Brujah

And there's a certain frenzy involved in the competition. We may not have wanted to take it that far, but the other guy is doing it too and if we don't do it, we'll miss out on all that money and marketshare that he's going to get for it. Or that if we don't, we can't survive in the long-term when the other guy gets bigger and squeezes us out. I don't think it's 100% greed or that any of those doing it are innocent of that kind of thinking.

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nocostporn

where is Roger?..he's usually the first guy to call somebody a hater for being against cross selling...sing it to us again home skillet

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Brujah

Btw, damn good thread though. Hope it can stay on-topic, without degenerating.

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Serge_Oprano

brujah,
the reasons WHY are irrelevant,
the END RESULT IS.

and the end result of crosses {artificial high} will be balancing LOW in business.

Serge_Oprano

don't worry,
I'll wipe my ass with degenerates and keep the thread open for all the rest
;-)))

BossHawg

You hit the nail on the head. With every other company out there cross selling the surfer to death, if you dont do it you are left behind and there is NO WAY you can compete at the $35-40 per signup levels. And if you pay lower than industry standard it is going to be a bitch getting new webmasters to try you out!

Cross sales themselves are GOOD. The way they get used is NOT. I dont claim I am a saint who dont cross sale as I do. YOu have to if you want to stay competitive with everybody else in the PPS market.

BossHawg

Serge I already told you, you are OLD NEWS. Get the hell out of my thread

fantasyman

Latest thing we've done at CECash is to add another revenue source to our Email programs.

XXXAccessPass, CEMags, RiskyMail4Free and Teen-Mail4Free now have 4 revenue streams.

XXXAccessPass
$1.30 per email no deductions, 50% of dialer revenue, $15 per upsell for our sites, **NEW** $5 per sale to programs outside of our sites. http://cecash.com/aap.html

CEMags, RiskyMail4Free and Teen-Mail4Free
$1.50 per email, 50% of dialer revenue, $15 per upsell for our sites, **NEW** $5 per sale to programs outside of our sites. http://cecash.com/mags.html

Then we have Pay It Forward which is just starting to get noticed. It pays $20 for every Free Sign Up - no deductions, $5 per recurring member and 40% of dialer revenue. You also get paid for all exit sign ups http://cecash.com/pif.html

Our 60% partner program pays $25.48 for each sign up and recurring member. This is a very nice payout!! http://cecash.com/fmfp.html

Then we have Adult Links which pays $55 per sign up. This program is kicking ass, it makes you an income stream even after you stop sending traffic. It sets up Favorites, Toolbars, Desktop Icon and Start Icon in surfer's browsers. It's nice to make an ongoing income months after a surfer has visitied your site.

We just came out with DVDORAMA and this is converting as good as a paysite with filtered traffic!! http://cecash.com/urentdvds.html

We also have a three tiered Webmaster referral program where Webmaster can make 5% for anyone they sign up, 3% for anyone that Webmaster signs up and 1% of all income from anyone they sign up!!

Then we have our CEVault where Webmasters can exchange points for over 2,000 different items including a three man submersible submarine http://cecault.com

This is just to mention a few of our latest programs, but aside from that, we're not doing anything.

Serge - Bosshawg has had a problem with me since I released CEMags with three revenue streams, he says we knocked him off, I don't understand how when his program has one revenue stream and we were doing this with RiskyMail before he ever had an email program. Folks like him want people to think they invented the programs they do. If that's the case I should have an attitude with anyone who has an affiliate program, but I don't

Hope that answers your question.

Snake Doctor

That's bullshit. I seriously doubt you have stats to back that up, you're probably just regurgitating what you read on the webmasters page of a partnership program.

Everyone says "I have A guy who's still recurring from 1998" but if you show me 2 sites that offer trials and AVERAGE 3-4+ months retention I'll give you $100 today.

Show me the stats and I'll show you the money.

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Serge_Oprano

boss,
make me do it!

your raised a good question and now you can fuck off....

I am has been, so it should be easy for you to make me go away...
;-))

moron......

Serge_Oprano

hahahahhahaha,
jelous punk!
;-))))))

I KNEW it's gotta be something for him to bark up
;-))))

Brujah

But what about cross sales and how it affects our industry, and your thoughts about how it will change if they are stopped ?

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BossHawg

OK...

we got our daily FM spam out of the way...

Serge trying to bring the thread off topic..

