Steve on a scale of 1 to 10 how much do you regret posting this thread right now?

this is gonna be a good read when they're all answered

:thumbsup

My question is this:

As a paysite owner who produces his own content, I'll ocassionally have models who are "found" by family members. Some of them go thru some very hard times because of this. How do you deal with similar situations?

This is an interesting one and one that I am sure comes up a lot with the bigger sites and programs.

This is a pretty good thread. It's funny though how some of you guys treat Steve like a celebrity.

That's because he is...didn't you see his pics on Mr. Skin?

Where are you going to be in Seattle?

i heard from someone at lightspeed that you pay tawnee 20k per shoot. or she was going to leave.

any truth to this?

Are we at 100 yet ?

:disgust

If there was never any porn on the Internet...what do you think you would be doing today. Would it be working 9 to 5 for someone else, or do you think you would have your own business, and if so what kind?

:1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh - the best question so far

hehe, that's a good question.

ever thought about a franchise opportunity? scouts could find new girls in just about every state.

What is the biggest challenge you see ahead for Lightspeed? and for the adult industry?

What was your first job?
When did you know you were going to be successful?
How did you get your first affiliates?

people. Read post #155 and then do some fuckin math.


:firehair

How much money did you personally gross this year and last?

Z

Was there ever a time when you felt it wasn't worth all the time and money you've invested, and what turned you around?

Are we there yet? :)

I know you only needed 6 more questions, but I assume some have been asked before and some are just retarded so incase you need another one:

When you are picking a girl for a site (her own solo site) how much of the decision is facotred by her looks and how much is facotred by her personality (and I dont mean inner beauty, I mean how loyal she seems, level headed, D&D free, etc)?

that was hilarious. :xmas-smil

whats your best kept secret on promoting your program?

Ok, here we go!

1) When will you discover a black lightspeed girl?
I?d love to add some women of color to our group of Lightspeed Girls. Next year we plan to go worldwide with our model search. I already have trips planned to Prague, Spain, Panama, Jamaica, Amsterdam, and Montreal. Maybe 2005 will be the year of the first black LightspeedGirl!

2) How did you happen across Tawnee?
Tawnee had just turned 18 and was starting college when I met her. Her boyfriend saw my ad in the local newspaper and called for her. I remember him saying ?Dude, my girlfriend is HOT!? When Tawnee started, she made $100/hour, we had no idea she would become so popular.

3) Who is YOUR favorite Lightspeed Girl-ignoring the monetary value?
It?s impossible to choose a favorite. I?ve worked with Tawnee, Taylor, and Raimi the longest. I consider them all my friends.

4) Are there any other girls with solo girl sites, you WISH was a Lightspeed girl?
I met TeenKelly before she had her own site. I think she is fantastic. I am also a big fan of Busty Rachel, Vanilla Deville, and Naughty Allie.

5) How much was your initial investment in the company?
I started Lightspeed with about $2000 out of my pocket. I bought two used cheerleader uniforms and a digital camera, and got myself set up on a shared server. I already had a computer and knew the basics about building webpages. I hired a lawyer and an accountant to draw up incorporation papers, and help me get started with taxes and record keeping.

6) Do you have sex with your girls?
I wish. They won?t let me. Seriously, I?ve always treated this as a business, and I made a promise to my wife when I started that I wouldn?t fuck our models. I have kept that promise.

7) How are the girls paid? Flat rate or %?
When we hire a new girl, we first shoot her on a flat rate basis for 10 sets. We use the content on our teen sites, and let her guest star on our other solo sites. Once we see how she looks on camera, and if our members like her, we commit to shoot 20 sets a month of her with the intention of growing her fan base while we shoot enough content to open her own solo site. After her solo site is online, she then gets a monthly shooting fee, a commission off her own site, all the profits from selling autographed pictures and her personal items, and monthly bonuses based on the performance of the LightspeedGirls and LightspeedWorld network of sites.

8) what is yuor favorite color?
I wear a lot of black and dark blue. I like to shoot content with a lot of light colors, pink, white, light blue.

9) Would you like to join us for Dinner on the 4th in Vegas if you have no prior plans?
I?m afraid I already have plans.

10) When will you guy be launching more gay sites?
We have no plans at this time to launch any more gay sites. We are focused squarely on the barely-legal and solo girl markets.

11) You going to sponsor our webmaster events in Phoenix?
We haven?t finalized any plans for the Phoenix show, except our commitment be large in our hometown and make the Forum a great event.

