The End of Free

The End of Free is free again

2007-10-04T17:12:00.000-07:00

Actually, The End of Free was always free, but the original domain TheEndofFree.com has been picked up by a domain squatter so I moved it to theendoffree.blogspot.com for archival purposes. For the better part of 4 years, this blog chronicled the move to paid services by early web companies. Anil Dash and I were just talking about when Evan Williams started this blog that it was one of the first inside industry blogs on the planet. I thought there might be some fun things to see in the history of the site. It turns out that there are like this link to MySpace back when it was an online storage site. The archives start way back in March 2001 and ran through April 2005 with a lot of links to 404'd pages (guess the web isn't as permanent as it could be). I don't know if this will be enough to get the contributors posting again but in the meanwhile enjoy the past.

[BusinessWeek] Will Meetup Users Pay or Leave?

2005-04-14T03:22:00.000-07:00

"In a mass e-mailing on Apr. 12, Meetup told its 2 million members that it's time for their groups to pay up. Starting May 1, organizers of each Meetup group, of which there are currently 54,000 that are actively managed, will have to pay $19 a month, though existing groups will pay only $9 a month for the rest of 2005. Organizers then can ask members to chip in. [...] It's hardly Meetup's first stab at making money. Since it launched in June, 2002, the site has tried to make money at least three different ways, from charging local meeting places for group referrals to offering individual memberships. The privately held company won't reveal revenues but concedes that no income source has really caught fire."

[Advertising] 2005 Selling Subscriptions to Internet Content Summit: May 10-11 NYC

2005-03-18T01:25:00.000-08:00

This year's ContentBiz event will feature 12 sites to present their case studies: WSJ.com, New York Times, Audible, Rivals.com, BeerNet, HighBeam Research, AskTheBuilder.com, Network Subscriptions, Time Inc, Playboy.com and Motley Fool. You'll walk away with a list of practical changes you can make immediately to improve your conversions and lower churn rates. $795 early bird special pricing ends today, Friday 3/18.

Seven Lessons in Selling B-to-B Subscriptions from Hoover's

2005-03-07T02:12:00.000-08:00

Interesting case study, especially on how to let a fee-based content site surface in organic search engine results.

[CNet] Friendster befriends blogs--and fees

2005-03-03T23:59:00.000-08:00

"Friendster, a so-called social networking site of linked personal profiles, launched a beta, or test version, of Friendster Blogs, a section of the site that lets people post and archive the daily musings known as blogs. [...] Friendster Blogs, [...] underlying technology is provided by San Francisco-based Six Apart [...]

The default option when users sign up for a blog is Friendster Blogs Basic, for $4.95 per month or $49.50 per year. That option boasts extra storage and bandwidth.

Friendster Blogs Pro, for $14.95 per month or $149.50 per year, offers "expert control over HTML, archive types and unlimited Web logs. Perfect for advanced users," the company said in a statement.

Friendster Blogs Plus, for $8.95 per month or $89.50 per year, lets users create photo albums, keep up to three blogs, and personalize the look of the blog."

[CNet] LinkedIn to introduce fees

2005-03-01T07:44:00.000-08:00

"Social networking site LinkedIn will soon begin charging employers $95 per job listing [...] LinkedIn, a site geared to professionals that claims more than 2 million members, on Tuesday is expected to unveil its first paid product, the LinkedIn Jobs network, along with the LinkedIn JobsInsider browser add-on. [...] LinkedIn said it had 300,000 job listings and expected to top 1 million by summer."

[Tom Evslin] Subscription Pricing

2005-02-17T02:15:00.000-08:00

"Customers like subscription pricing. In fact, they are willing to pay a premium for predictability and simplicity. If you can find a way to price a service at a flat monthly rate, you can make a better profit per customer and attract more customers than if your pricing is based on reading a meter. You also save a fortune in detailed billing, dispute resolution, and issuing credits.

[...]

Back in the early days of popular use of the Internet, ISPs including AOL and MSN charged by the minute for dialup access with no cap. People were afraid to sign up because they thought they might leave their PCs on and get huge bills. Some small ISPs experimented with subscription pricing; all the access you could use for $19.95. When we started AT&T WorldNet Service, we borrowed that idea and popularized it with the still hugely powerful AT&T brand behind it. Some said we’d go broke; others that we would ruin the Internet.

To hedge our bets, we also offered a metered access plan. We didn’t want to lose out on people who planned to spend less that $19.95 per month. To our surprise, people typically converted themselves from metered access to subscription when their monthly bill was around eleven or twelve dollars. And their usage didn’t spike after conversion. People were paying a premium for predictability and simplicity. With a subscription plan, they didn’t feel they had to keep track of minutes to make sure they weren’t being overcharged and they weren’t worried about surprises."

[MediaWeek] Salon's Talbot Still Believes in Paid Content

2005-02-14T08:50:00.000-08:00

"Four years ago, during the dotcom collapse, Salon began charging readers for access to its full array of content. Readers are still able to receive free day-passes if they agree to view an oversized advertisement.

That is something that Talbot does not expect to change anytime soon. "People say, 'Now that advertising is back, will Salon throw out the subscription model?' We all know how cyclical this business is. [The ad model] is why Salon is here. We don't want to be in the same place again.""

Jotspot Introduces Subscription Pricing

2005-02-10T04:22:00.000-08:00

Jotspot a wiki application that also lets you connect with other online applications relatively easily, is readying itself to exit its free beta period and launch its subscriptions. Current beta users will benefit from 50% discounts until the end of February, with pricing going from $4.95/mo for a single user to $3,200/year for 100 users.

Pay or Free?: Newspaper Archives Not Ready for Open Web...Yet

2005-02-02T10:00:00.000-08:00

"While bloggers such as Cory Doctorow and Jay Rosen added more calls for open archives, the keepers of the keys to newspaper archives were less enthralled with the notion. Those pay-per-view archives bring in a steady source of income for large newspaper sites, shielding them from the cyclical nature of online advertising. They also help preserve huge revenues from database services such as LexisNexis.

[...]

Nisenholtz admits that paid archives on NYTimes.com only brings in a percentage in "the low single digits" of overall online revenues, and Borrell Associates estimates that paid archives account for less than 5 percent of online revenues for newspaper sites.

But the sale of archives to LexisNexis, Factiva, ProQuest and others is a "significantly higher number" for NYTimes.com, according to Nisenholtz. While there's no stipulation in its database contracts for NYTD to keep archives behind a wall, Nisenholtz realizes that making archives free online would erode their value in other places."

Baby Telemetry Fee Service?

2005-02-01T03:14:00.000-08:00

I can't tell whether this is a hoax or the recognition that some people are really too obsessive about collecting and analyzing numeric data (not to speak of having too much free time):

"Trixie Tracker lets you record and track sleep, bottle-feedings, nursing and diapers for your child. When you sign up for an account, you'll get your own personal web address that will become your Trixie Tracker homepage. You'll then start recording events and begin to discover what kind of patterns (or lack thereof) exist in your child. [...] We currently plan to offer Trixie Tracker in 3 month and 12 month subscriptions [for $10 and $30 respectively]"

I have a 4-year old daughter and I can't imagine when I'd have felt a need for that service. It actually seems real. This is fun!

[IDG] Microsoft marries Hotmail and Outlook in new service

2005-01-23T15:27:00.000-08:00

"The new service, called Microsoft Office Outlook Live, costs $59.95 per year and includes Office Outlook 2003 for Subscription Services, which is a new downloadable subscription version of Office Outlook 2003, 2GB of online storage, spam, and virus protection, and the ability to send 20MB attachments.

Outlook Live has been designed as a single interface to subscribers' Hotmail accounts so that they can use Outlook Live to access, send, and receive e-mail messages and manage their contacts and calendars, said Karin Muskopf, MSN product manager. Changes made using Outlook Live are reflected in the Hotmail accounts."