Now with all that out of the way lets get back on topic..

Anybody else got thoughts on where the industry will be headed if cross sales were to go away?

P.S. Serge this is for you

FlyingIguana

i don't tell people my top sponsors. do i look like an idiot? they're worth much more than 100 bux lol

i'll tell you one site that i have members recurring since 99, but i don't promote that program anymore so i don't care. the site is planet lesbians. retention was horrible, but there always seems to be a few that stick around forever. stuff like that happens with almost any recurring program. some people just recur forever.

Serge_Oprano

everything there to say about it was already said,
are you blind, dumb or both???

READ THE THREAD A to Z, moron!

as for links to dirty pictures,
eat this:

Serge_Oprano

FM, Brujah asked a very legit question,
you were one of the first to use them,
what do YOU think their influence on the industry?

quiet

i smell the possibility of an old school piss...

fantasyman

Cross Sells are never going to go away.

The way cross sells are used is the issue.

Whenever CECash does a cross sell they pop up a java window with full disclosure. Billing info, customer service info including phone numbers, fax number and email to customer service. This complies with the FTC's guidelines.

The cross sells that are going on at other paysites don't have full disclosure, in fact many are pre-checked radial boxes with small writing. This is not FTC compliant.

The FTC insists that consumers are made aware of all charges "BEFORE" they take place, so just sending an email for the sign up after the fact is not compliant. We learned this with our FTC investigation and we were found with no wrong doing, no redress, no bonds, no fines and no frozen assets.

If and when the FTC comes down on these cross sells they will go after the Paysites, not the processors. The processors will say, we gave our customers tools to use, if they abuse those tools it is not our responsibility. When this happens the Paysites in question will be forced to pay redress for all sales made without "prior" disclosure. They will not accpet pre-checked radial boxes with small writing as prior disclosure and many Paysites will have the great financial burden of redress and possible fines. The worst part about this is that nobody is going to change their model until it is too late.

So again, cross sells will not go away ever. Those not handling them correctly will. Now that's my 2 cents and I'm sticking with it!!

Bosshawg hope this deals with the topic of this thread

FlyingIguana

so we could see another maxcash type crackdown in the future? could be nasty for any company that pisses off the FTC with their cross sales.

Pornwolf

Good answer FM

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fantasyman

The biggest problem with cross sells is the abusive nature in which they are used. If every time a consumer used their credit card, they found an incremental purchase on their statement they would stop using their credit card. That said, the consumer is contantly getting ripped off, this will be the biggest impact to the industry.

Consumers who get a cross sell without their knowledge will probably never use their credit card on the Internet again. Every time we lose a consumer there is one less person to help us make money. I guess the mentality is that we will continue to get new consumers, I don't think this is sound thinking.

Seems like the AdultNet is more concerned with how much money they can scam out of people in the short term and this is not long term thinking.

We'll just continue to do our thing and outlast the short term thinkers

Serge_Oprano

yeap...right or wrong,
but man is sticking to his gun and in intellegent fashion...I hope it's not too much for the AVERAGE GFY "intelligence"
;-)))

BTW,
I disagree with FM.

Serge_Oprano

and if I was a betting man,
I'd put my money that you will outlast the MOST in this thread
;-))

...including bosswhatever
;-)))

fantasyman

so what else is new

BossHawg

Good post FM...

I headed on over to check how you implemented the cross sale just to see how you implemented cross sales. IMO I found the disclosure to be less than what paycom discloses..

On CyberErotica.com..the Promo box is PRECHECKED cross selling CyberSexotica (sounds a lot like CyberErotica and I am sure confused a surfer or 2)..and your ONLY disclosure of price or trial length on the cross sale is in the j a v a script (edit: edited here as it changed the previous word to hahaha) popup box when I hit Submit if I am not mistaken. There is not even any info on the cross sale on the jettis join page nor price. Please correct me if i am wrong.

I am not bashing the way you run your biz just observed the above things which contradict your statements:
------
The cross sells that are going on at other paysites don't have full disclosure, in fact many are pre-checked radial boxes with small writing. This is not FTC compliant.
------

Good response though on the topic of cross sales!

vicki

Dayum a REAL industry thread!! These are far too uncommon these days it seems.

Bosshawg,
I agree, it would have huge and far reaching effects.
Yes the payouts to affiliates would be impacted
Yes the chargebacks would drop
Yes you could actually charge a customer X amount of dollars straight off the bat
Yes the sponsors would have to FINALLY (i'm not talking all but - most) have to give the surfer quality to get retentions up.

