This is the latest I’ve ever been to a MWP party, but I knew as soon as I was well I’d have something to say… just didn’t realize that was a couple of weeks off.

I love all the thinking out loud in the post and in the comments here. It’s true, though for those of us who’ve been in 2.0-ville for a long time it’s beginning to feel comfy and worn, while for the great majority of the world all of this is still incredibly new–so we still have that chance to start a revolution, or shape the future, or at least have a hand in it.

There’s a point that Michael made that’s so close to how I see it, that I wanted to jump off from his point:

… we’d really have to start with what kind of content subject matter and objectives first. Is the goal training? Is it on-demand advice? Is it a higher level of detail and depth than the free content? Are there “secrets” revealed you’d never dream of giving away on the blog?

Having worked with you on many occasions, James (and thanks for the shout-out), this will sound awfully familiar–

In my humble opinion, if we want to move to having our ideas (which become our writing) pay for themselves, what we’ll really have to start with is the potential customer’s objectives first.

Our own objectives to discuss the nuances of hand-crafting kayaks from polar bear hides and make money online from this writing are useless if we haven’t considered whether there’s a group of customers who’ll want to pay to learn what we want to pay to spread the word about… and whether we can be the most compelling voice in the kayak-building blogosphere, so that the customers not only enjoy, not only become paying devotees, but also help us spread the word of our incredibly valuable writings on bear-hide kayaks.

Is someone out there who needs what you do more than they need their morning Starbucks? What are his or her objectives?

Capture that information, and maybe you can push the revolution forward.

Regards,

Kelly
.-= Kelly´s last blog ..Gone Fishin’? =-.

You wrote that: “If your costs to produce one more unit are zero, prices will also approach zero in competitive markets… A great product like an ebook can temporarily make good profits but quickly begin to decline to close to zero, even in a long-tail economy.”

You used Apple’s iPod as an example of a “temporary monopoly” due to innovation.

But consider that the iPod first came out in October, 2001. That’s 8+ years that it’s been “temporary”. It was not the first MP3 player, or even the first high density one with a hard drive inside. It has never been the cheapest, or had the most features. (In fact, the iPod models continuously cost more, for less – in a pure sense.)

The iPod continues to succeed because MP3 players aren’t truly commodities. Sure, they can be — if you took the iPod away forever, none of the existing competitors could fill its shoes. The *competitor* products are like commodities, bought and sold on price and plain old feature sets. They’re all so BLAH.

eBooks also are not true commodities. There are many crummy ebooks out there — just like many crummy MP3 players — and THOSE ones are commodity-like. However, if you — like Apple — put real, honest, sweaty labor into making something wonderful, you can go on for a long, long tie.

Example: Nobody can really compete with my ebook, and it still sells 50-60 copies a month with no advertising, just over a year after I launched the first beta. And I raised the price to $39 a few months back. It’s not in a crazy niche like Train Your Cat To Use A Toilet And Talk, either. People know about it, and they know about my sales numbers, because I’ve written about it. It’s no secret. Just nobody out there can compete with me, and they know it.

This model — everybody thinks it’s a commodity except one or two companies, which totally kick ass in the market — is repeated everywhere. Look at Dyson. Look at OXO. Look at Lamborghini. Look at Lush. What could be more of a commodity than home vacuum cleaners, veggie peelers, cars, or soap?

And yet these companies de-commoditized themselves and make sooooooooo much money doing it.

Remember, people: for commodity pricing models (like John describes above) to work, the products have to be *exactly the same*. In short, they have to be true commodities. There’s a word for that, “fungible,” which means “you can exchange any one for the other.”

When that’s not true, then the whole “cost approaches zero blah blah” stuff does not apply.

And the beauty of creating your own products from nothing is that you can *make* it not be true.
.-= Amy Hoy´s last blog ..Your Questions: Amy, how do you learn? =-.

As, in my estimation, an average guy who reads blogs and researches on the net, your content will have to be the crown jewel of interest to get subscribers who pay. Obviously, I may be the only person on the planet who thinks like this.

I am hard pressed to think of a blog I would pay to read. Its not the ‘always been free’ concept that would keep me away. Its the ‘is it worth it’ idea that does it.

I believe if suddenly most superstar bloggers started pay-to-play subscriptions there would be a mass exodus of readers leaving those blogs. With the overwhelming glut of TMI anyway, it would not be a problem to find something to read.

All IMHO of course.

Sure, the delivery might change (video, audio… interactive crazyness) but in this economy, I’ve found reciprocation works really well. I think Gary Vee calls it the “thank you economy”. Has it worked? Well just see for yourself… after answering a sh*t load of emails everyday, speaking, doing videos and doing what his fan base wanted for like 4 years straight, they “thanked” him when the time came around and he released a product.

So for an entire blog to go premium-only is to shoot themselves in the foot… a hybrid approach is the future. There is a reason why the micro-subscription model is responsible for massive fortunes in the gaming industry. Sooner or later, the blogging platform will shift towards this also.