Is there still anyone really using Hotmail?

[Mediapost] Craigslist Considers Fee For Realty Listings

2005-01-11T10:07:00.000-08:00

"In a move to cut down on scams and frivolous listings, Craigslist, a popular online classifieds site, is considering charging a per-post fee for its real estate listings in San Francisco and New York City.

"We're being asked to start charging both by brokers ... and by apartment seekers," Jim Buckmaster, Craigslist CEO said. "As it is now, the volume of postings coming through those categories is just too high, and it's burdensome for all concerned.""

(link via Marketingshift.)

[ContentBiz] 12 Lessons from MyStockOptions.com on Selling Subscriptions, Site Licenses, & Print-to-Online

2005-01-05T01:46:00.000-08:00

"When the site bumped its initial lowball price from $59/year to $99/year, there was no significant drop-off in conversions to subscriptions.

After researching visitor traffic patterns and conducting informal user focus groups, the marketing team discovered they had two different animals of users. Some joined the site intending to use the resources year-round, but others joined while researching a one-time question and might never re-visit.

MyStockOptions.com's marketing team wondered if many more of these one-time researchers were turning away at the subscription barrier page simply because they didn't need a full annual subscription. Was the site leaving money on the table from one-time users?"

Basecamp pricing and plan structure changes

2004-12-30T01:40:00.000-08:00

"As of January 7, 2005, the new rates will be as follows:

The Personal Plan will move to $12/month from $9/month.
The Basic Plan will move to $24/month from $19/month, but will include 15 active projects (up from 10 — an increase of 50%).
The Plus Plan will move to $49/month from $39/month, but will include 35 active projects (up from 25 — an increase of 40%). The Plus plan will also include SSL encryption (previously only available on the Premium plan).
The Premium Plan (unlimited projects) will move to $99/month from $59/month. While we recognize that this is a big jump, we need to account for the extra support and hardware costs necessitated by power Basecampers who manage a large number of projects. In order to soften the transition we've increased the project count of the Plus plan. This means a lot of current Premium subscribers on the fence between Plus/Premium can safely move to Plus (and even save $10/month off the old Premium rate)."

[Clay Shirky] Notes from ITP: Flickr-as-web-services edition

2004-12-29T15:15:00.000-08:00

"Flickr seems to have avoided the Fuck Fotolog-style controversies, with a sizable number of ITP power-users going with the Pro service. I’m not sure how they avoided the typical user flames, but some of the factors seem to be Flickr being more on the personal side of the personal-to-public spectrum, whereas moblogs are often touted as publishing tools, and people seem to have an easier time paying for personal service than membership in a community; people with camera phones are already used to paying for getting the pictures off the phone; and Flickr has less of a conversational dynamic than Fotolog, and so less outlet for that kind of self-amplifying outrage.

It also has some business downsides as well —- the Pro pricing model assumes moderate use over steady periods, but both 24in48 and Bickr can drive incredibly spiky usage in short periods, not well accounted for in Pro pricing. However, making all the participants in things that use Flickr as a web service have a Flickr account will dampen adoption of the subscribing services.

Worse, there is a HotorNot-like incentive to leave all the photo-hosting costs with Flickr, rather than caching and re-serving locally. This tension between types of fees and who "owns" the user is an unanswered question in web service business models generally [...]"

[WSJ] Despite Earlier Predictions, 'Free' Web Is Going Strong

2004-12-29T10:00:00.000-08:00

"For many sites, it's still about finding the right mix of free and paid offerings. Microsoft's MSN gives away some listings from its Encarta encyclopedia, but charges for other Encarta content, especially video. It gives away NBC video clips but charges for Major League Baseball highlights, as part of an MSN package sold to broadband customers. "We're all still very much grounded in both camps," says Karen Redetzki, a product manager for MSN, though she adds that increased advertiser interest has allowed the site to invest more in improvements."

You'll also find a couple quotes from yours truly in this well-documented article (not just because I'm quoted!).

[Marketingshift] MetaFilter Makes Almost $10k In November

2004-12-06T04:27:00.000-08:00

"Since Matt opened up registration again on MetaFilter he decided to charge a nominal $5 fee. In November, MeFi added a total of 1,973 new users, yes I was one of them. [...] That equates to $9,865 in revenues."

[ContentBiz] Gated Content Now Drives 50% of Salon's Revenues -- How it's Working

2004-12-02T08:47:00.002-08:00

"When Salon gated off 20% of its site for paying subscribers only in an attempt to keep the wolf from the door back in April 2001, few media (including us) expected the tactic to really make a difference.

Three months later only 12,000 of its more than three million regular monthly visitors had paid up, and the site was out hat-in-hand again looking for investors to keep afloat during the worst of the recession. Subscriptions were not the golden pill that solves all ills.

At an estimated $2 million per year in subscription sales plus an additional estimated half a million in Day Pass ad sales, that 20% of gated content is now contributing roughly half of Salon's total income."

How to Make IT Conversations Self-Sustaining?

2004-11-29T02:31:00.000-08:00

Doug Kaye writes:

"I'd like your help in deciding how to make IT Conversations self-sustaining. As is true for other podcasters (if you can call IT Conversations a podcast) this is virgin territory. No one really knows what will work and what won't. But if any business model is to be successful it's got to meet the needs of the listeners without whom there would be no business to model.

I'm not desperate. IT Conversations isn't about to die or disappear if I don't get a sudden infusion of cash. I've kept the expenses low -- there's no staff -- and I've got enough in the bank to eat, pay the mortgage, and more. But I've been so flat-out busy with production that I've done virtually nothing to cover the expenses let alone pay myself a salary. And that bank account is going the wrong way, particularly compared to the days of getting those CEO/CTO salaries."

[Clickz] Paid Content Grows, Driven by Music Sales

2004-11-22T09:41:00.000-08:00

According to the latest Online Publishers Association (OPA) report, "U.S. consumers spent $853 million on online content in the first half of 2004, led by growth in entertainment content -- a 14 percent increase in spending over the same period last year, according to the Paid Content U.S. Market Spending Report, conducted by comScore Networks. [...] Personals/dating held its position as the leading paid content category, with U.S. consumers spending $227.9 million in the first half of 2004. Spending in the business/investment category dropped 8 percent to third place, with $154.9 million this year from $168.5 million in the first half of 2003. Both of these categories have seen slight declines in each of the last three quarters since peaking in Q3 2003."

Dow Jones Buys Marketwatch for $520M

2004-11-20T03:15:00.000-08:00

Rafat Ali covers this story in detail. Fred Wilson and Alan Meckler both clamor that it's the victory of free ad-supported models over fees. I don't remember too many people making that claim 2-3 years ago when most ad-based web sites (including finance sites) were in a world of pain and rushing to transition to subscriptions. The reality is that ad markets are very cyclical and if you can combine ad revenue with user fees then you get the best of both worlds, provided you reach critical mass in both (easier said than done of course).

[NYT] Price of MarketWatch Web site might reach $400 million

2004-10-29T09:50:00.000-07:00

"MarketWatch, the owner of a leading financial news site, CBS.MarketWatch.com, is soliciting bids expected to be as high as $400 million for the company, according to executives involved in the sale process.

[...]

Some of those same media companies are among the potential buyers, including CBS, Dow Jones, The New York Times Co. and possibly Pearson's Financial Times Group, the executives said Wednesday. Yahoo is also a suitor."

[NMA] FT.com runs online ads to drive up subscriber numbers

2004-10-29T02:14:00.000-07:00

FT.com is launching its first online ad campaign in two years as it drives the business towards the 100,000 subscriber mark. More than £100,000 is being spent to promote the Financial Times' online presence this autumn, publicising a range of new services. Ads will run across sites including Classic FM, The Economist, MSN and Lastminute.