12) What ever happend to that AZN gal that worked for ya?
You are referring to ?Coconut Christine?. She left Lightspeed in the fall of 2002, briefly worked for Adult.com, and has since left the industry. Last I heard she was starting her own mainstream talent agency.

13) Is the teen niche becoming oversaturated?
There are lots of teen sites for sure. Time will tell who has staying power and who doesn?t.

14) What is the most profitable niche in the adult industry and why?
I?m guessing that the hardcore reality market must be the most profitable, since it seems that all the biggest programs are focusing their attention on it. I think surfers like to imagine these crazy scenarios are real. We haven?t gone after that niche, mostly because I prefer to focus on the solo girl market. Our members fall in love with these girls, and keep their memberships for years. I think a regular girl interacting with her fans is more like reality than some hitchhiking girl getting fucked in the back of a van.

15) Where is Lightspeed Media going in the next couple of years, i.e., new technologies, models, ideas?
We are going to continue building the Lightspeed brand with the hottest models I can recruit. I see the PPV, VOD and mobile phone markets exploding in the next couple years, I plan to expand into those areas too. We may also start our own Lightspeed Girls DVD series.


16) Thanks a lot Steve I'd like to take this oppurtunity out of your busy schedule (and mine) to ask a simple question since it relates to how I film. The question is, when you have a new girl do you pay her the day rate per shoot plus give her a % of the site? I ask because the single girl site I'm filming for and hope to be live soon I'm paying the girl per shoot money also giving her a % of the site. In the future I hope to pay girls either one or the other but depending on your answer it could be different.

Good luck! See my answer to #7. Remember that if the girl doesn?t make enough money to pay her bills, she?ll quit. I think its best to ALWAYS pay them a base shooting fee (that can be adjusted over time). The commission on the site should really be more of a payment for exclusivity and for interaction with her members (responding to fan mail, keeping an online daily journal, and doing live shows). Also, paying them monthly bonuses on the overall company profits is a great way to keep multiple girls happy. Profit sharing makes them feel like owners of the company, then they are glad to appear on each other?s sites, help each other out, and recruit hot new girls into the network. Never make them compete with each other. That?s a sure fire recipe for disaster.

17) whats ur best promotion secret?
Attending (and eventually sponsoring) the industry events and conventions made all the difference for us. Get out there, be seen, meet everyone. People are much more likely to do business with people they?ve met in person.


18) How did you get started?
I started with a little free site called ?Lightspeed?s Hotshots?. It was all kinds of pictures of cheerleaders that I had collected from the newsgroups. Jeff Miller of SunUp Media called me to explain how using unlicensed content was going to get me in deep shit. Later I called him back and he was cool enough to explain to me the correct way to run a site. I started shooting my own content and opened Ls-University.com in April of 1999 with 12 sets of original content (3 girls). My original goal was to make $1000/month for my kids college fund. By March of 2000, the site was making more than my regular job, so I closed that company to pursue this full time.

19) What's your favorite part of your job....besides the hot naked women around you?
I really enjoy traveling and meeting people. The marketing part of my job has allowed me to visit some fantastic places and meet a lot of great people.

20) Should I move to Arizona? Is it a good place to live?
Arizona is great, if you like dry heat. I am from Seattle, in 2000 we were able to choose anywhere in the country to live. I chose Phoenix, and haven?t regretted it. Unless you plan to shoot teen content ? then Phoenix sucks balls, it?s already too competitive here.

21) What age did you become able to retire and not worry about money any more if you wanted to ?
I am 38, I could probably retire now if I chose to. But I?m not doing this for money. I do this for fun. I think I have the best job in the world!

22) How do you figure the Math for a good affiliate program without shaving? Figuring in the costs of operation, Model fees, Credit card % (Average 13 to 14% off the top of the signup) Employees etc. When it's all said and done what is the realistic % thats actually left. Also, since some of the check programs are now 50% off the top for a signup, how do you work them into an affiliate program?

The key to all this is controlled growth. Don?t spend money you don?t have! I did everything myself for the first two years. I learned as much as I could before we launched our affiliate program in 2001. For me, having a ton of internal traffic is the way to avoid shaving. We internally generate a lot of our own traffic and most of our sales. We base our budgets with the hopes of keeping about 20% in profits after everyone is paid.

50% for checks? I assume you mean returns and bounced checks. I agree check returns are a big problem. If you pay your affiliates on check signups, it?s fair to deduct the returns from them as well.

