Does A CMS Help With Rebills?
 

I'm thinking of switching my Members Areas over to a CMS. Right now they are all on a template but it's pretty bare bones. I'm wondering if a full CMS would help with rebills? If not then it's not worth the time, hassle or expensive of pouring 80 Members Areas and 2TB of content into a CMS (I assume).

What are the benefits and advantages to a CMS rather than just a 'static' Members Area?

Completely depends on how you handle the CMS and the overall flow of this site. Yes, it can improve rebills if done right.

bring you sites out of the late 90s, yes. it should help.

Switching out of cc bill and using a billing method that tries the card more then once will greatly increase your rebills. Ccbill is one and done if failed rebill and you are leaving so much money on the table by doing so.

Well that's kind of the point tho. HOW to "handle the CMS and the overall flow of this site".

It can help rebills if done right - so what does 'done right' mean? :)

A CMS saves you time and time is money.

Well, it can't save me more money than doing nothing saves me now. :) But I get your point.

CMS = content management script

You are supposed to use it to upload /delete / update content, display content to members, schedule content sets release, etc. You can setup templates of members area (how it looks like, etc).

I'm not even sure what is a static member area that you are running right now.

Anyways, what helps with rebills is a kickass, easy to use members area and tons of content.

Using a content management system is very beneficial. I used to use static HTML pages and manually update everything on the site. However with CMS you can keep your site dynamic with much less effort and even (depending on the script) set the site on auto-pilot with scheduled updates.

As far as billing goes you should have multiple re-tries on any failed transaction, and cascading billing in the event that processor 1 times out or for some reason does not get the approval.

If they make it easier to update regularly and improve the members experience then yes, of course they do.

If on the other hand the learning curve is so steep that you stop updating (or slow down) it could have the opposite effect.

If I was going to move to a different CMS I would run both side by side for awhile and see what got the most useage, make sure I wasn't upsetting anyone's apple cart.

As previously stated...a CMS can save you HOURS of time.
Other than any newly shot content, or a brand new girl that I want to add in quicker...I have
7 different members areas, for 40+ sites feeding into them (basically mini-networks) all preloaded and set to go, with content updates through next summer.
If I shoot a new girl on Saturday (which I am!) I can slip her into the appropriate site and add her in w/o disrupting any of the already programmed in content updates.

Doing that w/o a CMS would be a huge pain in the ass, literally every day of the week...
WITH it, I have time to market, promote, and more importantly, SHOOT!

I do have cascading billing on my Tours but I'm not sure if CCBill cascades the REBILL if it gets denied. I don't think so. :( More money left on the table...

This is my thinking as well. I just checked out Elevated X (and this is NOT a knock on any CMS software or company) but I got the impression it was all too....slick. I like all the features but don't know if I could even use everything they have to offer.

More exploration is needed...

System :2 cents:

I'm not 100% sure.. but I think CCBill allows for cross-over between different processors, like CCBill/Verotel. Maybe I'm thinking of something else, but I thought there was a transaction fall back option you could implement.

Please disregard my post.. I've started news years celebrating a little early and didn't really think my response through.

It makes since that rebills through a 3rd party processor could not cascade as they would have to share sensitive cc details between two separate processing companies. So that wouldn't work.

I suppose the only option would be to use a couple merchant accounts, maintain the cc details in a PCI compliant location and setup cascade billing between both accounts.

I think I'll sign off for tonight - Have a Happy New Year everyone!

The only way to cascade a rebill is to have multiple merchant accounts set up in a system like Mobious. They use Argus for their backend. If you have multiple merchant accounts set up thru different banks, you can try the card on different banks. None of the traditional processors will let you do this, as you are just borrowing their merchant account at their discretion.

A cms will improve productivity, allowing you to spend a lot less time managing your sites. In the online porn game, you should spend as little time as possible managing your sites. 80% of your time should be spent marketing. If you are spending more than 20% of your time managing sites, then switch to a cms.

Of course, there is expense in switching too. It will cost you a small fortune and many months of time to switch 80 sites to the cms you mentioned. I've seen conversions of large sites take 6-8 months.