The initial aim will be to push new and existing users to a new FT.com tour facility, created by GT Network-owned Incline, and designed to better promote the site's virtues."

[Reuters] United Online Profits Up, to Buy Classmates Online

2004-10-25T13:57:00.000-07:00

"Low-cost Internet service provider United Online Inc. on Monday reported a higher quarterly profit despite slowing subscriber growth, and said it agreed to buy Classmates Online Inc. for $100 million in cash."

See also Fool.com.

[CNet] Extra! Wall Street Journal gives away Web content

2004-10-25T07:40:00.000-07:00

"In recent months, the business news outfit has been sending nightly e-mail to bloggers, or online diarists, to offer up several daily stories free so that they can point to or link to them from their Web pages. And on Nov. 8, the company plans to remove its paid wall altogether for five days, for the first time in 7 years, according to the company."

Flickr Launches Pro (Beta) Account

2004-10-01T01:57:00.000-07:00

Flickr, an up-and-coming photo management online application and community, is launching its Pro account for $41.77 (what kind of price is that?), or 30% off the regular annual price of $59.95 (which they say might be adjusted when they launch version 1.0 of their service). Accounts are not auto-renewed (which is probably a mistake) and you can sign up for one or two years upfront, but the longer option is not discounted further. You can buy a gift subscription for a friend, a nice extra more sites should implement. What I don't understand however, is why they force their customers to use Paypal for online payment (they do offer an offline alternative) as Paypal lets you accept credit cards from people who don't have a Paypal account.

Here are the premium features:

1 GB monthly upload limit

Unlimited storage

Unlimited bandwidth

Unlimited photosets

Permanent archiving of high-resolution original images

Ad-free browsing and sharing (coming soon)

Fotolog Needs $70,000 to Keep Handling Its Load

2004-09-30T01:52:00.000-07:00

"More people than ever are using Fotolog to share their photos with the world, and more people are paying for Fotolog Gold Camera memberships. This is bringing us closer and closer to the dream of having a site where there are millions of both free and Gold Camera members (thank you!), and they and their friends and family can continue to see each other's photos and share their own. However, it is very expensive to run a site that serves over half a billion page views per month! We have to rent over 70 servers and pay for over 22 terabytes of bandwidth each month."

As I'm posting this Fotolog has raised about 10% of what they're asking.

Origins Networks Introduces Subscription

2004-09-28T01:47:00.000-07:00

Up to know based on pay-per-view, Here's the latest from UK genealogy site Origins Network:

"After considerable input from our users, we've decided to operate as a subscription based, integrated service to offer our users the best value for money when accessing our unique English and Irish genealogy collections and services [...]

Included in the all-you-can-view service are new datasets on British Origins (formerly English Origins) and Irish Origins, with over a million new names plus map images available for subscribers, plus a new Origin Search Pro service and Free access to a basic version of Origin Search, our unique specialized web search engine for genealogy. All services are accessible separately or via the integrated Origins Total Access offer, starting with a 72 hour trial period and available via monthly, quarterly and yearly renewing subscriptions."

[ContentBiz] Ancestry.com Reveals Results of Landing Pages Tests That Raised Revenues by $500,000

2004-09-27T13:30:00.000-07:00

"[Drew Izzo, Ancestry.com Director of Online Marketing]'s team reviewed the 'classic' landing page that most old links directed to. It was averaging a 2.47% click conversion rate with a conversion defined as a prospect entering their contact data and credit card info to start a free trial. [...] The winning landing page is currently averaging a 3.37 conversion rate - almost an entire percentage point higher than the old standby control."

[ContentBiz] How to Launch a Profitable Paid Email Newsletter (Look Ma - No Ads)

2004-09-13T13:36:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting tidbit from this case study:

"Putting some (but not the majority) of content behind a paid barrier failed completely, utterly, miserably. "People just accept what they get. They say, 'OK, I'm still getting enough stuff. They find it hard to justify paying for more stuff.""

[NYT] For a Fee, a Stream of Tunes, Talk and Video

2004-09-09T03:07:00.000-07:00

This is just a wrap-up of what's currently available out there, including talk radio offerings I hadn't heard about yet.

[News.com] AIM update puts price on new buddies

2004-09-04T16:40:00.000-07:00

"The update adds a batch of personalization features, such as static and animated buddy icons, sound effects and "wallpaper" images for the IM windows, but these will come at a price. The company will charge $9.95 for a yearly subscription or $1.95 a month to access these features... [...] The update also places other features behind the subscription wall. AOL already charges for AIM-based video games and business applications in hopes of tapping direct revenue. The subscription business is part of AOL's overall revenue diversification strategy to supplement its declining dial-up business."

Not sure who's even going to think about paying for an animated buddy icon, but the move goes to show AOL's desperate need for cash.

[ResearchBuzz] FindArticles Adds a Premium Component

2004-09-01T11:33:00.000-07:00

"I went over to FindArticles yesterday to look for an article, and I noticed that they have something that seems to be new -- or at least it's new to me: premium content. FindArticles, you may remember, is a search engine for periodical articles. I hated it for years because it had mindbendingly lovely content but no way to sort or search by date. That's been fixed. At this writing it claims over 5 million articles from over 900 publications. If you run a search you'll see that some articles have a premium denotation next to them. (There's also an option to search free content only.)"

[Info Today] A New Scoop for Business Information Makes Its Debut

2004-08-30T15:15:00.000-07:00

"NetContent, Inc., known for its Intellisearch technology, has launched Scoop, a new business information service that offers news alerts and publishing capabilities. The subscription service is aimed at sales and marketing/communication executives. Content suppliers include ProQuest, Thomson Gale, and NewsNow, a U.K.-based Internet news monitoring service. The Scoop Publisher functionality enables group distribution of retrieved content through an RSS/newsletter/news feed mechanism."

After a 7-Day Guest Pass Offer, the personal subscription costs $29.95 per month.

Retention Tactics Gone Overboard

2004-08-25T01:34:00.000-07:00

For chuckles, you want to read this story of someone cancelling their AOL account (starts at the third paragraph).

Blog Ad Network Blogsnob Evolves to Better Fund Itself

2004-08-23T09:11:00.000-07:00

Adam Kalsey, owner of Blogsnob writes:

"What I'm intending to do is let advertisers insert some ads into the Blogsnob network. If you want to get some extra promotion for your blog, you can buy some ads. If you have a product or service that you think bloggers would be interested in, you can buy an ad. This has some huge benefits for you as a Blogsnob member because it's going to guarantee some improvements in the system. I'm going to take all of the things that I need to build into Blogsnob to support paid advertisers and give them away to you for free."

In other words Blogsnob, a free ad exchange service for weblogs, will improve its product to better serve a segment of its user base while funding the core free service.

[ClickZ] Online Publishing: The Long View, Part 1

2004-08-11T09:13:00.000-07:00

This column by Vin Crosbie is the preface to another one (to be published next month) dedicated to the future of paid content, but this point rings so true:

"Some fight change by attempting to maintain their outdated business models, an error Harvard Business School Professor Donald Sull calls "active inertia." Magazine publishers are fruitlessly trying to get Web pages to act more like paper. Commercial broadcasters are fruitlessly searching for ways to get streaming media limited by geographic broadcast region or by number of replays."

[PR] Salon Reports First Quarter Fiscal Year 2005 Results

2004-08-06T02:01:00.000-07:00

"Total revenues for the current period were $1.7 million compared to $1.0 million last year, a 66% increase. Advertising revenues for the current period were $1.0 million compared to $0.4 million last year, a 163% increase. Salon Premium subscribers at the end of the quarter were 75,700 compared to 66,200 a year ago."

