need to personalize to a certain degree.
E.g. like I did once by replying on a specific message mentioning an
article published in Smart People magazine (see http://tinyurl.com/m4fvev).
> Of course, I compared Smart People to that. We have a two-level
> audience -- those who get access to the open articles (cover story
> plus one from each section), and those who subscribe and gain access
> the whole magazine. We don't have advertisers yet, but the higher our
> hits go on the webpage the more likely we are to make ad sales. Those
> numbers are looking good, but the subscriber numbers have a long way
> to go.
faster than with subscribers only. In order to get them we can't
convince them to advertise with our website traffic and subscriber
base, yet. Therefore we should also tell them that website updates
will be bublished to the Smart People communities on linkedin & Co.
This would rise the "media data" numbers (e.g. 200- on twitter, 500+
on linkedin, 300+ on facebook)
> Boris has been talking about giving less away, thinking if we give too
> much, we can't make the sale. Boris is an experienced marketing guy,
> so I listen.
> There is a dichotomy of purpose between building circulation and
> charging money. It pulls you both ways -- a chicken or egg thing. Give
> it a way free and the numbers go up. But unless you can monetize by
> converting those numbers to cash, you're back to the public service
> thing and your growth is severely limited.
but in the July issue it were more.
> Of course, we talked about this before we launched -- which business
> model, based on free or fee. But when I think about the blogging
> success of Carl Ocab's interview (diversify income) I think "yes,
> people will buy information on the Internet, but we need diverse
> sources of income."
content they get. In my view the Smart People magazine content is
appropriate to make money on the web but we need to advertise more,
more, more. Till now there is nothing ...
> As luck would have it (I mentioned this before) one of our larger
> group told me about his experience with licensure, not just for
> software but for access to information. The inference was that we
> could offer Smart People to organizations through licensure.
about.
First, this is a new media publishing. The production costs are much
more ceaper than for a print version. You have to produce the magazine
only once and provide appropriate web space to the people so that
there is no problem with accessibility (i.e. web space that is
allowing an appropriate amount of traffic). That's it. For a print
issue the cost would rise with the number of subscribers ...
Second, these rates are fary-tale. Apart from the fact that we're in a
financial crisis, would you as person responsible for purchasing
magazines and the like for your organisation really pay these rates?
Even when I would purchase a print publication I would pay for one
subscription only and would curculate the issues internally or I would
make it available somewhere where a lot of people have access to
it ...
Third, I would not produce personalized issues for each organization
(at the moment) - Too much workload! Who should do this, Michele ...
As for an online publication I would calculate the price in a totally
different way ...
Example:
- Cost of production of production for x issue(s) - let's say 1-2
- Some cents for each employee - let's say 20 cents
This calculation will not work if we personalize the content.
> This concept has grown and I am having some very good response from an
> organization in the US (we are talking about co-marketing) which may
> lead to the development of Smart People licenses for small, medium and
> large organizations. If that happens, then we have diversified our
> business model from individual subscriptions to include group
> licenses. And by licensing groups, we will be accomplishing both
> monetization and circulation.
links as I mentioned before. But then we would need a space on the
website where we can link back to our marketing partners (e.g. a
partner directory as I suggested at the very beginning). There is
already a prospective partner to back link with ... (http://
tinyurl.com/mlp6bx - see last message)
Boris
boris jaeger
would be not much additional workload to add this to the website right
now. What should be the price for an issue? More than $5 USD
definitely (keep in mind the paypal fees)
Boris
On Jul 24, 7:18 am, Jerry Ash <smart.g...@smartpeoplemagazine.com>
wrote: