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Paid Content in Computer Aid

Computer Aid Posted on by

I just thought I’d let everyone know that some parts of this blog will become “paid content” sections.

To keep things fair (those who know me, will know that I’m a big fan of being fair, honest and open), it will only be selected posts… probably less than 10% of the overall blog.

The way I’d like it to work (this part is not finalised yet), is that paid posts will be split into 2 parts:

  • The first part will be free and contain background information
  • The second part will need to be paid for by paypal (I’m thinking around $4 – $8 per post), and it will contain the real interesting/vital information.

To be even more fair to my loyal readers, all new posts will be free, and a post might become a pay post only once it drops off the front page, and it shows a certain amount of long-term popularity.

I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and by looking at the stats on my website, I’ve noticed that certain posts are a lot more popular than others (even some posts from 2006 show up in my top 10 posts).

So I figured that if someone is looking for a solution to a specific problem, then paying $5 for the solution is a lot better than spending 10 or 20 times as much to have a professional tech fix the problem.

The stats also show that I get between 10,000 and 20,000 unique visitors per month, but only 1% will click on the google ads… each ad earns me an average of $0.23, with about an average of about 6 ad clicks per day, I’m getting about $40 per month.

I can easily see that most visitors to my site are looking for a specific solution… They read a relevant post, fix their problem, and then leave (rarely leaving any feedback, and rarely looking at other parts of the website).

I started thinking: If I could just earn $1 from each visitor, then my website would earn much more than Computer Aid!

So, I thought about how to increase my income from the Computer Aid website. Most solutions seemed to revolve around changing my website into a hard-sell site, with up-sells and continuity programs and all sorts of marketing stuff that I really didn’t like much…

So, I came up with a more subtle approach.

I’m not sure how well it will work, but its worth a try.

What are your thoughts? Do you think its a good/bad idea?

Comments

Paid Content in Computer Aid — 9 Comments

  2. Google adsense has a feature you can set up to allow it to authenticate or bypass your login screens to index the content.

    I think the real danger here is lost readership. You have to do what is best for you, of course, but I know that a site like Experts Exchange probably gets a much higher bounce rate now that people go there and find out that they have to register or pay to see content. I never click on their links anymore when they show up in Google’s search results. I’ve got an account, but when the very next or prior search result has the same answer without requiring me to authenticate, then I don’t see the point in going through the extra step.

    There is an idea out there to provide the first hit free but then require registration or payment for subsequent hits. It would require more programming on your part, but would still provide content to first time viewers who have no idea whether or not your content will actually help them before they pay.

  3. I think you have a good idea

    For any business to be viable you need to have income.

    And $4-$8 seems very reasonable.

  5. Healy: no firewall. I’ll start by just password protecting the top 10 most popular posts (all older than 2 months anyway!)

    Paul: I’ll lose a minimum of readership, as this will not affect regular readers, just those who are desperately looking for a specific solution (and I’m guessing that a small percentage of those will be willing to pay).

    Flowerhorn: No risk, since at least half of the original post will still be there (as a free teaser), the actual solution near the end will be password protected.

    I won’t go for more ads or paid posts, as that devalues the entire website. eg: I prefer the simplicity of the google homepage over the confusion of yahoo and msn.

    So I try to model my website more like google.

  6. What happens when someone pays the money and then doesn’t like the solution received for the money. Will you offer refunds?

    Also, if you are password protecting old posts, search engines like Google will have already cached your full page by then. Your solutions will be visible for people who use the cache.

    Just some thoughts.

  9. Hello пapaзит,

    I’m not sure what you are asking.

    If you are asking how frequently I update my blog, then its about 10 – 25 time per month

    If you are asking how often a blog should be updated, then that depends on the type of blog.

    A newsy blog should be updated a few times per day.

    An authority blog should be updated anywhere between once per week to 7 times per week.

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