Business Paysite Owners: How Was 2014 For You?

[The Porn Nerd]

As another year in the Adult Industry comes to an end it is time to reflect, and prepare year-end reports. What a wonderful (or horrific) opportunity to go through the year, month-by-month, and see whether you are making more sales now in December then you did in January.

Fun times? Or a sobering cocktail of disgust and confusion?

Perhaps your sales remained "steady" but not improving? What then? There are several ways to look at your stats but the most important thing to remember is the current state of the Adult Industry overall and factor that into your numbers. In other words, if your sales are "steady" then maybe that's really a triumph, especially if so many other companies are struggling or going out of business. Perhaps treading water is a kind of victory in itself?

Production is down, traffic is harder to get, Google keeps messing with their algorithms...where are we all headed for 2015? I feel things have stabilized somewhat but, as always, something will happen to shake things up in unexpected ways. So are you, as a Paysite Owner, hopeful for the future or concerned? I am, in fact, both and it's a weird feeling.

Have a great 2015 everyone.

Let the music play on!

[pornguy]

The data work that I got through each Jan is an amazing pain in the ass.

I know the feeling and dread it but at the same time love it because I can work out new ideas pinpoint issues and fix them etc.

[seeric]

.

Month over month growth.
Protect your content. Even if it is a losing battle.
Streaming only. Surfers do not care. They're trained now by Netflix, etc.
Kill fraud immediately. Many reasons here.
Keep your brand strong any way you can.
Products that are just run of the mill failed or fail.
You can't stay in the box anymore. Get out of it.
Build traffic internally.
The sky did not fall if you have a brand, it just a little more challenging to grow.

.

[1726cash]

its the fight.... keep going, be more strategic, be more stronger with hard times. Santalatina.com making more cash every year.

[arock10]

Pretty static and steady with good ratios. Really I just need more traffic, but that's always gonna be the problem with micro niche

[rastan]

Originally Posted by arock10

Pretty static and steady with good ratios. Really I just need more traffic, but that's always gonna be the problem with micro niche

My stuffs not so micro, but the same story here. Ratios are good, customer retention is good. Just need to shove more in the top of the pipeline!

[adultmobile]

Cam site here: I can compare 2014 with 2013 regarding sales and ongoing stuff, can't complain and can't celebrate, things kept so stable I nearly fall asleep.

[PornDude]

Got 7 sales. So far so good.

[Yanks_Todd]

This past month 11/14 we had more new sales then any month since 2007. This includes months with the extra day. Overall 2014 was up as well.

[Yanks_Todd]

Originally Posted by seeric

.

Month over month growth.
Protect your content. Even if it is a losing battle.
Streaming only. Surfers do not care. They're trained now by Netflix, etc.
Kill fraud immediately. Many reasons here.
Keep your brand strong any way you can.
Products that are just run of the mill failed or fail.
You can't stay in the box anymore. Get out of it.
Build traffic internally.
The sky did not fall if you have a brand, it just a little more challenging to grow.

.

Post of the fucking year here. Seriously, bravo on all points.

[Alice22]

Originally Posted by Yanks_Todd

This past month 11/14 we had more new sales then any month since 2007. This includes months with the extra day. Overall 2014 was up as well.

Can i ask what you did to get it?
I can't even compare 2007 with 2014, not even close
We work much much harder, and spend way more on production than before and still making less than 2007.
I even have a site that have daily updates with exclusive content...
In 2007 4 updates per month was more than enouf to make great $.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by Alice22

Can i ask what you did to get it?
I can't even compare 2007 with 2014, not even close
We work much much harder, and spend way more on production than before and still making less than 2007.
I even have a site that have daily updates with exclusive content...
In 2007 4 updates per month was more than enouf to make great $.

2007 was the 'golden age' of online porn. Maybe the waning days but still great. OH how I WISH I had started my crazy business just five years earlier. LOL

[Nicky]

Bukkake had another strong year

[Yanks_Todd]

Originally Posted by Alice22

Can i ask what you did to get it?
I can't even compare 2007 with 2014, not even close
We work much much harder, and spend way more on production than before and still making less than 2007.
I even have a site that have daily updates with exclusive content...
In 2007 4 updates per month was more than enouf to make great $.

Originally Posted by Alice22

Can i ask what you did to get it?
I can't even compare 2007 with 2014, not even close
We work much much harder, and spend way more on production than before and still making less than 2007.
I even have a site that have daily updates with exclusive content...
In 2007 4 updates per month was more than enouf to make great $.