Your best bet if you really want a cms is www.porncms.com - it's cheap and easy, and has every feature you need. I'm not only the owner, I'm also a client.

Though not intended to be a paysite CMS, Mechbunny is fantastic. Especially if you run multiple sites. Upload your content once, publish it to as many domains in your network as you like. I publish everything to one domain that I don't use for anything just as a central place for it all and then I can push it to any paysites in my network that the content is appropriate for. I won't say it's perfect but if you ask Konrad about any part of it that isn't perfect for you, he can usually offer a reasonable solution, it's extremely customizable. You can queue several years of updates if you like and set them to auto publish at intervals via cron jobs, etc. I would look at Mechbunny, especially now that it's so inexpensive, you can get a lifetime license for inlimmited domains and updates for what it would cost you to use one of those monthly leased solutions for 6 months (or less, depending)

I will also check out porncms. :) But I realized the #1 hassle would be, after I checked out Elevated X, is the time it would take to tag every single video and photoset, models, scenes, add descriptions....OMG I can't even think of the nightmares this would cause me. LOL

That's a great idea, thank you. I will talk to Konrad about things. :)

If you add new content, CMS might help you out with rebills... if you schedule new releases to a future date ... you could have a *Next Releases* area on non-members and members area...

We have imported successfully

• 935 galleries
• 561 models
• 325 DVDs/categories

from a CSV file to our CMS.

If you have all of your content in a spreadsheet it should, in theory, not be as big a hassle as you'd imagine. I moved a client from static to CMS about a month ago. Once the CMS was installed and the template configured it was a simple .CSV import

That's great! I have maybe 300x that much content. LOL How long did it take you to import? :)

A few *days*...., 'cause we were using the raw files, and we had to add watermarks on photos & videos...

Our system will make 3 additional attempts to charge the card if the initial rebill was a failure.

I would also like to mention that if you switch from any other IPSP to Verotel and have a minimum of EUR 100/week in processing. we will pay the annual fees on your behalf. :pimp:2 cents:

we switched to elevated x, it took a very long time to port all content over to all our sites, 1000s of galleries. Does it save time now, yes, hours and hours saved every week from when it was manually updated, no question about it.

Did it help with rebills? not really, all our videos were new larger and better, with many more download / streaming options and picture sets greatly improved. There were many other benefits for members too with model lists, tags, comments etc. Sales remained pretty much consistent between the old and new - we did expect better retention but it was not the case.

Yes it helps specially if you using a feature called UpComing Updates. If you got some thing new and exciting to user then user stay else cancel membership and fuck off.

I don't want you to make a decision based on mistaken assumptions and I would love to have you on board with Elevated X and help make that happen. :thumbsup

In 10 years we have done dozens upon dozens of migrations. Some we do in-house and some our clients do themselves with or without our assistance.

Migration options:

1) If you have a commercial CMS product, assuming we are able to convert your data, we have a deal where we will migrate you to Elevated X for free.

2) If you currently have a database, chances are high that your exiting data can be exported to CSV which can then be imported into Elevated X in one shot.

FYI - These days this rarely takes a period of several or more months and is often a very smooth process.

3) If you do not currently have keyword tags, titles, descriptions, models, etc. categorized for each of your updates, these sections can be removed from your templates in a matter of 10 minutes. These are NOT required fields in Elevated X and you are welcome to add content without them. :)

Feel free to email me at [email protected] or Skype me at elevatedx anytime for info on the move process. I'm also happy to schedule a time for a phone call to talk about the migration process and options.