Here's an analogy for ya
you really really want to buy that jazzy new stereo system you heard about.

store number one:
four salesman come rushing at you from all sides
you manage to get down to business with one and start asking for the features you want
salesman slicks through the answers easy as snot and assures you the system has Everything including free asswipes.
you buy the system, long story short you find out it only has 1/3 of what was promised and not only that its not the quality you were told.
You look at your cc statement and see they charged you extra for the asswipe holder, the speaker wires, and the handy dandy box it came packed in. Btw you'll also be charged a monthy warrantee fee.

store number two:
the salesman points out all the features, anticipates your questions and explains straight up what is not included in the advertised prise, But goes over cost of adding in extras.
he's polite, pulls no tricks and they system you go home with is exactly as he stated so you have no surprises.

Which store would you go back to when you need that awesome new TV?
Which store would you recommend to your buddy at work?
Which store would get a returned stereo and/or a chargeback?

IMHO the medium to large sponsor programs that finally straighten out and fly right with the surfers will only benefit in the longrun .. BUT they'd do best by nametagging their sites (ie: another no bs, no scam, pure quality site offered to you from 'company name'). You'd probably start seeing search terms popping up for them within months! lol

I have to agree with Serge (OMG what am i saying!! lol) .. the industry has become stagnant.
Everyone is out for the most money they can drain from the blood sucking, bandwith stealing surfers.
Screw him before the next guy can.
Is that wrong?? No but it damn sure isn't helping the industry any.

oh and yes, you can hire my ideas for change hahahahhaa

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fantasyman

Thanx for the passsing grade

The key factor is that the consumer has full disclosure pop up in front of them "before" the sale is made - if they click on no - they will not be charged. This is FTC compliant.

Having a radial button pre-checked with no disclosure or disclosure in small print is not FTC compliant.

Serge_Oprano

hhaahahahahahha,
what's NEW is that we both survived despite our disagreements
;-)))

not too many people can say that...I see them around less and less
;-)))

jayeff

The original post specifically mentioned cross-sells and yes, in that narrow context the dishonest cross-sells are the biggest problem. But isn't it really all part of the wider issue of jerking surfers around? We have more problems than just what we can scrape past the FTC and Visa.

It isn't even just what we do to surfers before they buy: it's like you just went to collect your new car and every time you went to open the door to get in and drive away, the salesman was grabbing you and trying to sell you another.

7 years ago almost all our potential customers were newbies. Now it's probably fewer than 15% with the ratio falling each year. We are educating these people so "well" it's getting harder even to give stuff away.

Take your pick of a dozen headline sites and you can reasonably expect 10 of them to have the same-old, same-old albeit slick graphics and a bunch of overused slogans. There won't be a damn thing between the lot of them that amounts to a convincing sales pitch or any clue as to what separates one from another. But there will be warps, entry consoles, exit consoles, and every other trick you can think of to wear the visitor down.

It would be a heck of a lot easier to excuse all that stuff if it had been used as a last resort when all else had failed. But we used it as a first resort: that's what is crazy.

Dianna Vesta

When I first started reading the thread I?m thinking, ?Wow, what?s wrong with cross selling?? Don?t all businesses do this? Then I?m reading on and see that some companies force the sale. Ok, that?s not cool and it?s really criminal IMO.

Recently we started using them on our sites as a way to offer new customers a chance to try our other sites at a discount. When they check out offer them something else, cheaper and simpler. It does boost sales quite a bit. So if I?m reading correctly, ?you want $40 per trial signup right?? then this would mean that the consumer is manipulated or deceived to make this happen? ::::shaking head::::: which means that you take a risk on the customer finding out, charging back and never doing business with that company again?

This is obviously a long thread and I am a babe to the complexities of cross selling ala deception.

DV

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BossHawg

So the key words in the statement you made above is:
"pop up in front of them "before" the sale is made"

What is a customer has hahahahahahahahahaha turned off, will your popup still disclose to them the billing points, etc? How about if they have popups turned off?

I am not arguing what is and what is not FTC compliant as you have dealt with them in the past directly..