For sure.

1. I wasn't being facetious when I said that seeric nailed all his points. He did, those are most of the recipe we use, all great tips.

2. What I believe he also implied but didn't say directly is you need to make killer content in a niche that will sell.

3. If you have the eye balls and produce 100 naked pics of a hot girl or guy and 99 of them are free, there are more then enough people who will pay good money for the 100th pic. Pick a good niche and don't sell that 100th pic too cheap. Protect it as well, as seeric said.

4. I believe that the consumers that are buying porn are the folks that don't give a flying fuck about $30-$40. I like Scotch, in this market make Macallan 30 Sherry Wood, not Cutty Sark. There is a huge market for free cutty sark, but there are plenty of people that would rather buy the good stuff then search for the cheap stuff. Find those folks.

5. Relationships - built them with the tubes, review sites, your vendors your customers and your competitors. Ask how you can be involved with them.

6. Customer Service. Here is a shocker, don't rip your customers off. Exceed their expectations and try to keep them around.

7. Social - twitter, facebook (kinda), Tumblr and reddit. But don't just post BS, interact. It is more of a grind then it used to be but the effort has a nice shelf life.

8. Work with the people in your content niche, they are your competition, but your best friends as well. Members area presence trades and content trades work well.

Hope that helps.

[pornmasta]

Originally Posted by Yanks_Todd

4. I believe that the consumers that are buying porn are the folks that don't give a flying fuck about $30-$40. I like Scotch, in this market make Macallan 30 Sherry Wood, not Cutty Sark. There is a huge market for free cutty sark, but there are plenty of people that would rather buy the good stuff then search for the cheap stuff. Find those folks.

Can you give me an example of "Macallan 30 Sherry Wood" porn ?

[12clicks]

This will be my best year ever. Anyone not doing business with me should be.
I've been top of the food chain for 16 years.

[clickhappy]

Originally Posted by 12clicks

This will be my best year ever. Anyone not doing business with me should be.
I've been top of the food chain for 16 years.

What do you do now? Paysites? Affiliate programs? Tubes? Payment processing? Im just wondering what is doing well right now because my year s-u-c-k-e-d and im a little fucked and you dont have a sig.

[MaDalton]

I have been saying this about streaming video years ago and people have laughed...

But I could say from my point of view which sites are doing well but at the end it mostly boils down to: you get along when you use tubes as a tool, you die out when you fight them

[skrog]

Originally Posted by 1726cash

its the fight.... keep going, be more strategic, be more stronger with hard times. Santalatina.com making more cash every year.

Santalatina.com looks just like brazzers.com

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by MaDalton

I have been saying this about streaming video years ago and people have laughed...

But I could say from my point of view which sites are doing well but at the end it mostly boils down to: you get along when you use tubes as a tool, you die out when you fight them

Yes I agree, and working with tubes has been a major factor in my little company still being around six years later and actually growing (shock). BUT changes are coming in Tubeland. As with all businesses and business models, the tubes are settling in to their positions and the landscape will change yet again.

All this would be fine EXCEPT once tubes go down (in terms of traffic) where does all the traffic go then? I am guessing NOT back to the TGPs and Blogs, so where? This is what worries me now, and for 2015.

[Yanks_Todd]

Originally Posted by pornmasta

Can you give me an example of "Macallan 30 Sherry Wood" porn ?

Our stuff is pretty close, but nothing really tastes that good.

[chronik]

Originally Posted by seeric

.

Month over month growth.
Protect your content. Even if it is a losing battle.
Streaming only. Surfers do not care. They're trained now by Netflix, etc.
Kill fraud immediately. Many reasons here.
Keep your brand strong any way you can.
Products that are just run of the mill failed or fail.
You can't stay in the box anymore. Get out of it.
Build traffic internally.
The sky did not fall if you have a brand, it just a little more challenging to grow.

.

Streaming only so as to protect video downloads? I don't think there's any kind of stream that can't be easily ripped with current tools out there

[Jman]

Originally Posted by seeric

.

Month over month growth.
Protect your content. Even if it is a losing battle.
Streaming only. Surfers do not care. They're trained now by Netflix, etc.
Kill fraud immediately. Many reasons here.
Keep your brand strong any way you can.
Products that are just run of the mill failed or fail.
You can't stay in the box anymore. Get out of it.
Build traffic internally.
The sky did not fall if you have a brand, it just a little more challenging to grow.

