Hi, I am here to ask for a Feedback about a business plan. I am planning to start a new Webmaster Membership Blog in which I publish articles which I collect from various sources. For e.g I will purchase an eBook and will rewrite that in my own way and so on. I am planning to charge $29.95 annually. But along with the membership I will give 3 Domain Names and a 300 GB Web Hosting from IXWebHosting.com (their business plan) for one year. From 2 year onwards the members have to pay for hosting if they decided to stay there or may cancel that after one year. Also I will offer a money back guarantee for the members if you are not satisfied then I will give a full refund of your money and whats more you keep the Hosting for FREE. AFTER READING THIS PLEASE VOTE WHETHER YOU WILL SUBSCIBE TO SUCH A SITE OR NOT. Please include the reason too so that I can make it more attractive.
Thanks for the feedback.. so you are not willing to give it a try??? As I have mentioned there you get free domain names, web hosting and a full money back guarantee.
Also feel free to post here about what exactly do you expect from such a membership site and do I really need to provide FREE Web Hosting and Domain Name with this and lower the membership fees. Suggest your views on this as this is just a business plan...
Some people might go for that, but I'm to the point where I don't feel like taking the time. The time to signup for the blog, signup for a new domain registrar, ask for the refund if necessary, etc, especially when I can go to johnchow.com or shoemoney.com and read for free without hassle. Plus I could put a site on my server faster and cheaper than starting up at the new host. I just wanted to warn you that not everyone will be lining up this
Im not sure why I would pay for someone "Rewriting" existing stuff. As far as a free domain and hosting, you can get that for a lot less then $30 It is very difficult to offer paid services these days for entry into a blog or forum so you really need to offer some value
Ok so if I lower the fees then should I give the hosting and domain names with it? Actually atfirst I was also thinking like the shoemoney way.. but as its a webmaster blog.. I dont think that I get any revenue from adsense or from other affiliates as my visitors know they are ads so they wont click.
Also what if I give a FREE Trial.. means free membership to all with out the hosting so that they need to pay only if they find some value in the site.
Charging for content is a business model only major newspapers would get away with. Even then they lose a lot of traffic because of it. How do you propose to publicise your blog if only subscribers can see it?
No offense but you haven't actually said anything that would be included that would be of any value (apart from hosting although most people prefer their own hosting companies) Rehashing existing articles is not value.
Not many blogs work on a subscription model, but few who does works really well. Still my advice is to not go for subscription model, as it make you a wall community and your chances of getting links, visibility reduces drastically.
I would give tips and information which I think webmasters would find useful. For e.g Are you a CJ Publisher? Do you Promote GoToWebinar/GoToMeeting/GoToMyPC? Do you know about their bonus payouts? Once I got $150 from them just for placing a text link in my site. Yes all we have to do is to place a special link in our site and then have to click then once by our self so that we get a bonus. And I did the same and I got $150. Just for doing nothing. Now they are paying double the actual commission for every leads generated in the first 2 weeks of march.
Except there are hundreds of free blogs that offer that same info. Im telling you, start a free blog with no ads and start posting like it was your membership site. If the masses start flocking to it (At least 500 uniques a day) then you have proven your worth and you can start exploring ways to monetize it. I hate to be so blunt but I believe that helps people. If you start out on a membership basis, you won't ever make a penny.
Very true... Unless you are Seth Godin or Guy Kawasaki. Hey wait.. Even they don`t charge their readers..
I'm not interested in rewritten content but I think I would be interested in paying for a membership on a site if it can give a little marketing for blog and actually generate visitors. --Joe