Are adult sites are losing visitors?

jayeff · 2007-04-25, 08:02 AM

I haven't the vaguest idea whether overall we are losing or gaining visitors. I do know that online porn as a major industry is barely into its second decade and still moving towards the inevitable equilibrium between supply and demand. In other words, competition is getting fiercer and that surely impacts on the business done by the average site.

I do believe we have "stalled". The last real innovation from the mainstream adult webmaster community was live video back in what, 1997. Our product has generally improved and most of our sites are more user friendly, but essentially we have been selling the same things in the same ways for the past 5 years and more. The internet brings us a steady stream of new and therefore curious visitors, but the ratio of experienced surfers is steadily increasing and for those to whom we have failed to appeal, we have nothing new to offer.

While sites such as "I Shot Myself" and "Suicide Girls" have appeared out of left field as it were, longstanding webmasters have increasingly resorted to feeding off each other, rather than staying focused on building sales to the general public. Boards/sites like this may be benign, but they are still a symptom of that and others like Zango are most definitely not benign. With a handful of honorable exceptions, many of our major sponsors still treat surfers and affiliates as if we were in the 90's.

Bottom line, I suspect the report is at best a distortion, but I do believe that until a new generation of webmasters moves to the top of this industry we are being held back. Right now we must have many who long since fulfilled their ambitions and are marking time, others who owe their prominence to lucky timing and only momentum is keeping them moving. That doesn't make for a dynamic market, one that is better maximizing its potential.

Halfdeck · 2007-04-25, 09:27 AM

http://www.economist.com/business/di...ory_id=9040354

Jim · 2007-04-25, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

http://www.economist.com/business/di...ory_id=9040354

That's an interesting article and I saw a chart that looks like that a couple of months ago. But, it was for different sites.

Here is what has me puzzled about the premise of less people going to adult sites. As long as there are new people getting online, new people are going to visit adult sites. I could understand if the article said that the adult site market was saturated and individual sites were getting less visitors. But, to say that adult sites as a whole are getting less visitors just seems wrong. As "old" people stop visiting, "new" people begin.

r3n3gad3 · 2007-04-25, 05:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

http://www.economist.com/business/di...ory_id=9040354

that was the article I was reffering to, thnx Halfdeck!

But if this is true we will need to search for different methods to keep the visitors on our sites..

Halfdeck · 2007-04-25, 06:21 PM

That graph isn't tracking change in overall number of visits, just change in % share. You could have more people visiting adult sites and still show a negative trend.

For example:

Month 1:3 adult site visits / 3 myspace visits = 50%/50%.
Month 2:5 adult site visits / 15 myspace visits = 25% / 75%.

Jim · 2007-04-26, 08:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Halfdeck

That graph isn't tracking change in overall number of visits, just change in % share. You could have more people visiting adult sites and still show a negative trend.

For example:

Month 1:3 adult site visits / 3 myspace visits = 50%/50%.
Month 2:5 adult site visits / 15 myspace visits = 25% / 75%.

I thought of that just after I posted. You also have to look at one of the largest groups of new users...children. Of parents online, almost 1/3rd of their children under 2 are also online. And the largest group of new users are people under 21. So when you throw underage users into the mix, the data has to be scued.

Allfetish · 2007-04-25, 06:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jayeff

I haven't the vaguest idea whether overall we are losing or gaining visitors. I do know that online porn as a major industry is barely into its second decade and still moving towards the inevitable equilibrium between supply and demand. In other words, competition is getting fiercer and that surely impacts on the business done by the average site.

I do believe we have "stalled". The last real innovation from the mainstream adult webmaster community was live video back in what, 1997. Our product has generally improved and most of our sites are more user friendly, but essentially we have been selling the same things in the same ways for the past 5 years and more. The internet brings us a steady stream of new and therefore curious visitors, but the ratio of experienced surfers is steadily increasing and for those to whom we have failed to appeal, we have nothing new to offer.

While sites such as "I Shot Myself" and "Suicide Girls" have appeared out of left field as it were, longstanding webmasters have increasingly resorted to feeding off each other, rather than staying focused on building sales to the general public. Boards/sites like this may be benign, but they are still a symptom of that and others like Zango are most definitely not benign. With a handful of honorable exceptions, many of our major sponsors still treat surfers and affiliates as if we were in the 90's.

Bottom line, I suspect the report is at best a distortion, but I do believe that until a new generation of webmasters moves to the top of this industry we are being held back. Right now we must have many who long since fulfilled their ambitions and are marking time, others who owe their prominence to lucky timing and only momentum is keeping them moving. That doesn't make for a dynamic market, one that is better maximizing its potential.