23) Will you be adding hardcore solo girl sites?
Many of our solo girl sites already have some hardcore, and all our sites include tons of hardcore feeds. We leave it up to the model herself to determine the level of content she wants on her site. Jordan is one of our most successful sites, and she?s never even done a masturbation scene. Sometimes giving the surfer too much right away doesn?t keep them interested.

24) Do exclusive modeling "contracts" really hold up?
We have our models sign exclusive contracts, and we?ve had several walk away from them. Generally the girls that want to quit are the same ones I would like to fire, so it all works out in the end.

25) What are you going to do with a site when it's model gets too looking?
I have already experienced this, with TaylorLittle.com. She cannot be marketed as a ?teen? anymore. We have instead transitioned the marketing for her site to focus more on her lesbianism and made her into the ?teacher? for our new younger models.



TO BE CONTINUED....

Interesting :thumbsup

great thread. LSSteve rox!

nice post

(sniffle) he didn't like my 'boxers or briefs' question.

Hmmm :rasta ok!

about time someone asked a normal question.

26) What was the deal with Coconut Content? Why did you decide (at the start) to sell your content rather than keep it exclusive? Did you not understand the importance of exclusive content, or did you not forsee how successful your models would become?
I started Coconut Content originally to provide content to our affiliates that everyone didn?t already have. It seemed like the way to do that was to charge a small price per set. I never expected the content to be used to build entire new sites that compete with our own. Lesson learned.

27) How go you manage to get it all done, and what tips do you recommend to others to succeed?
Lightspeed is a group of great employees and a legion of loyal affiliates. I still work 15-18 hours every day, but there?s no way I could get everything done without help. I pass along advice I got in the beginning, ?Do something you love, the money will come?. Success isn?t always about money. Doing something you love to do is a lot more satisfying than having a job you hate.

28) What is your compensation package for the girls that sign on for a solo website.
This question gets asked a lot. See #7 and #16. I tell people that I have found the ?secret formula? for keeping models happy. I call it ?Letting them walk all over me.?

29) You going to do something special for your top 10 affiliates of the 2004 year?
We will be adding some very cool things to our rewards store soon, including an invitation to the 2005 all-expenses-paid Lightspeedcash ?Adventure Weekend?, which will include a ride on this www.nogravity.com.

30) In all seriousness. What would your suggestion be for a designer to catch the eye of a progam owner such as yourself? What do you guys look for in a designer?
I look for humor and creativity, not just someone that can copy others. We hired the designer we use now because one of his banners was really funny.

31) Do you shoot bulk content of your girls in order to have peace of mind and efficiency for updates or do you have pre scheduled appointments with your girls on a recurring basis.
It depends on the girl. See #7. We have also paid models before to shoot 200 sets in 20 days, so they can move on, and we will have enough content to run a solo site for about 3 years.

32) If you were starting from scratch with the intention of being the number 1 guy in any niche what would you need to have to get the job done. Example specific type of server with x amount of bandwidth, Nats, special scripts, photo and video equipment etc.
I don?t think anyone could answer this question. I think it could be possible to hire a dream team of existing industry experts to create sites and an affiliate program that would dominate a niche, but that route would be expensive and risky.

33) And my third and final question..... does it happen that some people join your sites ( usuaully that means they buy the full membership ) and they expect hardcore in your members area....and then they get upset? Isn't that an issue that can significantly increase refunds and charge backs in a softcore solo girl site like yours?
Our refunds and chargebacks are really low. We try to be as honest as possible in our ads and tours. We don?t promise a lot of hardcore. Believe it or not, softcore sells and retains well too!

34) What is your biggest headache in this business?
Although I recognize our affiliates as the lifeblood of our business, honestly it becomes difficult for our small group of staff to accommodate the needs of tens of thousands of people. We are often asked to spend a lot of resources working on a specific requirement for one affiliate, even when that affiliate has not even begun sending traffic. And if we refuse anyone?s request, it might appear that we don?t value our affiliates. That is not the case at all!

35) Do you use DRM on your vids? If not why not?
We haven?t begun using DRM on our videos yet, I?m still not convinced in the value of it. We have always freely given tons of content away, since I believe that people get bored of looking at one set or one video, and they will eventually come to our site looking for new material. I think just labeling our content with our URLs is more effective to accomplish that.

36) Do you think a potential member will not join if they see that a license is being used?
I doubt that would stop anyone from joining a site, if the site has content they are interested in.

37) What password protection software do you use? I need one for my sites..!
We currently use proxypass. We used pennywize for years also.

