Why is this business harder these days?

[ArtWilliams]

Everyone seems to agree that there is too much free porn. None-the-less those webmasters who got in early have a distinct advantage. They have market share [i.e. traffic = sales]. The newbies want it.

Economically speaking we have a mature market here -- at least in the English language porn world. Therefore sellers/distributors must do one of two things -- 1. Use financial resources go after the market share of others. 2. Innovate thereby creating new needs or fulfilling new needs (not already identified to date).

The problem with the 1. is that other porn sellers/distributors will use their financial resources to defend their market. Profits will be reduced until producers achieve just a minimum return on capital. The problem with 2. is it take research and imagination to come up with something new that the public wants or you can convince them that they want.

In layman's terms, doing the same shit doesn't cut it because there are a million people doing the same thing [unless you have deep pockets]. So the moral of the story is give the surfer something new and different that they can't get elsewhere or go get a job somewhere else.

My two cents.

---aw

[LD]

Originally Posted by artwilliams

Economically speaking we have a mature market here -- at least in the English language porn world.
My two cents.

---aw

Is it really a mature market? I was under the impression the market was still growing...it has changed for sure, but I would think there are more people viewing porn now than say 10 years ago, and I would think the market would expand as new technologies become available.

[ArtWilliams]

IMHO, most English speaking people with credit cards -- the people I am interested in -- already have a PC and Internet access. You might get me to cede your point with respect to broadband. That would decrease the market for pics and increase it for movies but we are already seeing that happen. Then again I made a total of 8 sales last month so what the hell do I know?

Originally Posted by LusciousDelight

Is it really a mature market? I was under the impression the market was still growing...it has changed for sure, but I would think there are more people viewing porn now than say 10 years ago, and I would think the market would expand as new technologies become available.

[aj]

Originally Posted by artwilliams

IMHO, most English speaking people with credit cards -- the people I am interested in -- already have a PC and Internet access.

“Of the 64% online Europeans owning a credit card,
more than half will not use their credit card to buy online!”

How can anyone afford ignoring 200 million European customers?

[ArtWilliams]

I never said I wouldn't take their paper Euros. They can send them to me in a plan brown envelope. I have a P.O. for that.

Originally Posted by aj

“Of the 64% online Europeans owning a credit card,
more than half will not use their credit card to buy online!”

How can anyone afford ignoring 200 million European customers?

[maniac]

Originally Posted by aj

“Of the 64% online Europeans owning a credit card,
more than half will not use their credit card to buy online!”

How can anyone afford ignoring 200 million European customers?

Interesting, did you get that info from an article? I'm curious to read more about. Would you mind sharing the source of that information?

And to the original topic, I agree:

1. Free porn

2. Surfers don't trust to put in credit card information to join pornsites.

3. Competition among webmasters

[ArtWilliams]

One other thought. I've been around here for a number of years (though I've just started taking my work seriously in the last few months). In 2003-4, you could start a link list and the common thinking was that it would be profitable within a year. Now, everyone seems to agree that on average it takes 2-3 years to do that.

My question is will there be a point in the future that no one in their right mind will start a common link list because they are not willing to wait what might be 5, 7 or 10 years to make some money from it? Hobbyists might not care but not someone who treats this as a business won't wait that long. None-the-less, with the cost to get into this business being so low, that is what it might become.

[Roger MGC]

We have a man fucking a water melon on our new site and it's fucking converting like crazy. I guest you have to do different things to make it in the maker these days.

[Triton2004]

there are more reasons...a few of them are already told, but nowdays the biggest is the problem on the american real estate market.
the surfers don't have money for porn..

[Mr Exotic]

I'll tell you what I think is one of the biggest contributors to this biz getting harder and harder besides all the free porn. I mean no offense to the good webmasters from these places, but that is Eastern European countries getting the internet. They are pretty much worthless as customers, but there are thousands and thousands of them who think they can strike it rich throwing up some porn pages by making a go of it as a webmaster. Hell if they can pull in 5 or 6 sign ups a month they probably are rich in their countries. Not saying I am or think I am more entitled to a peice of the pie than they are, but its just the facts. For every dozen bathroom gangs there probably is a webmaster from the US or Canada losing a peice of the action.