[PR] MarketWatch.com Reports Second Quarter 2004 Financial Results (PDF)

2004-07-30T05:01:00.000-07:00

"MarketWatch.com, Inc. , a leading provider of business news, financial information and analytical tools, today announced its second quarter 2004 financial results. The Company’s net revenues for the second quarter 2004 were $20.2 million, compared to $11.1 million for the same period a year ago. Net income for the second quarter 2004 was $1.4 million, or $0.05 per share on 27.0 million diluted shares, comparing favorably to a net loss of ($127,000), or ($0.01) per share on 17.3 million diluted shares, for the second quarter 2003. [...]

Advertising revenues totaled $8.0 million in the second quarter 2004, increasing 48% from the second quarter 2003. [...] Subscription revenues in the second quarter 2004, which mainly consisted of fees collected for the Company’s newsletters, increased 33% over the same period last year to $476,000 due to the continued introduction of new subscription products."

[PR] The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Uses Traction Software's Weblog Software for AJC Sports Plus, Its New Sports Subscription Service

2004-07-27T09:21:00.000-07:00

"[..;] The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has deployed Traction TeamPage as the blogging solution for AJC Sports Plus, an Internet subscription sports service that features opinions, columns, blogs, deep statistics and more from Atlanta Journal Constitution sports experts.

AJC Sports Plus's allows sports fans to enjoy up-to-the-minute weblogs (also known as "blogs") written by AJC reporters and columnists covering the Atlanta Braves and other sports teams, and a unique opportunity to talk back to AJC reporters, columnists and other sports fans."

We don't really care about what software was used, but the subscription costs $6.95 a month or $29.95 a year.

Google Turns Another Acquisition into a Free Product

2004-07-16T05:53:00.000-07:00

First it "freed" Blogger Pro, now just days after announcing it acquired Picasa, Google offers the software for free download.

[Rick Bruner] NYTimes.com Planning to Go to a Paid Model?

2004-07-16T01:39:00.000-07:00

My friend Rick Bruner comes with this rumor:

"Sure, New York Times Digital made a 23% profit last year, but its overall revenue of $88 million accounted for only 3% of the NYT Company's total $3.2 billion in revenue. So, as much as NYTD is a darling in the online sector, it's a zit on the ass of the parent corporation. Moreover, it's a zit that some senior management at the company are itching to pinch, still concerned as they are about online's 9 million readers canibalizing the print paper's 1 million daily readers.

In particular, NYT Co's president and CEO Russell Lewis, former SVP of circulation, apparently really doesn't see the point of giving away the paper's content for free when online readers contribute only $11 a year to the paper's overall revenue compared to $900 for print readers, according to this timely Wired piece. "

[ClickZ] Free or Fee in Spain, Revisited

2004-07-14T07:51:00.000-07:00

Vin Crosbie revisits how major Spanish newspapers are doing online about one year after transitioning to paid sites:

"Spain still has no clear winner among these different online business models. Though outcomes aren't clear yet, some trends are developing. El Pais' switch to mostly paid content has probably given it the greatest overall revenue, adding its new online subscriptions to its probably marginally declined online advertising revenue. Meanwhile, the free El Mundo site has steadily increased its market share, probably at the expense of El Pais but probably without as much immediate revenue.

Is fatter paid revenue from a narrower audience better than thinner ad revenue from a broader free audience? That's the competition between these two newspaper sites. Meanwhile, La Vanguardia chose a middle road, offering free but registered access, while using e-mail advertising to increase revenue."

Oddpost Acquired by Yahoo

2004-07-10T03:15:00.000-07:00

Now here's an interesting development in the free+fee email space. This can only be interpreted in light of how Gmail's web interface is superior to Yahoo Mail's, and the people at Oddpost have been providing that kind of responsiveness to their users for a while.

[CNet] Yahoo profit doubles; shares tumble

2004-07-08T01:40:00.000-07:00

"The Web giant posted a profit of $112.5 million, or 8 cents per diluted share, for its fiscal second quarter, which ended June 30. That's up from $50.8 million, or 4 cents a share, in the same period last year, taking into account a 2-to-1 stock split, effective May 11. Revenue for the quarter was $609 million, excluding traffic acquisition costs (TAC), compared with $321 million a year ago.

[...]

Revenue from Yahoo's paid services businesses jumped to $104 million from $88 million last quarter and $70 million last year. Bulk paid subscriptions reached 6.4 million from 5.8 million last quarter and 3.5 million a year ago. Executives attributed the revenue difference to a price increase for SBC Communications' dial-up customers who also use Yahoo's services."

More of the same at Yahoo: solid search ad growth (though "investors" had grown way inflated assumptions at this point) and comparatively tepid paid service growth. It's funny to see people expecting the most of what was an external company (Overture) not so long ago.

[Slashdot] Wikipedia Hits 300K Articles

2004-07-07T06:46:00.000-07:00

An anymous coward but nonetheless credible person comments on Wikipedia's growth challenges and how they spend the money donated to them:

"The funding isn't resolved. We're about to spend another $20,000 or so on more equipment and that will exhaust the currently available funds. [...] The budget side includes plans beyond currently available funds. Web servers are currently the hot item we're after - those max out at peak times.

Our growth is pretty simple: when we're fast we grow to use all the capacity until we're slow again. Still no sign of us hitting the limit on demand, so it appears that we'd have no problem at all serving more people if we had another $50,000-100,000 to spend - there are ballpark growth estimates suggesting that we'd end up doing that by the end of the year if we could stay fast until then.

If anyone wants to donate, as one of the hardware people, I'd rather see monthly recurring payments of a smaller amount than a lump sum. It makes it easier for me to try to predict what we can buy based on some moderate predictability of available funds."

Wikipedia is now bigger than fee-based Britannica. Quality varies from article to article but this self-organizing thing works rather well (somewhat surprisingly, depending on how much faith you put in the human species!).

[CNet] Factiva chief: Google not a threat

2004-07-02T09:13:00.000-07:00

"Factiva's top executive has dismissed suggestions that the company's paid search services are under threat from high-profile free rivals such as Google."

[Alacra] Google vs. Factiva vs. LexisNexis vs. Dialog NewsRoom?

2004-06-29T01:26:00.000-07:00

"[T]he real challenge for Factiva, LN and Dialog NewsRoom is not making the content more available, it's adding value to the content in ways Google (or Yahoo!) cannot or will not. [...]

There will always be clients who need the content that is available via Factiva, LN and Newsroom that is not freely available on the web. Trade journals, the Wall Street Journal, and New York Times archives, for example, are not served up by Google News. So knowledge workers in financial and professional services, who need comprehensive and complete "news runs", should be safe markets. It's the marginal, price sensitive user that will become increasingly difficult for the premium services to win over."

[MarketWatch] Craigslist insists it isn't for sale

2004-06-29T01:16:00.000-07:00

"To help build out, Craigslist, which makes 100 percent of its revenue from charging San Francisco residents $75 per month to post resumes, plans to charge $25 for resume postings in L.A. and Manhattan as early as August. [...] Craigslist is also considering charging for real-estate listings, but it doesn't have any set time.

One business that Craigslist plans to stay away from, however, is online dating, which seems an opportunistic move, Newmark suggested, given that many people go on Craigslist to meet other people."

Craigslist is an amazing success indeed. Who else can afford that leisurely
pace in making money with their new businesses?

[CNet] Hotmail to offer 250MB of free storage

2004-06-24T02:46:00.000-07:00

"The upgrade will increase Hotmail's free e-mail storage limits from 2 megabytes to 250MB and its paid e-mail service, which costs $19.95 a year, from 10MB to 2 gigabytes. The changes will begin in early July. [...]Ask Jeeves also plans to grant its e-mail subscribers more storage room. Earlier this year, the search company acquired Internet Search Holdings, including My Way, The Excite Network and iWon.com, which all serve Web surfers with free e-mail. Ask Jeeves plans to give each of the sites' e-mail subscribers 125MB of free storage, up from an allottment of 3MB to 6MB previously."