.

BAM!!! right on the nose and that's what we been doing and is the plan for all new sites coming out of the factory for 2015.

Eric you are truly an inspiration, thanks

[slapass]

One thing I have noticed as a guy who has been around a while, every year they claim it is harder.

I just saw someone say he wished he had started in 2007. I started n 2002 and was told I had missed the good old days 1997. I kicked it in 2004-2008. And for me 2007 was past the peak. The handwriting was on the wall for the small affiliate. And now the Porn Nerd started in 2012 and is still growing.

Seems like there is still opportunity out there.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by slapass

And now the Porn Nerd started in 2012 and is still growing.

Seems like there is still opportunity out there.

Actually I started in Jan. 2009 but I get your point.

Work hard, adapt, NEVER stop, work harder = profits.

[stevemen]

Just getting started here..

[seeric]

I have a new product that is releasing in January 2015. It's a first to market angle type thing. A very cool play on trends, sexuality in 2015, and good old fashioned sexy time happenings.

If there are ad networks reading, contact me and let's get you an offer set up! Mobile/Desktop.

I will also buy CPM/PPC if you can restrict keywords. No crap blend or RON traffic.

Note: Streaming does not stop piracy. It greatly reduces it. If some thief wants to steal from you, he is going to do it. Doesn't matter what you do to stop them. Thieves are not concerned with the best quality. At the end of the day, if it plays on the monitor and can be seen with the human eye, it can be recorded and pirated a number of ways. Same with grabbing streams, or resurrecting cached copies of movies played. What you do with streaming is remove a very large percentage of the population that can't steal it, isn't motivated to steal it, or is ethically prohibited. The studies I did showed that surfers who saw download links actually thought that they can download and OWN something they download. They assume they can do whatever they want with a downloaded file in their mind, because YOU sold it to them. With the streaming model you remove ownership.

[seeric]

Originally Posted by Jman

BAM!!! right on the nose and that's what we been doing and is the plan for all new sites coming out of the factory for 2015.

Eric you are truly an inspiration, thanks

Oui Oui! I'm just a guy who learned some things the hard way.

Originally Posted by Yanks_Todd

For sure.

1. I wasn't being facetious when I said that seeric nailed all his points. He did, those are most of the recipe we use, all great tips.

2. What I believe he also implied but didn't say directly is you need to make killer content in a niche that will sell. Yes, This!

3. If you have the eye balls and produce 100 naked pics of a hot girl or guy and 99 of them are free, there are more then enough people who will pay good money for the 100th pic. Pick a good niche and don't sell that 100th pic too cheap. Protect it as well, as seeric said.

4. I believe that the consumers that are buying porn are the folks that don't give a flying fuck about $30-$40. I like Scotch, in this market make Macallan 30 Sherry Wood, not Cutty Sark. There is a huge market for free cutty sark, but there are plenty of people that would rather buy the good stuff then search for the cheap stuff. Find those folks.

5. Relationships - built them with the tubes, review sites, your vendors your customers and your competitors. Ask how you can be involved with them.

6. Customer Service. Here is a shocker, don't rip your customers off. Exceed their expectations and try to keep them around.

7. Social - twitter, facebook (kinda), Tumblr and reddit. But don't just post BS, interact. It is more of a grind then it used to be but the effort has a nice shelf life.

8. Work with the people in your content niche, they are your competition, but your best friends as well. Members area presence trades and content trades work well.

Hope that helps.

Originally Posted by Yanks_Todd

Post of the fucking year here. Seriously, bravo on all points.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by seeric

Build traffic internally.

More on this would be helpful.

In what ways would you suggest building your own 'internal' traffic? Any basics?

[fuzebox]

This thread is getting fun

[XXXtrailers]

Originally Posted by skrog

Santalatina.com looks just like brazzers.com

It's the same content provider I guess.

[celentano]

bad bad bad

[The Porn Nerd]

Sales were down for "Cyber Monday" but up for the week. Thanksgiving Week was SHIT but the week before was great.

Up-and-down, up-and-down...the roller coaster ride continues eh?

[Barry-xlovecam]

Originally Posted by seeric

[T]he studies I did showed that surfers who saw download links actually thought that they can download and OWN something they download. They assume they can do whatever they want with a downloaded file in their mind, because YOU sold it to them. With the streaming model you remove ownership.