[ronnie]

Originally Posted by Triton2004

the biggest is the problem on the american real estate market. the surfers don't have money for porn..

Huh?

Porn is like booze, smokes, lottery and cable tv, people will find the money. No body's going to stop jacking off because of real estate market or anything else.

[macker]

Originally Posted by ronnie

Huh?

Porn is like booze, smokes, lottery and cable tv, people will find the money. No body's going to stop jacking off because of real estate market or anything else.

This is true, although the increased availability of free porn means that they don't always get their porn on a paysite.

Smaller micro-niches I've found work better because there is less overall material available online. Basically, they're paying for something because they can't find it for free anyway.

I think the overall situation will get worse before it gets better. In time though, as the industry and online commerce in general matures we will see revenue streams going increasingly to rightful owners.

Self regulation has been great until quite recently, but now self regulation is showing negative effects. In the future, I believe 'wild west websites' will be a thing of the past.

[the New Shemp]

there was no masterbation before TGPs ....

[neticule]

Most surfers seem to be going to the tube sites now... I know most people dont trust alexa too much, but this graph speaks for itself:
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/tr...1y&size=Medium

youporn and redtube are two of the most popular adult tube sites now. You can see the hun and worldsex are in a slow decline, while these tube sites are shooting sky high, almost 2 percent reach, in less then a year. They get so much traffic they dont know what to do with it.

This business is getting harder for most people these days following the "old" model of running a tgp and submitting galleries, but talk to someone running a tube site and I bet they will sound like business has never been better. I havent wanted to start one because of the crazy bandwidth it would take, the copyright problems, and all the other legalities that come with allowing surfers to upload stuff. But its hard to ignore the amount of traffic they get, it makes the big tgps look tiny by comparison.

[Neo]

I think there is still as many men and women jerkin off as ever, only thing makes this job hard is Sponsors who dont pay what they owe you on time.
They are the hardest aspect of this job in my opinion, its easier to create traffic than to get your cash out of some of the lying cheating money grabbing sponsors ,who will hold n hold n hold n hold your money you earnt, until you tell them you will bring it up in forums if they cant be nice in private, then they pay you in seconds with a guilty mind.
Like any job in the world, its done to get paid, you only have a problem if your not getting paid, so good advice to anyone new thinking its hard, as soon as you see evidence of a bad paying sponsor...RUN A MILE.
Sponsors are ten a penny, and the ones who are serious, honest and give a shit always pay you on time, as they have already sat on your cash long enough. As for tube sites, its natural and to be expected the way content is given away by programmes.

[Mr Exotic]

Originally Posted by Neo

I think there is still as many men and women jerkin off as ever, only thing makes this job hard is Sponsors who dont pay what they owe you on time.
They are the hardest aspect of this job in my opinion, its easier to create traffic than to get your cash out of some of the lying cheating money grabbing sponsors ,who will hold n hold n hold n hold your money you earnt, until you tell them you will bring it up in forums if they cant be nice in private, then they pay you in seconds with a guilty mind.
Like any job in the world, its done to get paid, you only have a problem if your not getting paid, so good advice to anyone new thinking its hard, as soon as you see evidence of a bad paying sponsor...RUN A MILE.
Sponsors are ten a penny, and the ones who are serious, honest and give a shit always pay you on time, as they have already sat on your cash long enough. As for tube sites, its natural and to be expected the way content is given away by programmes.

Back in the early days when I was making ridiculously easy money hand over fist I was burned and ripped off by sponsors many times. I havent been ripped off by a sponsor since 2001. Sponsors paying and paying on time is one aspect of this biz that has gotten much better.

[JTandmisstee]

Originally Posted by neticule

Most surfers seem to be going to the tube sites now... I know most people dont trust alexa too much, but this graph speaks for itself:
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/tr...1y&size=Medium

youporn and redtube are two of the most popular adult tube sites now. You can see the hun and worldsex are in a slow decline, while these tube sites are shooting sky high, almost 2 percent reach, in less then a year. They get so much traffic they dont know what to do with it.