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2004-06-15T15:12:00.000-07:00

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Free Things Can Disappear at a Moment's Notice

2004-06-15T12:03:00.000-07:00

After Dave Winer's decision to close weblogs.com, many people comment that there's a limit to what you get for free. Ahem, didn't we hear that story again and again? The ability of some people (I'm not talking about the people I linked to, I'm talking about upset users) to build inflated expectations about things that are given to them continues to amaze me.

Update: Wired: Thousands of Blogs Fall Silent.

[InternetNews] Reaching for Real Starz

2004-06-15T02:30:00.000-07:00

"Nearly two years after first announcing plans for a video on-demand service, RealNetworks and Starz Encore Group have finally launched a $12.95 a month movie subscription service for broadband users.

The Starz Ticket on Real Movies service will hawk unlimited access to the Starz cable channel's library of movies, as well as a streamed version of the Starz linear service. This is the first time a premium movie channel has been delivered simultaneously over broadband, the companies said in a statement."

[CNet] Yahoo to launch 100MB free e-mail

2004-06-15T02:09:00.001-07:00

"Yahoo on Tuesday will begin offering 100MB of extra storage for users of its free e-mail service as part of an overall redesign of its mail service.

Along with the 100MB boost, Yahoo will upgrade Mail Plus paid users to 2GB of storage and lower its yearly subscription from $29.99 a year to $19.99. Other a la carte services, such as POP e-mail forwarding, will consolidate under this plan and no longer be sold on a standalone basis."

[ClickZ] Past Is No Prologue for Micropayments

2004-06-09T10:41:00.000-07:00

"Over the past few months, I've encountered many people influenced by [Clay] Shirky's declaration that microtransactions cannot work. They forget they've been making micropayments for water, electricity, telecommunications, and other services for years. Microtransactions are common and used every day.

They reply, "Online is different."

No, not really. The sole difference is that unlike older technologies like water, electricity, or telecommunications, no open and interoperable billing system has yet been implemented for online use. During the first 20 years of the electric or telephone industries, the situation was the much the same as it is now with online."

Vin Crosbie adds a few thoughts to his column on his weblog.

[Baseline] Hoopmasters: Courting Success

2004-06-05T06:47:00.000-07:00

"Coleman and another well-known scout, Bob Gibbons, created a Web site called Hoopmasters.com that has become an online decision-making tool for coaches. The subscription site publishes information on top amateur players across the country, including physical measurements such as height, weight, and age; game statistics including scoring average and rebounds; and eligibility for college ball. They also send out e-mail updates to subscribers and will post daily Web bulletins from the camps and tournaments on player performance.

[...]

Hoopmasters offers free pages in addition to its paid content ($7.95 per month or $59.95 per year), with news about players and games available on the front page and player stats and analysis behind the paywall. Hoopmasters also sells printed reports and magazines."

[MarketingSherpa] How AmericanGreetings.com et al. Engage New Opt-Ins in One Day (or Sooner)

2004-05-27T10:02:00.000-07:00

"People who sign up for americangreetings.com's paid e-card service get a welcome e-card the first day, followed by two more mailings in the first 30 days after joining and five total over 60 days.

"Our objective in the first 60 days of membership is engagement," President/CEO Josef Mandelbaum says.

Instead of following a conventional 30-60-90-day schedule, AmericanGreetings.com mails new customers on Days 1, 2, 14, 45 and 60, a schedule it developed through testing. The e-card lets the company show off its own resources and move people right into using its services, instead of waiting for subscribers to make the first move."

[ContentBiz] M&A Special Part II: Tips for Evaluating a Subscription Site's Potential

2004-05-25T02:46:00.000-07:00

"If you're considering purchasing a subscription site, here are some of the factors you should review in addition to the standard stuff you'd expect from any publication acquisition:

Subscriber acquisition costs per tactic

Digging into renewal rates

Cash or accrual basis

Potential for increased traffic

Potential for increased conversions

Staffing

Scalability & potential uses of back-end technology

Potential to increase subscriber lifetime value"

[ClickZ] Sportsline.com to Explore "Strategic Alternatives"

2004-05-22T05:22:00.000-07:00

"SportsLine.com, publisher of CBS SportsLine.com, has hired investment bank Perseus Group to explore "strategic alternatives to enhance value to its shareholders" -- code words that usually indicate a company is for sale.

Despite a general rebound in online advertising, SportsLine still hasn't been able to turn a profit. For the first quarter of 2004, the company reported a net loss of $8.4 million, or $0.20 per share. During that period, the company derived 94 percent of its revenue from online advertising, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. [...] The company recently provided subscription access to the 2004 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Championship for $9.95."

[CNet] Lycos: We're first with a gigabyte of e-mail

2004-05-18T14:22:00.000-07:00

"Lycos announced Tuesday that it is upgrading its service in the United Kingdom to give consumers 1GB of e-mail storage. But unlike some rival services being developed, the Lycos service is not free. Users will have to pay a monthly fee of 3.40 pounds ($6.01). [...] In a somewhat labored swipe at Google and Yahoo, Lycos was keen to point out that this makes it the first major e-mail specialist to offer a 1GB service."

Lycos, by claoming they're first to market, is full of hubris. I've been using GMail for several weeks and it works great. Since users now have the ability to invite their friends, you can consider Gmail as good as public.

Hot 'Free' to Fee Transition at Six Apart!

2004-05-14T17:25:00.000-07:00

If you think it's now easier to introduce a service for a fee when its current user base was used to getting it for free, think again and see the heat Six Apart (the software vendor behind Movable Type and TypePad) is getting after it introduced its MT 3.0 pricelist yesterday. There's definitely room for improvement in a pricing structure that looks somewhat stuck between what's standard for online apps and what's done in the world of enterprise software, but at the same time there's still going to be a limited product for free and no-one forces you to upgrade if you don't like the new deal.

I expect Six Apart to rephrase some awkard restrictions, create smoother upgrade paths where needed (for instance for current beta users who weren't told this was coming), and provide a more flexible model for those corporations they now target explicitely. On the other hand, no matter the (feigned) outrage, they need to stick to their guns and run this as a business, nice happy vibe or not. This will be interesting to watch.

05/17/04 update: Changes in and clarifications about the licensing terms.

06/16/04 update: more changes.

[CNet] Semel raises Yahoo's subscriber goal

2004-05-13T16:57:00.000-07:00

"Semel on Thursday said Yahoo is increasing its target by 50 percent to 15 million new subscribers. That's up from the 10 million goal that he announced during his first analyst day as Yahoo's new chief in November 2001. Semel did not offer a time frame for when the company will reach its new goal, nor did he elaborate on which businesses would fuel the growth."

Again, we're mostly talking about co-branded deals with ISPs here, not services organic to Yahoo.

[CNet] Yahoo boosts free e-mail storage to 100MB

2004-05-13T16:22:00.000-07:00

"Web portal Yahoo will begin offering "virtually unlimited storage" for its paid e-mail customers and will upgrade free users to 100MB, an executive said Thursday.

The upgrade is part of an overall enhancement for Yahoo Mail that will launch this summer. Besides additional storage, the service will get a face-lift and tie in more Yahoo-branded services, such as Photos and Messenger."

Nate Elliott at JupiterMedia Comments on IAC Quarterly Results and Online Dating

2004-05-06T03:27:00.000-07:00

"I found IAC's dating results disappointing. Their personals revenue grew by only 19% year over year (the whole market is growing by 27% this year), and a chunk of that came from the purchase of a new site, uDate. Excluding uDate, subscribers numbers grew by 23% year over year -- respectable, but again below average -- and IAC made made 9% less per personals subscriber this Q1 than last. As we say in our most recent online dating report [subscribers only], the growth in this space is slowing: time to look for new revenue streams. Offline dating events and wireless dating services, anyone?"