^^^This

Start living in the Youverse and you will do just fine ... Surfers/referals/customers could care less about your MYverse ...

[lepsoma]

For us It was perfect! in 2013 we were a small tech startup, in 2014 we are a pornsite!
I'm sure in 2015 we will be a fucking good pornsite! We had to re-think and re think our ideas, but finally everything seems to be on its place, tech is working properly, marketing start to performing better and better. Really looking forward the next years!

[Rochard]

Sales are up if you doing the right thing.

Lots of people are using YNOT Mail to reach out to prior members and to bring them back into the fold. It's golden traffic and you are foolish if you don't try to keep them interested.

Yanks Cash just reported their best sales month every last month.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by Rochard

Lots of people are using YNOT Mail to reach out to prior members and to bring them back into the fold. It's golden traffic and you are foolish if you don't try to keep them interested.

To be 100% honest here: I use YNOT mail to email ex-Members. Last month I sent out an email to 25K people and got.....1 sale.

!!!!!

Perhaps my emails are shit (a real possibility) and perhaps I need some schooling in the best way to email market (absolutely I do) but I would think I would get more than a single sale from a 25K mailing list. No? Yes?

Also, YNOT is expensive ($129 for 25,000 emails) so with a list of 25K, to even send out 3 emails, would cost hundreds more using YNOT. So either I need a better solution and/or some help with constructing effective emails.

(Love Jay at YNOT so it's not a knock on their service AT ALL. YNOT is great, I am certain it is ME who is fucking up here.)

[seeric]

No, it's because email is shit! a t best it's a supporting branding piece or cancelled/expired members.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by seeric

No, it's because email is shit! a t best it's a supporting branding piece or cancelled/expired members.

Well the 25k list IS expired/former Members (6 years of ex-Members).

See this is what is interesting to me: two GFYers, two opinions (emails great/emails shit). LOL

[wehateporn]

Originally Posted by The Porn Nerd

To be 100% honest here: I use YNOT mail to email ex-Members. Last month I sent out an email to 25K people and got.....1 sale.

!!!!!

Perhaps my emails are shit (a real possibility) and perhaps I need some schooling in the best way to email market (absolutely I do) but I would think I would get more than a single sale from a 25K mailing list. No? Yes?

Apparently DamianJ is good with the emails

You sure you're not going into Spam boxes?

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by wehateporn

Apparently DamianJ is good with the emails

You sure you're not going into Spam boxes?

Well, a percentage will go into Spam and sometimes it is unavoidable given how some of my website names contain 'spam keywords' (according to YNOT). But basically I am taking the newbie stance here and saying I do not know Jack Shit about constructing an effective email marketing campaign. LOL I am a kick-ass writer (ahem) but effective emails may not be about 'good writing' but more about effective calls to action.

Ah DamianJ, where are you when I needs ya? haha!!

[seeric]

Originally Posted by The Porn Nerd

Well the 25k list IS expired/former Members (6 years of ex-Members).

See this is what is interesting to me: two GFYers, two opinions (emails great/emails shit). LOL

Well, I have much bigger lists than a lot of people on here.

I have an email background.

Porners can tell stories all they want, CANN Spam compliant email is not a valuable revenue stream. It's supplemental income at best, but I've found it to be more of a branding exercise these days if you don't want to spend 10 - 20 k per month on mailing, and have it be a giant pain in the ass to make your money back.

I don't care who it is, they all spam box on every one of my email addys, Brazzers, RK, Twistys, Vivid, Wicked, you name it, spam box.

A few will get through here and there, but for the most part the big three are VERY VERY good at identifying adult mail in many different ways and they all bounce it or spam box it.

To get through, you have to be very, very tricky, AND have keys to all the big free email providers, which is what people use when they sign up to porn sites for the most part.


That's why I said it's a nice brand supporting activity that you can do with cancelled members.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by seeric

Well, I have much bigger lists than a lot of people on here.

I have an email background.

Porners can tell stories all they want, CANN Spam compliant email is not a valuable revenue stream. It's supplemental income at best, but I've found it to be more of a branding exercise these days if you don't want to spend 10 - 20 k per month on mailing, and have it be a giant pain in the ass to make your money back.

I don't care who it is, they all spam box on every one of my email addys, Brazzers, RK, Twistys, Vivid, Wicked, you name it, spam box.