This business is getting harder for most people these days following the "old" model of running a tgp and submitting galleries, but talk to someone running a tube site and I bet they will sound like business has never been better. I havent wanted to start one because of the crazy bandwidth it would take, the copyright problems, and all the other legalities that come with allowing surfers to upload stuff. But its hard to ignore the amount of traffic they get, it makes the big tgps look tiny by comparison.

I Just had to chime in here neticule is right if you read article that was posted over at Xbiz by By Colin Rowntree, from Wasteland back in July of last year and how the new web2.0... Blogs Community groups User generated content RSS feeds will be affecting TGP's and affiliates pretty much sums it up IMHO.

http://www.xbiz.com/articles/81699/Web+2.0

[Busty]

WAY WAY WAY to much for free, and sites now just buy content and put it together as opposed to the old days of shooting it yourself, so the surfer sees the same shit over and over and decides to go and get it for free. Also bad experience with signing up and not being able to cancel left a bad taste in their mouth, so rather go to a free site, beat off and hope your virus protection looks after your computer.

[Paul7]

The business is harder nowadays than it was before because of the P2P networks. There are too many porn pirates out there.

[Lenny]

Traffic is the only currency that means anything in this biz, and it always has been.
The proliferation of free porn isn't making it harder to sell memberships, it's just making it harder to get and keep traffic.
Sure there's more free stuff out there than there was in 2000, but the quality of membership sites today compared to then is ridiculous. People get alot more for less money than they did in 2000.

The reason it's harder for joe blow to get into this biz and make money is because there's hardly any free traffic left.
In 2000 and before that, you could just trade content for traffic. You give away free content on a page, and lots of people were willing to send traffic to that page.
Now everyone has content, the sponsors own their own content and go directly to the traffic source instead of dealing with a middle man.

Again, traffic is the only currency that means anything in this business. People with lots of traffic don't think this business is hard. People who are using 8 year old methods of trying to obtain traffic are the ones who think this business is hard.

[LD]

Originally Posted by Lenny

People who are using 8 year old methods of trying to obtain traffic are the ones who think this business is hard.

So....how do we get traffic now?

[ronnie]

Originally Posted by LusciousDelight

So....how do we get traffic now?

Better content.

[Ramster]

Originally Posted by Lenny

Traffic is the only currency that means anything in this biz, and it always has been.
The proliferation of free porn isn't making it harder to sell memberships, it's just making it harder to get and keep traffic.
Sure there's more free stuff out there than there was in 2000, but the quality of membership sites today compared to then is ridiculous. People get alot more for less money than they did in 2000.

The reason it's harder for joe blow to get into this biz and make money is because there's hardly any free traffic left.
In 2000 and before that, you could just trade content for traffic. You give away free content on a page, and lots of people were willing to send traffic to that page.
Now everyone has content, the sponsors own their own content and go directly to the traffic source instead of dealing with a middle man.

Again, traffic is the only currency that means anything in this business. People with lots of traffic don't think this business is hard. People who are using 8 year old methods of trying to obtain traffic are the ones who think this business is hard.

Very good post

[Useless]

Originally Posted by Lenny

Again, traffic is the only currency that means anything in this business. People with lots of traffic don't think this business is hard. People who are using 8 year old methods of trying to obtain traffic are the ones who think this business is hard.

That's exactly why I'm going to start SE spamming.

I'm really beginning to build a sort of 'fuck you' attitude towards people who want to tell others that they aren't doing it the right way, but refuse to offer any real advice. Smug, arrogant douche bags.

[Bobc01]

Originally Posted by Useless Warrior

That's exactly why I'm going to start SE spamming.

I'm really beginning to build a sort of 'fuck you' attitude towards people who want to tell others that they aren't doing it the right way, but refuse to offer any real advice. Smug, arrogant douche bags.

I doubt they even know to be honest, too much hype on SEO that everything tends to contradict it's self.

I just try out different things of my own and stick with what i know works.