[PR] MarketWatch.com Announces First Quarter 2004 Financial Results

2004-04-28T09:02:00.000-07:00

"MarketWatch.com, Inc. [...] today announced financial results for the first quarter ended March 31, 2004. The Company's total revenues increased 60% to $17.8 million for the first quarter 2004, compared to $11.1 million for the same period a year ago. Due to certain charges totaling $1.3 million related to the acquisition of Pinnacor Inc. and other unusual costs, first quarter 2004 net loss was ($325,000) or ($0.01) per share, compared to $35,000, or $0.00 per share, for the first quarter 2003. The Company reported first quarter 2004 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of $1.1 million, compared to $1.0 million for the same period of 2003. [...]

Advertising revenues, which include online, and radio and television broadcast, sales, totaled $7.7 million in the first quarter 2004, an increase of 48% from the first quarter 2003, and up slightly from the fourth quarter 2003. The strength in advertising revenues was driven primarily by advertisers in the financial services sector, while at the same time the Company obtained new and renewed contracts from advertisers in the travel and automobile sectors. [...]

Subscription revenues, which consist of fees collected for the Company's newsletters, were $397,000, an increase of 23% over the $323,000 reported the same period a year ago."

Here's another company reporting smaller relative growth in subscriptions as opposed to advertising, out of a smaller revenue base (i.e. when it should be easier, all other things equal, to show stronger growth).

[Ad] 2004 ContentBiz Summit: Selling Subscriptions to Internet Content -- May 10-11 NYC

2004-04-27T14:00:00.000-07:00

At ContentBiz's 4th Annual Subscriptions Summit, 16 online subscription executives will share practical hands-on tactics they've used to raise sales to every kind of content -- including research databases, news sites, ecards, audio downloads, streamed video, trade magazine sites, and consumer advice sites. This year's invited speakers include AmericanGreetings.com, New England Journal of Medicine, CNN.com, eDiets, The Economist, TradingMarkets, VNU Business Media, Ancestry.com, Weatherbug, eLibrary, Audible.com and more.

Buy your tickets now, as this event is sold out every year.

[Note from the editor: I'll be at the event, and I recommend you go, plus if you buy through your ticket my link you'll fund my travel expenses from Europe! Here are my notes from the 2003 and 2002 events, see you there next month.]

[Salon] Salon Premium turns 3!

2004-04-27T13:42:00.000-07:00

"Some 74,000 of our readers now count themselves as Salon Premium members."

[PR] SportsLine.com, Inc. Reports First Quarter Operating Results

2004-04-27T13:37:00.000-07:00

"SportsLine.com, Inc. [...] today announced its operating results for the quarter ended March 31, 2004. SportsLine.com's net loss was reduced to $8.4 million, or $0.20 per basic and diluted share, an improvement of 14% compared to the net loss of $9.8 million, or $0.26 per basic and diluted share, in the first quarter of 2003. [...] Subscription and premium products revenue for the first quarter 2004 decreased 8% from the first quarter 2003. Excluding approximately $200,000 in revenue received in 2003 from the creation of games and contests for AOL, which did not exist in 2004, subscription and premium products revenue increased approximately 26% year over year. [...]

Approximately 20,000 paid fantasy baseball leagues have been sold in 2004, representing approximately 200,000 owners. Total paid leagues and owners have increased approximately 15% over the totals for 2003. The average price per unit for the Company's fantasy baseball league management service increased to $123 in 2004, a 5% increase over the average price in 2003."

[PR] EDGAR Online Announces First Quarter Results

2004-04-27T13:33:00.000-07:00

"EDGAR Online, Inc. today reported first quarter 2004 subscription growth of 13% over the same period last year and up 4% from the previous quarter. Since inception, the Company's subscription revenues have grown incrementally each quarter. The average annual revenue reached $247 per subscriber, an increase of 17% from the first quarter of 2003 and an 8% increase from last quarter. [...]

EDGAR Online reported revenue of $3.1 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2004, a decrease of 18% compared to the same period last year. Strong growth in the Company's core subscription business was offset by a $814,000 or 80% decline in the Company's technical services revenue. Seat-based subscription revenue increased 13% from the first quarter last year primarily due to an overall increase of over 1,800 seats of its premium EDGAR?Online Pro service to financial professionals. At March 31, 2004, the Company had approximately 26,000 total subscribers."

The Onion Premium

2004-04-25T00:55:00.000-07:00

"For less than the price of a $30 cup of coffee, America's Finest News Source is now available in a new, non-free form."

[PR] eDiets.com Reports Q1 Revenues of $11.1 Million

2004-04-23T15:47:00.000-07:00

"The company reported revenues of $11.1 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2004, representing 51% growth over revenues of $7.3 million for the first quarter of fiscal 2003. The net loss for the period was $3.0 million, or $0.16 per share, compared to a net loss of $2.0 million, or $0.13 per share, for the comparable prior year quarter. [...] eDiets.com sold 119,000 new subscriptions during the first quarter of fiscal 2004, an increase of 49% over sales of 80,000 new subscriptions in the comparable prior year period. Paying subscribers at March 31, 2004 totaled approximately 204,000 compared to paying subscribers of approximately 180,000 at March 31, 2003, an increase of 13%."

Once again, eDiets.com attributes its lack of profitability in part to "rising online advertising rates."

04/27/04 update: Tom Hespos chimes in.

[Sponsor: ContentBiz's 4th Annual Subscriptions Summit, NYC May 10-11 -- interestingly someone from eDiets is among the speakers.]

[ContentBiz] 5 Specific Ways Subscription Sites are Leaving Money on the Table

2004-04-19T14:28:00.000-07:00

"[Joe Meth, head of the consumer portal SubscriptionConnection.com] estimates content subscription services online including niche b-to-b offerings may be as high as 2,500 by the end of 2004. In comparison, the print subscription newsletter industry has more than 5,000 titles and in 1995 was estimated to sell at least $2 billion in subscriptions per year, plus an additional $800 million in ancillary revenues mainly from list rentals and items such as special reports sold directly to subscribers. Now, almost a decade later, it's certainly significantly larger.

If you assume the two industries are fairly similar in terms of selling targeted high-value content directly to end users, this means there's plenty of room for the online subscription industry to grow."

Interestingly, there seems to be less new subscription sites being launched these days. Joe Meth also gets questions from angry customers who can't figure out how to cancel auto-recurring services.

[PR] RealNetworks Announces More Than 450,000 Subscribers for Its Digital Music Services, Extending Lead in Music Subscriptions

2004-04-15T22:07:00.000-07:00

"RealNetworks [...] announced that it added 100,000 paying subscribers for its premium digital music services during the company's fiscal first quarter (ended March 31, 2004), pushing the total subscription count for its music services beyond 450,000. This is the second consecutive quarter the company has added 100,000 subscribers for its digital music services, including Rhapsody and RadioPass. Overall, the subscriber base for these services has grown by 80% since the end of Q3 2003. [...] For $9.95 per month, Rhapsody delivers unlimited access to a broad library of major and independent label music, with more than 625,000 songs available for on-demand streaming and more than 550,000 songs available for purchase at the industry-low price of 79" per song."

Despite much bragging by online services, I'll remind readers unfamiliar with this industry that their offerings cover only a relatively narrow slice of the overall music catalogs out there. Though this is slowly improving, if your tastes are outside of the mainstream there are many things simply missing from online download and subscription services, not to speak of weak coverage outside of the US. One wonder how the majors have the guts to bitch about so-called piracy in Europe where there's hardly any alternative available to music lovers interested in digital products.