But IMO more people would ignore that popup than those who would ignore a checkbox that says CLEARLY on the form what it rebills at, etc..

fantasyman

OK - so when the FTC comes down on the industry - we'll be left standing and you'll want to argue the point

I'm talking about being FTC compliant - nothing else.

fantasyman

Bosshawg I guess nobody else wanted to stay on topic

Probono

I would love to see this industry without cross sales and rebills. It would significantly reduce the problems we all deal with because we are all lumped into one mold by the credit card people.

If you have a quality product people will join month after month, year after year with no fruad or scam involved.

Serge_Oprano

my pussy is qualitier than yours!

;-)))

Serge_Oprano

Bosswhatever,
I got the reason why you are so anxios..

your board is sucking MAJOR cock lately..

Probono

Meow mix is on the way

Serge_Oprano

Poshiol na hui, mule!

fantasyman

Yes, without cross sales and rebills paysite would be able to pay out about $3 per sign up - that would be great, not!!

gothweb

I dunno. I pay a lot more than $3* per signup, as do a lot of pure revshare programs.

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jayeff

As could any site with something the customer wanted to buy and keep on buying...

Liines like "if we played straight we couldn't pay the webmasters" are pure bullshit. If all the crap had to stop dead, the customers would still be there, still wanting to buy porn. We might even keep more of them if we weren't trying to screw them every time they blinked.

So some people would have to learn how to sell without using smoke and mirrors. What a pity.

Probono

Well said.

Probono

Serge if I knew what you said I could respond. Instead I will keep the meow mix for my cat.

Brad Mitchell

Here's my rant, for better or worse..

Someone earlier in the thread seemed to suggest that the sponsors would be holding the bag if the FTC ever bitched about cross-sells... suggesting that the 3rd party billing companies wouldn't be on the hook.

Well, by the way that I reason out the whole issue it seems to clearly be racketeering. The company making the sale is the billing company, not their client, and the billing company is financially motivated to make as many sales as possible. The fact that they are so closely partnered in revenue says to me that there is no way a beaurocrat or prosecutor would find it necessary to separate the two, especially considering that the billing companies have deeper pockets. After all, if you were a devout christian prosecuting cases for the FTC would you rather take out an industry big-wig or one of their billers that represents thousands of companies and hundreds of times more revenue?

There's no deniability when you're the billing company of what your clients are doing. Things are so sophisticated now, it's not enough to simply say well we gave them tools and they fucked the customer. Bullshit!

It would stand to reason that none of the major billing companies who allow cross-selling would even have the option to stop the process cold. For those of you that didn't already know about how merchant accounts are managed... here's a short course:

Chargeback ratios are determined on a monthly basis and the math is quite simple, really. If a processor has 1,000,000 transactions in a month then they would theoretically be allowed 10,000 chargebacks to come through during that period (1%). This isn't even really true now, as I understand it they're now including refunds and chargebacks into the same equation. What many of you don't realize is that chargebacks can come back 3, 6 even 12 months after the fact from some issuing banks. So, the chargeback limits aren't cumulative so if you're under one month there's no carry-over.

What does that mean? Well, simply put it means that if I've had 12,000,000 transactions in the last 12 months I had better still not get more than 10,000 chargebacks in any month period. As you can see, the risk is cumulative and therefore the pressure to keep a constantly high amount of transactions is necessary.

So take processor "ABC" that is doing 1,000,000 transactions monthly... they decide that they're going to cut out the cross-sells and that lowers their monthly volume to 750,000 because of course they still have lots of new transactions every month and tons of rebilling. Well, that same processor is having to manage the risk of having 12,000,000 transactions in the last 12 months and their chargeback limit is related directly to how many transactions they did during the most current month. Case in point? Well, if they're averaging 8-10k chargebacks monthly then they're fucked if their transaction volume dropped sharply during that month period.

What to do?

Well, it would seem to me that 3rd party processors that are doing alot of aggressive and inunformed cross-selling would need a plan of de-escalation. Basically, they have a complete inability to change over night but if they played their poker hand right they might be able to alleviate the liability and practice over a good period of time.

Will it happen?

Fuck if I know... although I'll bet that at least one more processor is tits up by January. I'd actually like to see a list of processors that are allowing and not allowing cross-sells. Although it's possible that any processor might fuck themselves I'd think that the ones with the deceptive billing practices would fall sooner or later. You can all tell me that it's not deceptive but the reality is that virtually everyone would be fucked if the FTC got a hard-on for billing practices.