AJ

that's the easy part. getting it INTO the csv file is all the work.

who can't write a data importer? i think that was my 5th grade project lol

:error

Thank you so much for this candid post. Rebills are the ONLY metric I care about, period. I will jump through 10,000 hoops if it means more money for my company. But this is what I hear from honest webmasters so thus my hesitation. But thank you again. :)

Haha "databse"! You're cute. :D Just kidding AJ. Thanks for posting this info. This thread is NOT - repeat not - a slam against Elevated X (or any CMS or any company that uses a CMS). It was and is an honest inquiry into how to make more money and improve user experience. :)

Maybe it's because I started out in the 'Amateurs' niche but the porn websites I've been inside and checked out lately (about 20 of them, mostly larger sites) leave me cold and sterile. Slick and techy and...not sexy at all. They all feel like a bot made them or are computer-generated. LOL I know that sounds crazy but I never get the feeling there are any actual "people" behind there, just machinery.

Of course, this may also be why I remain a "small" guy and not a Baller. LOL :helpme

the best retention after a site upgrade is old members who cancelled because they didn't like the old site. the new members won't know the difference. you should email old cancels. maybe a few will rejoin.

rebills are mostly based on updates and content options. if that didn't change much, then retention won't change much. its still the same site with a nicer interface.

the best way to improve retention is to talk to your members and visitors. the site owners who talk to their members often have rebills many times higher than their new sales.

You type a lot. It's little wonder you are looking to optimize things. As in any other business, what works best, is what's seen least. Think custom.

I'm surprised that you even get joins. The others are right. Anything would be a HUGE step forward, looking at the 1999 design of some of your sites. :Oh crap

He wants to optimize what he hasn't even initiated. Too much ego is the issue in his cases. Thus the blah blah blah.

so far from the truth.

99% of members rebill because they forget to cancel. If you can't rebill the member properly you are shit out of luck... and if you have ccbill as your biller.... welp

Dude I have over 80 paysites. LOL Much of my content is erotic and shot in 4K. But much are amateurs leftover from when I started. So yeah, a site like this one is pretty shitty and gets maybe 3 joins a year:

London Towers - Welcome Baby!

But I don't promote that site. It gets a whopping 10 hits a day. LOL It's a Members Bonus site. Now this one gets many joins a day, every day:

Fellucia Blow - Welcome - Erotic Blowjob Videos

And this one:

ErosExotica - Enter

Even old school content sells really well:

Screw My Wife Club - Welcome!

Or my newest:

Blowjob Utopia - www.BlowjobUtopia.com - Erotic Blowjob Videos

So it all depends on WHICH sites you are looking at. Over 80 paysites....do the math. :)

(But this thread is about Members, and I have thousands of those, too.)

friendly advice

haha true :1orglaugh

yea i was talking about the conscious buyers, not the drunk ones lol

who designs your sites?

Shoot me an email at [email protected] (or Skype me at elevatedx when you're free to chat for a few minutes) and send me logins to your sites and I'll take a look and see if I can make some suggestions to help this. :thumbsup

AJ

It's much of the same reason if you turn on your TV and watch any NASCAR or Formula 1 event you notice how boring it is...all the damn cars look the same! It's so lame!! :1orglaugh

I said that tongue in cheek but that's really a lot of it.

There are 2 schools of thought from the perspective of a site owner:

1) Do what I like and assume my customers are like me

2) Do what works and what my customers want, even if I don't like it so much

I don't mind divulging that the only reason we started adding multiple design themes and will be adding more wasn't to help pay sites make more sales but because enough pay site owners feel the same way you do. It doesn't matter if I point to sites using an out of the box Elevated X setup (or one with very little customization) that's 100x bigger and more successful financially than most pay site owners even hope to be. Bottom line is most people want what they want.

We've had plenty of clients customize their sites to the degree that they are literally unrecognizable as Elevated X, even to us.

We've also had clients cancel service to build a custom CMS so they can have things just how they want in all areas.

Even if they hate his personality, most can agree that few people are better at what he does than Donald Trump and one of his trust statements is that you can't successfully sell something you don't believe in.

If you want total control and want something unique my suggestion is to go custom and spend a year or so migrating your better selling or higher potential sites by hand if necessary.

You've got some good stuff going there and I think regardless of "how" you choose to do it you'll benefit long term from modernization.

Feel free to email or skype me anytime (with no obligation) if you want to bounce ideas around or weigh the pros and cons of whatever you're considering doing. :thumbsup

AJ