What to do about changes in the Live Chat content market?!

[guestcam]

I have NO IDEA What to do about changes in the Live Chat content market ! Assuming I am not the only person who's using live chat content providers, I thought I'd find out who is dealing with this and how you're dealing with it.

My current provider and at least 4 other competitors all seemed to have made the same exact change, which is no longer requiring credit card information at the time of sign up. My provider didnt charge the surfers, we just collected and verified the info at the time of sign up and true to our word, the signup was free.

And this setup did two great things for me - (1) provider a legally satisfying way of age verification and (2) made my surfers ONE CLICK away from an impulse buy of one on one time - aka my upsell.

But now with the new change the surfers only have to supply a working email address. Not only is this change screwing me out of income - now getting 20 percent of what I was making before the change - but it also now exposes me to legal actions! Either I push all my pages behind protected areas or I put up warning pages infront EACH of the promo pages for the live chat. I dont envision either of those solutions helping my income.

In fact, at least with my current provider, making their content available only in my members only areas presents a brand new problem - dual and confusing member ids. They will need a member id for my area and then a member id for the live chat sign up.

I LITERALLY have had my emailed suggestion of allowing my signup page to be sent to their servers (to allow a single username) get ignored. Twice.

Its very frustrating. Anyone else feel this way? Has your upsell income taken a dive since this change? or if not, then whats been your ajustments or solutions to this no credit card change?

thanks
Harry

[RawAlex]

I read your post twice and I don't get it.

Can you give me a more clear before and after? Also, which companies are doing this?

Alex

[guestcam]

Originally Posted by RawAlex

I read your post twice and I don't get it.

Can you give me a more clear before and after? Also, which companies are doing this?

Alex

...........the same exact change, which is no longer requiring credit card information at the time of sign up. ............

...........But now with the new change the surfers only have to supply a working email address.................

No credit card needed to view since change. Hence less immediate income. Sharply less. Thats as best as I know how to explain it.

Do you have a sponsor who supplies live chat content and you make money on the upsell ?

[guestcam]

well looks like no one had a live chat content product to plug............oh well it was worth a shot to ask. Ya never know when or where altruism will pop up.

[Wizzo]

1 good point, the other not so much... I agree that it gets the surfer closer to making a impulse 1click sale and understand that.

But using a CC as a source of age verification has already been ruled as a inadequate means of age verification by a number of courts. So you are no less legally protected. Just as a example my 10 year old daughter has Visa debit card in her name attached to her savings account and certain there's millions of other minors that now have the same.

[Smutferret]

Over the last couple of months I've noticed a considerable increase in live cam upsells. Maybe something to do with the colder weather, I don't know, but then things weren't this good last winter.

I don't think my primary live cam sponsor ever took credit card info for the free chat, but I could be wrong.

Regards,
SF

[kevsh]

Originally Posted by Smutferret

I don't think my primary live cam sponsor ever took credit card info for the free chat, but I could be wrong.

A few do, and I noticed one that switched to this (vs. free access to chat without any signup) and the conversions plummeted dramatically. I stopped promoting them.

I can see reasons for both views but in the end the numbers don't lie: The easier it is to access an actual live chat, the better the conversions, ROI and of course income - at least from an affiliate POV

[juggernaut]

Originally Posted by Smutferret

Over the last couple of months I've noticed a considerable increase in live cam upsells. Maybe something to do with the colder weather, I don't know, but then things weren't this good last winter.

Agree here. Being my wife does this we do notice much more sales in the winter. I think its just common place around the net as a lot of people just dont want to exit and enter the cold and have nothing better to do but sharpen their pencils.

Originally Posted by kevsh

A few do, and I noticed one that switched to this (vs. free access to chat without any signup) and the conversions plummeted dramatically. I stopped promoting them.

Agree tried this with my first site and it was mostly to stop beggars and underage people. Did not work. Only good thing that came from it was I did charge $5 for access to the site and made about $300 in total. But in the end sales were minor..

Originally Posted by kevsh

I can see reasons for both views but in the end the numbers don't lie: The easier it is to access an actual live chat, the better the conversions, ROI and of course income - at least from an affiliate POV

Agree. New site is totally free, just have to sign up with a real email addy and verify it. Site went from offering a purchase button on the hosts page to saying fuck that. I knew the traffic I was busting my ass for was being redirected to these girls personal sites and that started to piss me off. Changed it so all the hosts now get a purchase button if they like it or not. We are still getting hosts signing up about an average of 3 a week and once I put up the buttons I knew I did something right as with in 24 hours we had the first sale from it. Now we are seeing about 1 a day. Not much but still nice to see the change worked for the better and the targeted traffic is paying off. Some of the hosts are still redirecting I suppose but I will be testing them on that and also how they treat a possible customer. Any shady shit and they are banned.

[guestcam]

Originally Posted by Wizzo

1 good point, the other not so much... I agree that it gets the surfer closer to making a impulse 1click sale and understand that.

But using a CC as a source of age verification has already been ruled as a inadequate means of age verification by a number of courts. So you are no less legally protected. Just as a example my 10 year old daughter has Visa debit card in her name attached to her savings account and certain there's millions of other minors that now have the same.

well in these days of pussified DNC leadership and running scared media orgs, yeah I suppose NO ONE not doing gop's, I mean god's bidding, can be no less legally protected (by what use to be called your civil rights).

I am kinda ignorant on the specifics of these court cases you refer to; are any of them federal courts?

as to the debit visa cards - I had the impression our processors can tell which are true visa credit and which are debit cards. Arent debit cards rejected as a source not only for age reasons but because of rebill reasons as well?

IN any case, as someone said, numbers dont lie. Maybe I need more and or different traffic and then the 'easier access to live chat means more one on one upsells' theory will come into play. But right now, its the 'two many steps and a wallet to go fetch' theory that seems to be working against me at the moment.

Harry
PS: Thanks to you all for the rebirth in interest in the topic

[guestcam]

Originally Posted by kevsh

A few do, and I noticed one that switched to this (vs. free access to chat without any signup) and the conversions plummeted dramatically. I stopped promoting them.

you wouldnt mind pm-ing me with those you havent dropped, would ya?
I own a few domains - I'll be glad to try out one of your guys. put my current and your credit card using guys in a race for most upsells and see which theory works out best.

H