[ContentBiz] 5 Ways NASCAR.COM Keeps Paid Member Churn Rate at Just 15% Despite Doubling Prices

2004-04-13T11:51:00.000-07:00

"The team also invested heavily in new tech and site improvements to make the paid service significantly different from the free content. But that cost had to be passed along -- annual subscription fees were jacked up over two years from $29.95 to $64.95. [...] It's not just buying a subscription, it's giving them access to things they normally couldn't do." The team tested five tactics to grow this membership mentality:

Monthly service input chats

Beta testing new services

Real-world event

Fan Miles

Emailed notes to cards gone bad

[...] According to Bailey, NASCAR.COM currently has "roughly 200,000-225,000 subscribers" and he expects that number to grow significantly over time. "Our churn is incredibly low," he notes. "We only have roughly 15% churn and the majority of sign-ups are annual.""

[CNet] Microsoft roots for the home team--Windows

2004-04-08T07:28:00.000-07:00

"Microsoft, which just signed an estimated $40 million deal with Major League Baseball for Webcasting rights, is offering the bargain to subscribers of MSN Premium, a subscription-based product that doesn't work with the Mac or Linux operating systems.

Here's the deal: Sign up for MSN Premium and you get the first three months free, including access to all video- and audio-casts from MLB.com. After that, you pay $9.95 a month. For the full six-month baseball season, which runs from April to September, that comes to only about $30."

The rest of this article is full of hot air, including brain-dead samples such as: "Mac users--equipped with their high-resolution "cinema" displays". Gee, I guess ALL Mac users have high-res "cinema" displays, and nobody has big, wide screens on PCs. A good chunk of the Mac installed base has small 15" screens (think iMac), but I disgress. The point is, sometimes I'm puzzled by the enormous amount of words CNet can publish about non-events. MSN runs an MLB promo, and that's it. Stop reporting a marketing fart as a nuclear blast, hmm-k?

[PR] Yahoo! Reports First Quarter 2004 Financial Results

2004-04-07T16:42:00.000-07:00

"Revenues were $758 million in the first quarter of 2004, compared to $283 million in the same period of 2003. [...] Marketing services revenue for the first quarter of 2004 totaled $635 million, a 235 percent increase from the $190 million reported in the same period in 2003. Fees revenue for the first quarter of 2004 totaled $88 million, a 39 percent increase compared to the $64 million reported in the same period in 2003. This increase was primarily driven by the growth in the number of paying relationships for Yahoo!'s premium services, which were approximately 5.8 million at March 31, 2004 compared to approximately 2.9 million at March 31, 2003."

It's interesting to note advertising grew much more than fee-based services during the last quarter and trailing 12 months. Part of this is due to acquisitions (Overture above all), but even Yahoo's organic growth is stronger in marketing services (48%) than premium services (39%), even though the former started from a bigger absolute number. In Q1 '03 fees represented 22.5% of revenue, while this quarter this ratio dropped to 11.6%. Since most of the fee-related revenue comes from deals with broadband ISPs such as SBC, one can conclude that organic paid services are increasingly marginal at Yahoo.

[PR] eDiets.com Announces Preliminary Q1 Results

2004-04-07T01:53:00.000-07:00

"eDiets.com [...] today announced that it expects to report revenues for the first quarter of fiscal 2004 of approximately $11 million, compared to earlier guidance of $12 to $13 million. The $11 million in revenues represents an increase of approximately 50% over the comparable prior year quarter."

The stock market didn't like the news. Here's an interesting quote from their CEO (many companies moved into subscription models because of the weakening of the online ad market):

"We believe that the increased competition in the online advertising market currently affecting eDiets.com may continue and we have begun to more aggressively deploy television ads based on the successful preliminary tests that we ran earlier this year."

[Wired] Find the Download in a Haystack

2004-04-06T09:15:00.000-07:00

"RealNetworks hasn't been doing itself any favors with its affinity for pop-up ads, icon installations throughout users' computers and aggressive (and sometimes misleading) pitches for subscription products, analysts say. Instead of developing user-friendly products, RealNetworks has been focused on getting as much money as possible from users with each registration. [...] RealNetworks has had some success in winning back critics. A couple of months ago, the website of the popular radio show Car Talk dumped Real, citing frustration with the registration process. A newsletter to users said there was "perceived trickery" in getting users to buy a premium version of the player. "The free player is harder to find than Osama bin Laden at night," they quipped.

But on Monday, the hosts of the show announced that they were giving RealNetworks another chance, after the company got in touch with them and said it would fix the problems."

I think the conclusion tells it all: "Yet despite its attempts to update the player to a more user-friendly design, it may be too little, too late."

[CNet] Yahoo promotion upgrades e-mail for some

2004-04-05T09:10:00.000-07:00

"Yahoo confirmed Friday that it has sent e-mail promotions randomly to some subscribers of its popular Web-based e-mail service. One promotion sent Tuesday upgraded users to 100MB of disk space as of March 31 for free, and gave allowances for sending and receiving larger attachment files using Yahoo. [...] Yahoo allots free mail subscribers 6MB of storage, offering 100MB for $49.99."

Google to Disrupt Free and Fee-based Webmail

2004-04-02T02:52:00.000-08:00

It turns out Gmail is not a joke. Since Google's email service is going to be free (at best/worse depending on how you look at it, POP3 access will cost a "nominal fee"), this is most likely going to be highly disruptive, destroying Yahoo or MSN's ability to charge for a mere few megabytes of space. And about time too, considering the falling prices of network storage, which made these offers artificial and plain stingy in this day and age.

It's interesting to see Google base most of what they do so far on advertising and deliberately undermine their competitors' ability to charge in the process (remember Blogger discontinued its Pro paid service). I've posted additional thoughts on my personal blog.

[DM News] South Beach Diet Binges on Web Site Members

2004-03-29T10:21:00.000-08:00

"Since the June launch of the site at www.southbeachdiet.com, more than 26 million visitors have checked out content and tools designed to help lose weight. More than 200,000 people have signed up at $5 per week for access to recipes, community, nutritionists and chats with diet founder and cardiologist Dr. Arthur Agatston. And 2 million consumers have registered for newsletters."

[CNet] Microsoft, America Online to play MLB games

2004-03-23T01:45:00.000-08:00

"As CNET News.com first reported, the deal, worth as much as $40 million over two years, according to sources, is one of online sports programming's most expensive to date. MSN will offer these streams as part of MSN Premium, a $9.95-a-month software package that offers Net services and content. MSN's dial-up customers will only have access to MLB's live audio streams.

In addition, the software giant will sell MLB subscription packages through its MSN Web portal. MSN visitors can subscribe to MLB.com All Access, which includes live video and audio, for $19.95 a month or $99.95 a season; MLB.TV, a video-only subscription, for $14.95 a month or $79.95 a season; or MLB.com Gameday Audio, for the live radio broadcasts only, for $14.95 a season."

[MarketingSherpa] How Match.com Gains Nearly 50,000 New Paid Subscribers per Month

2004-03-08T14:09:00.000-08:00

"At nearly 30 million visitors per month Match.com's sites together get nearly three times more traffic than its nearest competitor's. Plus, Match.com is going to hit the one million paid subscribers mark any week now. [...] ContentBiz' math (based on publicly available data) shows the sites gain 46,000-48,000 paid subscribers and lose roughly 16,600, for a net gain of 30-32,000 new paids per month. We predict at this rate, Match.com will hit one million paids by mid-April 2004. An average of 40% lapsed subscribers ultimately return to become paid members once again, presumably when their relationships hit a downswing."

