I have thought of an idea for a site and I am currently starting a business plan for it and I have 2 main options: 1 - Free site, use adverts 2 - Site only available for subscribers - subscription only £2 or so per month Now I also have a combination of the 2 as I was thinking of adding a forum to the site and as they can be expensive to run when popular I was thinking of making the site free and charging for the forum, once again only £2 or so per month. I was also thinking it would also be possible to build up a base then give people the option for an ad free site by paying I am torn simply because - some of the famous sites are so because they offer a free service for example plentyoffish and whateverlife, but then again Match.com based on subscribtions makes $300m compared to $100m or so, now I dont expect to reach these numbers or get anywhere close its just the thought that on a very large scale subscriptions would make more
I would try the first, if its working out well, change the model into a membership with upgraded benefits.
No one's going to pay for a subscription if you're not big. Go ads, then when you get to the point where your users would actually be using to pay to use your site you can offer subscriptions.
Hi Bidzapbiz, I'd go to #1 first with pushed subscription. If I liked the amount of subscribers, I'll transform the site to #2. Cheers!