38) What is your favorite car?
I?ve always been a big fan of the ?Mach 5? from the Speed Racer cartoon. I wish my car had sawblades that could cut through a forest (but what about the stumps?) I thought Speed Buggy was cool too.

39) What ideas do you have that you can share via icq that you don't have time to do?
Privately sharing info sort of defeats the purpose of this thread, doesn?t it?

40) What aspect of online marketing has given you the greatest return on your investment in terms of traffic and/or sales?
I would say that our hosted galleries system has brought us the most traffic and sales. Also, our Gallery Revshare program has been a win-win for everyone, we?ll be releasing version 2 of that system soon.

41) Good people are the lifeblood of any successful organization. How do you personally go about hiring good employees? Are there any "secrets" or "tips" (you've learnt over time) to hiring and retaining the best people?
I had the bad experience of working for a crappy boss once. He fired a bunch of my co-workers, only to buy an expensive motorcycle for himself later that week. I remember thinking ?What an asshole!? When I started hiring my own employees, I decided that if I?m going to get rich doing this, then so will my employees. We implemented a 20% profit sharing plan in the very beginning. When we have a good month, our employee?s profit-sharing bonus often exceeds their regular paycheck. Ask Rochard about ?Golden Handcuffs?.

42) What aspects of your business do you personally focus on? What areas do you delegate out?
I handle most of the marketing and branding aspects. I also like to personally attend the industry events and tradeshows. I used to shoot all the content myself, I?ve backed off of that now but I?m still involved in recruiting and model management. Rochard handles all our sites, servers, and operations issues, Lisa (Sweetums) handles traffic and affiliates, and Shannon handles all the accounting and taxes.

43) How active were you in marketing your sites when you started? (was there an affiliate program from the beginning?)
I didn?t know what an affiliate program WAS in the beginning. I marketed my site by trading with other sites for traffic and content, and by submitting my own galleries to tgps. I didn?t start the Lightspeedcash affiliate program until almost 2 years after my first sites were open.

44) How long did it take for your business to become profitable?
We were profitable in the first month, since my startup costs were so minimal.

45) Were there any failures/losses/setbacks before your business started to boom?
Shortly after Tawnee started working for us, all 5 of our other contract models quit for various reasons, all within the same week or so. It felt like we were finished. We basically had to start over with everything.

46) Who is your favorite processor?
CCbill has been our primary processor since the beginning, and I enjoy a great relationship with them. We also use Epoch/Paycom as our backup processor, and NoCreditCard supplies our dialers. I used Ibill for a while, but that turned out to be a poor decision.

47) What Single girl Site just passed the Bling Bling Mark last month for the first time?
Tawnee Stone, currently in her 4th year as a 19 year old, is still our #1 site and more popular than ever. She is truly a phenomenon that I can?t explain!

48) What will the two best events in April be?
The 2005 Phoenix Forum is going to be great, and I?m personally looking forward to a private vacation with a few close friends in April!

49) What single strategy (either marketing/affiliates/site/models) has been the single largest contributor to help make the program a success?
When I hired Tanker in 2001, we agreed to hit the marketing trail hard by attending EVERY SHOW. Our goal from 2001-2003 was to ?Get out there, be seen, meet everyone?. Between us, we attended and/or sponsored 50 consecutive events and tradeshows.

50) what's your opinion about B.Shaw?
He is a legend in his own mind! He doesn?t like me, but who the hell cares? I?ve made it this far without his help, haven?t I? I like to say, ?Every hero needs a villain.? Life would be pretty boring if we were all the same, right? I think Brad is my top unpaid referrer. Every time he bashes me, I get droves of great new affiliates!

His opinions of me seem to be based on a lot of inaccurate and obsolete information. I think I spoke to him ONCE a few years ago. We have lots of mutual friends who try to tell him to lighten up, but he apparently doesn?t value their opinions. I?m sure he?ll start bashing away at me again as soon as he reads this. Whatever Brad, at least you are consistently an asshole. Go ahead, I could always use some more new affiliates!

However, he does have a nice online operation, good employees, and a beautiful wife. He seems to have done well for himself. I?d bet money that he has checked this thread every day for this answer since this question was posted (hahaha)

awesome thread steve!

Keep em coming Steve ... this is great material for my book! : )

"We may also start our own Lightspeed Girls DVD series."


LONG LONG OVER DO!

Even with a press of 5000 copies of Tawnie Stone DVD they will fly out the garage faster than you can click for the next order.

Question 101: When are you guys going public and how do we get in early? :winkwink:

200 problems and lightspeed aint one