A few will get through here and there, but for the most part the big three are VERY VERY good at identifying adult mail in many different ways and they all bounce it or spam box it.

To get through, you have to be very, very tricky, AND have keys to all the big free email providers, which is what people use when they sign up to porn sites for the most part.


That's why I said it's a nice brand supporting activity that you can do with cancelled members.

Great post thank you! This was actually my feeling as well. I know many will offer discounts via emails, and I have tried that with little success. From a branding perspective I would think tubes with their millions of views would be better than emails.

I wasn't looking afor new revenue stream per se, just that additional bump to boost a shitty sales week. LOL But that did not happen, and what you said about spending 10-20k...well, total agreement here.

And yet on Black Friday I get fifty thousand spam emails from PC Richard, Eddie Bauer and Macys. LOL!

[seeric]

Holy Crap! No lie. You know who we got blown up by this year? Rosetta Stone! For 8 solid days I got 3 emails a day. I literally found their marketing guy on LinkedIn and sent him an inMail saying "Really dude? 3 emails a day for 8 solid days?" hahaha.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by seeric

Holy Crap! No lie. You know who we got blown up by this year? Rosetta Stone! For 8 solid days I got 3 emails a day. I literally found their marketing guy on LinkedIn and sent him an inMail saying "Really dude? 3 emails a day for 8 solid days?" hahaha.

So which language did you end up buying? Haha!!

Viva la Spamola! :D

[seeric]

Haha. None. Was a good deal though. 199 for the whole language courses 1-5 and it was all the best ones. Huge discounts.

Maybe I will buy the French online version at some point. Ehhhhhh.

[Elli]

Originally Posted by seeric

Well, I have much bigger lists than a lot of people on here.

I have an email background.

Porners can tell stories all they want, CANN Spam compliant email is not a valuable revenue stream. It's supplemental income at best, but I've found it to be more of a branding exercise these days if you don't want to spend 10 - 20 k per month on mailing, and have it be a giant pain in the ass to make your money back.

I don't care who it is, they all spam box on every one of my email addys, Brazzers, RK, Twistys, Vivid, Wicked, you name it, spam box.

A few will get through here and there, but for the most part the big three are VERY VERY good at identifying adult mail in many different ways and they all bounce it or spam box it.

To get through, you have to be very, very tricky, AND have keys to all the big free email providers, which is what people use when they sign up to porn sites for the most part.


That's why I said it's a nice brand supporting activity that you can do with cancelled members.

For my own site: I send a weekly email that consistently gets 20% "open" rates. It gets 4-8% "click" rates. Obviously that's not a huge money maker, but it keeps my brand front-of-mind for expired members and members-to-be, so I find the 30 minutes it takes to write it as time well spent. I don't think the value of email can be quantified only with sales numbers. Just my

[DWB]

Working harder. Working smarter. 2014 was very good. 2015 will be great.

Originally Posted by The Porn Nerd

To be 100% honest here: I use YNOT mail to email ex-Members. Last month I sent out an email to 25K people and got.....1 sale.

Something went terribly wrong there. Were they not opened, went to spam, or perhaps your offer wasn't good? I would be interested in seeing the mailing stats on that and your offer.

[seeric]

Originally Posted by Elli

For my own site: I send a weekly email that consistently gets 20% "open" rates. It gets 4-8% "click" rates. Obviously that's not a huge money maker, but it keeps my brand front-of-mind for expired members and members-to-be, so I find the 30 minutes it takes to write it as time well spent. I don't think the value of email can be quantified only with sales numbers. Just my

Yep.

You are the whole brand, the whole product. Very highly targeted.

For what most of us are referencing is general porn surfers, qualified to porn.

If I had an 1 million fresh email list of people that are just seeking Tranny BDSM with big tits, then well you're still going to be able to make great money.

We're talking about lists that are more or less people who join normal general pay sites.

You are the exact person that email marketing does benefit.

Your experience does not translate to every application, that I can assure.

[The Porn Nerd]

Originally Posted by DWB

Working harder. Working smarter. 2014 was very good. 2015 will be great.



Something went terribly wrong there. Were they not opened, went to spam, or perhaps your offer wasn't good? I would be interested in seeing the mailing stats on that and your offer.

I'd be more than happy to share this info with you.

Maybe send me an email (or PM me here?): porn nerd cash AT gmail.

ANY help is appreciated.