You can only sell so many ads and do sponsored affiliate articles before that nonsense stops working or bringing in the revenue all together.
.-= FitJerk’s Fitness Blog´s last blog ..Recipe: Grilled Fish & Berry Blast – FitJerk Friday’s =-.

I have been blogging for less than a year (just about nine months) and it is currently my only means of making money – by choice (combined with a little bit of laziness and some help from a crappy economy).

I am basically playing a zero sum game where I make just enough to cover my monthly expenses (including a minor amount of discretionary spending).

I have decided to use 2009-2010 as a testing ground to see if I can continue to make money (and more of it) through entirely in online activities. Without boring you with the details, I used to work in the computer software industry as an engineer and consultant.

My blog currently provides indirect monetization only – I don’t have any advertisements or any affiliate links. My blogging provides an advertisement for my skills as a writer, blogger, and social media “definitely not an expert, but I play one on the Internet” expert.

All of my earnings currently are paid blogging (mostly as a ghostwriter) for other blogs.

I am only beginning to look into the potential (or lack thereof) of advertising, affiliate links, and creating and selling my own information products (e.g., e-books).

As I ponder this, I can definitely to your comment about the difference between “a fan who would cheer and love what I do… but who wasn’t (and would never be) an actual paying customer.”

I doubt my current “fans” would pay for any of my content (although, in fairness, I haven’t asked them yet, so who knows until, as you said, I start a conversation with them about the topic).

Chris Brogan has mentioned in a few of his recent conference speeches that he believes the future may be “sponsored blogging” – which I know is a future that is already here to a lesser extent than what he is predicting – and I also can’t speak to what he means in any detail, since I only heard the sound-bite a few times.

I also agree with Deb Ng that some blogs (and some niches) are harder to monetize than others. My niche is narrow and highly specialized, which is probably why I can make a decent amount of money for a limited number of ghostwriting gigs (at least for now, things change rapidly in the serendipitous “Series of Tubes” also known as the Internet).

I like the idea of adding a premium content section to my blog, which would prevent me from pissing off my “fans” by continuing to provide the “free” content they love now. I also agree with your remark to Rochelle’s comment – you don’t need a massive following, even if a small percentage of fans convert to customers, then even a small following could yield financial success.

I have often wondered what it would have been like if my blog had a “for premium members only” section right from day one. Would I still have the small, but thankfully currently loyal, fan base I have today or would the fact I had restricted content caused me to lose people before they could have even become fans?

I have also been toying with starting a separate premium blog – as opposed to the “put this behind a paywall” approach, but I am not sure if this would simply splinter my efforts.

Bottom line for me: I agree with you, wholeheartedly, we need to have more of these conversations. Thanks for starting this important discussion.
.-= Jim Harris´s last blog ..Shut Your Mouth =-.

In that regard, there really isn’t anything new.

What follows is me thinking into my keyboard. Sorry if it’s long and messy.

You have the written word in pixels or print. You have audio with its various ways to store it and deliver it. You have video online or on DVD. You have live events. Teleseminars/webinars. Games and virtual environments (difficult to create as a learning tool). You have private RSS feeds.

Then, text information can be in the form of web pages/blog posts, PDF ebooks, forum posts, wikis, etc. If the objective is training in a specific subject, some of these would work better than others. If the objective is community, different tools like forums and wikis would come to the fore.

Membership sites are a good logistical way or vehicle to store and deliver a great deal of content in various media—especially if that content has to change and update a lot. It seems stupid to buy a book on SEO nowadays when it seems every 3 weeks something major happens with Google or Bing. That’s why the next version of my SEO book won’t be a book.

Just like you never have to upgrade your Gmail, with a membership site, content can be updated instantly for everyone.

A paid newsletter is another way to deliver content. It can be just a “regular” email or it can be a PDF (I tried to one like that and couldn’t keep on schedule and canned it—I’m considering private feed aggregation instead). People can and do pay for these kinds of newsletters.

I’m working backwards here, but we’d really have to start with what kind of content subject matter and objectives first. Is the goal training? Is it on-demand advice? Is it a higher level of detail and depth than the free content? Are there “secrets” revealed you’d never dream of giving away on the blog?

Training is something a lot of people can easily see spending money on, because there’s such a definite return. For that same reason, people are suspicious of a training site where the course never ends, because that just looks like an excuse to suck money out of your PayPal account every month before you remember to cancel.

Unstructured advice and community-building can happen in a forum or BuddyPress set up, but that’s a hell of a lot of work to maintain, too. And maybe a bit harder to sell. I happily joined Sean D’Souza’s 5000bc member forums because of the massive value I received from a free course he gave away. I knew there was no question 5000bc would be worth my money every month.

Membership sites can have a live training and service element, too, apart from the more static content. For example, Clay Collins does regular mentorship calls with members of Project Mojave in addition to all the regular content.

If I had more time, I would’ve written something shorter, so my apologies for rambling. Just trying to get some shit to stick to the wall.
.-= Michael Martine´s last blog ..Ten Steps to Rock Your Business Blog in 2010 =-.