[MarketingSherpa] Top 4 Subscription Marketing Lessons from the Adult Content Industry for Mainstream Sites

2004-03-02T15:21:00.000-08:00

"Lesson #1. Raising Profits with Cross-sales Interstitials Between Competitors
Lesson #2. Improve Search Marketing Conversion Rates With Targeted Landing Pages
Lesson #3. Mass Portal Sites Can Use Boutique-style Niche Offerings to Raise Conversions & Lifetime Value
Lesson #4. Lifetime Retention Starts With Your Banners"

KeepMedia Uses RSS Feeds to attract free traffic

2004-02-26T05:39:00.000-08:00

With these new feeds, "KeepMedia is now offering "Featured News on KeepMedia" in the RSS format. Featured News on KeepMedia offers breaking news and related articles from our library of current and archived publications. KeepMedia plans to offer additional RSS feeds in the near future. [...] The RSS feeds are provided free of charge for use by individuals and non-profit organizations for personal, non-commercial uses."

In its current form this is too generic to be of much use, but with a vertical focus this would be a nice way to expose the tip of KeepMedia's content on a recurring basis and hopefully convert those free visitors to a paid subscription.

[CNet] Semel toys with an ad-free Yahoo

2004-02-26T04:02:00.000-08:00

"Semel declined to offer any specifics and cautioned that Yahoo's subscription businesses have not amassed enough paid users to justify an ad-free environment. Semel also did not elaborate on whether Yahoo would offer an ad-free version of its entire site, but said individual businesses are under consideration."

[NYT] The Search Engine That Isn't a Verb, Yet

2004-02-22T02:05:00.000-08:00

"[Yahoo's CEO Terry S. Semel] also tried to insulate Yahoo from the vicissitudes of the advertising market by creating products that consumers will pay for, but so far he has found few. He talked at first of charging fees for premium versions of the company's major categories, like news and sports. Research showed that there was not much demand there, and the idea was dropped.

[...]

The company, however, has been quite successful in a few subscription services. Merrill Lynch estimates that Yahoo had revenue of $52 million last year from its online personal ads, $33 million from its premium e-mail product and $62 million from services for small businesses.

[...]

Even so, Mr. Semel has thrown out his initial goal of earning half the company's revenue from fees and is enjoying a wild ride as online advertising rebounds."

[Contentbiz] How to Raise Subscription Site Conversions and Lifetime Value Rates

2004-02-17T12:50:00.000-08:00

"More than 100,000 sites, including The Weather Channel and several CNET properties use the Internet Billing Company to process their reoccurring billing offers for content, downloads, and site access.

We interviewed Major Accounts Director Howard Goldberg to get some eagle's eye advice on what works and what doesn't work for selling online subscriptions."

Interesting concept: 1-Day Trial

2004-02-16T02:50:00.000-08:00

Delphion Research, a patent research online database, has an interesting setup where you create an account that's free to use for one day. I remember Hoover's did this for a limited time, and it seems a good way to collect customer information and beat the iron while it's hot.

[MarketingProfs] Introducing the MarketingProfs Premium Subscription Program

2004-02-10T11:28:00.000-08:00

"[W]e are launching a comprehensive Premium Subscription package that combines the best of all we have to offer:

Unlimited access to our online seminars on key strategic and tactical topics

2,500 points that you can use to get instant answers to marketing questions in the Know-How Exchange

Exclusive newsletter content covering the most critical topics in marketing today, written by industry experts."

Intro yearly price is $199 per year, there's a corporate offer at $399 for up to 5 users.

iMorph's InfoMinder to Charge

2004-02-10T09:19:00.000-08:00

Our reader John Morrish sends us this tip: "The excellent InfoMinder, which tracks changes in websites you nominate, used to be free if you only wanted to track up to 10 sites. Now that Basic version has been redefined as a "trial"."

The change occurred on February 5, though I've been very slow to post it. The trial lasts 90 days, intro pricing is $24.95.

[ContentBiz] Selling Subscription Renewals via Emailed Transactional Forms

2004-02-10T02:23:00.000-08:00

"Lorna Lowery, Retention Director at Weiss Group Inc, a publisher of investment advisory newsletters, loves to test new tactics to boost subscription renewal rates. Naturally she's tested email, but it's only had limited success. "Mail is still a more responsive media for us. Email blasts may return half of what my DM efforts do."

Partly that's because she's promoting mostly to men over 55 who may go online, but they don't spend practically all day long online at work the way younger people do. Also, the Weiss Group's new subscriptions are primarily sold through postal DM, so it would make sense that channel would be the best to renew them through."

[NYT] Social Networks: Will Users Pay to Get Friends?

2004-02-09T05:41:00.000-08:00

"But as the popularity of [social networking web] sites has taken off, the big question for investors in new technologies is whether social networking sites can ever make a lot of money by connecting friends of friends in mini-networks of trust, whether for dating, business or maintaining acquaintances. For many, the buzz over social networking sounds a lot like vintage Internet hyperbole from the late 1990's."

New web-based project management launches

2004-02-05T02:41:00.000-08:00

Basecamp uses a 30-day trial and three pricing plans based on the number of active projects you want to handle. There's also a free 1-project plan you can upgrade from later on.

[CNet] Fees come to social networking

2004-02-04T09:46:00.000-08:00

"After months of anticipation, fees for social networking services, which let people create linked networks of personal profiles for social or professional ends, will make their debut Tuesday, when San Francisco-based Tickle starts charging for access to some profiles.

Tickle stressed that its basic social networking service, an August addition to its pre-existing matchmaking system and personality quizzes, will remain free. [T]he only thing that will require a paid subscription is the ability to contact people separated from a member by more than four links away in the social network."

[MarketingSherpa] How to Sell Online Content to the US Corporate Market

2004-02-03T07:17:00.000-08:00

"Instead of corporate libraries and individual executives, [online content corporate] purchases are now being made by a new power in content purchasing -- people Corcoran calls portal managers. [...] They may be in competitive intelligence, training, intranet management, and even knowledge management (a title that was hot, cooled way off, and is re-heating again.) Some are former librarians, some are webmasters, some are CIOs, some are VP marketing, you name it."

[Seattle Times] RealNetworks' loss widens despite fourth-quarter surge

2004-02-03T03:18:00.000-08:00

"RealNetworks continued its transition to becoming a consumer software and services company last quarter, and the ratio of its consumer revenue to total revenue hit an all-time high of 76 percent. Much of that revenue was from subscription fees for premium services, such as the Rhapsody music service. [...] The company's paying subscriber base grew to 1.3 million in the quarter, up from 1.15 million at the end of September and 1 million at the end of June. [...]

The company said it would no longer sell subscriptions to sports, such as Major League Baseball games, as a stand- alone product. RealNetworks made a name for itself by striking a deal with MLB to offer highlights and audio play-by-play coverage of baseball games, but the relationship has become too expensive, executives said.

Less than 2 percent of RealNetworks' 2003 revenue was from its Major League Baseball sales, and getting out of the stand alone business will save the company at least $5 million this year, said Chief Executive Rob Glaser."

[BusinessJournals] Earnings up for MarketWatch

2004-02-03T03:13:00.000-08:00

"MarketWatch grew revenue 14 percent to $13.4 million in the fourth quarter and reported net income of $2.5 million, or 13 cents a share, versus $854,000, or 5 cents, in the year ago quarter."

[PR] Alacritude, Today Renamed HighBeam Research, Unveils New Service

2004-01-26T06:30:00.000-08:00

"Alacritude, LLC, today announced that it has changed its name to HighBeam Research, LLC, and has introduced the company's new flagship online research service, HighBeam Research. The service is designed for individuals engaged in serious business, educational and personal research and delivers convenient, customizable access to the free Web, selected registration and subscription online services and the HighBeam Research proprietary eLibrary database.

Effective today, the company's eLibrary and Researchville services have become part of the new HighBeam Research service. An enhanced version of the HighBeam Research's Encyclopedia.com service will soon become an integral part of HighBeam Research."