Y'all can call cross-selling whatever you like but most of the examples I've seen are outright fraud. If that's what you're into, cool, it's just not something that I would ever have done. Enjoy it while it lasts and if you're smart you've already sacked away your millions - onshore and offshore.

The only thing that's constant in business, most especially our business, is change. The ways in which we all make money, trick surfers, rebill, trade traffic, deliver content and virtually everything else that we do is constantly morphing. If you made a quick big buck and you're still pulling shady shit then you're just greedy and flirting with disaster.

Look at the girls gone wild crew.. if they liked the coke that much perhaps they should have just moved to Jamaica and called it a day.

Cheers,

Brad

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Swoit

Finally.. A thread worthy of serious discussion.

Brad, congrats for a well thought out reply. You illustrate the conundrum of the cross sell and why it cannot be simply phased out overnight.

I have done quite alot of merchant processing work during my years on the internet (mostly for the big guys down under) but we found that you would very easily get caught up in a cycle .. as your sales went up, there was the ever-looming threat of higer volumes of chargebacks. The solution? simple - increase sales volume to flush through more fresh transactions and water down the chargeback rate.

What do you think is the easiest way to that - cross sell! And when THOSE cross sells start to charge back and you need to flush through more volume.. what is the answer... A SECOND cross sell !

I see sponsors around these days that offer two cross sells, and they seem to have lost the whole notion of a cross sell, or getting access to another site cheaply as an upsell. Sure you double or triple your transaciton count, but when those cross sells are themselves high-value transactions ($19 - $49) and the customer ends up getting billed anywhere from $80 to $110 in a few short days, you can start to see why chargeback rates are a real problem. And as someone suggested, once someone's been burnt before, it would be very unlikeley that they will make another purchase over the internet anytime soon.

I believe that there are alot of good sponsors out there that could legitimately pay a good per-signup rate (30 to $35) because they work hard on their members sections and will achieve enough retention to make a profit at the end of the day. With good customer support and a members area that offers what they advertise, chargeback rates could be controlled and kept to a minimum.

But the PPS market is a very competative one, and there are the guys with crap members areas, who in order to be able offer similiar payouts, hit their members with 1 or 2 cross sells. They won't get the retention of the other guys, but they may make enough quick bucks from customers who'll take the hit, that it allows them to stay in the market. These are the guys that are dragging the industry down.

I dont think cross sells will ever 'go away'. How are you going to stop a guy with his own merchant account billing a credit card twice for different amounts at the same time.. However I do think that the VBV implementation may wake a few surfers up to exactly how much they are going to be charged when they have to acknowledge and authorize the funds before they purchase.

Just my 2c - and i look forward to more in this thread.


Steve

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optikalz

So, bottomline, you are advocating RESPONSIBLE use of cross sells? ie., no pre clicked bullshit?

Probono

Your discussion is inciteful and very real. It mirrors a ponzie scheme and for that reason it will eventually fail.

I wonder how many sponsors have built their entire business based upon the cash flow resulting from monthly sales volume increases that allows them to pay outragous amounts for sales.

What happens to this entire house of cards if sales start declining on a monthly basis?

What bothers me is that those people who have built real honest business models that are not based on these devices will all suffer the same fate as those who have profited from the method.

MikeEP

Great post Brad. Some good thoughts in there.

That's the big question. Are processors simply shooting themselves in the foot by allowing the deceptive cross selling tactics? No one will ever know the numbers except them.

It's another question that comes to mind when talking with others who run and focus on clean paysites with high rention numbers. If shit we're to hit the fan, or the FTC got involved in a big way, we all get penalized because of all the people using deceptive cross selling. I could be wrong, but i don't think they'll go after each site individually, they'll go after source..the processor that allows it. Then again, i have no idea.

I personally would like to see a list of processors who don't offer cross selling, or at least monitors it with a fine tooth comb. One that regulates it in some sort of way, or is very strict on enforcing some 'fair' rules with it.

I'm not against cross selling at all. But after seeing some of the incredibly deceptive shit out there that the processors are allowing, people who are running the 'other business model' of clean paysites with very high rentions, are of course worried about being safe under the same processors as the cross sellers.

For myself, even though i trust my processors and we've always stuck with them through thick and thin, it's still a minor worry that keeps me awake at night.

Brad Mitchell

Ponderous... So who are the 3rd party billers that allow cross-selling and double cross-selling?

Brad

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