Excellent post. I agree with the sentiment. It seems we have reached the point where conversion ratios seem to be ever climbing and competition is increasing making it harder to get traffic. Program owners now seem willing to screw over affiliates in their desperation to maintain a certain income level. They do this full well knowing the consequences that it will have to their relationship with potential affiliates. To me this tells me that either 1) Many of these people are starting to pursue an exit strategy where they are seeking short term revenue in order to be able to leverage that revenue in other non-adult ventures or 2) The program owners are taking calculated risks and assessing marketing conditions. They have decided that affiliate contributions to their revenues will likely decrease in the future.

Halfdeck · 2007-04-25, 08:37 PM

Quote:

essentially we have been selling the same things in the same ways for the past 5 years and more.

I blame bad marketing. Affiliates over promise and paysites under deliver. It should be the other way around.

Ronzo · 2007-05-02, 08:18 PM

I think many people in this business... both affiliates and program owners, whether they know it or not... are thoughtlessly pursuing a short term revenue model. There is such an enormous emphasis and attachment to the word "free" in this industry. In most other businesses, that word is not even in their industry vocabulary. When a newbie comes to this board, or any other board, and asks for advice, they're encouraged to start building free sites and galleries. Submit them to TGPs... and keep doing this day in and day out. The end result of this strategy is over-saturation of every niche and trend that comes along. It gets to be that the only surfer you have a chance of selling is a new one... or one who's not an experienced porn surfer. Because, as surfers become better educated on the adult side of the Net, they find less and less reason or need to purchase porn... especially that which is available through subscription sites. It's no wonder we're seeing higher and higher conversion ratios.

Try to make a regular, dyed-in-the-wool, gallery submitter see this point, and they'll boast that they make a sale or two every day. So, for the time being, this MO may be working for some. However, the long term deficiency in this strategy is that eventually internet growth slows down, creativity stagnates, technology languishes, and what worked in the past, fails miserably in the present, and provides no profitable segue to the future. We're intensely involved in a "give away the store" mentality to make a sale, instead of instilling value and worth in what we sell... and that's a very flawed strategy.

2007-04-25, 09:27 AM	#2
Halfdeck You can now put whatever you want in this space :) Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: New Haven, CT Posts: 985	http://www.economist.com/business/di...ory_id=9040354 __________________ Success is going from failure to failure without a loss of enthusiasm.

2007-04-25, 06:21 PM	#5
Halfdeck You can now put whatever you want in this space :) Join Date: Oct 2004 Location: New Haven, CT Posts: 985	That graph isn't tracking change in overall number of visits, just change in % share. You could have more people visiting adult sites and still show a negative trend. For example: Month 1:3 adult site visits / 3 myspace visits = 50%/50%. Month 2:5 adult site visits / 15 myspace visits = 25% / 75%. __________________ Success is going from failure to failure without a loss of enthusiasm.

2007-04-25, 08:02 AM	#1
jayeff Just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't understand! Join Date: Sep 2006 Posts: 95	I haven't the vaguest idea whether overall we are losing or gaining visitors. I do know that online porn as a major industry is barely into its second decade and still moving towards the inevitable equilibrium between supply and demand. In other words, competition is getting fiercer and that surely impacts on the business done by the average site. I do believe we have "stalled". The last real innovation from the mainstream adult webmaster community was live video back in what, 1997. Our product has generally improved and most of our sites are more user friendly, but essentially we have been selling the same things in the same ways for the past 5 years and more. The internet brings us a steady stream of new and therefore curious visitors, but the ratio of experienced surfers is steadily increasing and for those to whom we have failed to appeal, we have nothing new to offer. While sites such as "I Shot Myself" and "Suicide Girls" have appeared out of left field as it were, longstanding webmasters have increasingly resorted to feeding off each other, rather than staying focused on building sales to the general public. Boards/sites like this may be benign, but they are still a symptom of that and others like Zango are most definitely not benign. With a handful of honorable exceptions, many of our major sponsors still treat surfers and affiliates as if we were in the 90's. Bottom line, I suspect the report is at best a distortion, but I do believe that until a new generation of webmasters moves to the top of this industry we are being held back. Right now we must have many who long since fulfilled their ambitions and are marking time, others who owe their prominence to lucky timing and only momentum is keeping them moving. That doesn't make for a dynamic market, one that is better maximizing its potential.

2007-05-02, 08:18 PM	#9
Ronzo WHO IS FONZY!?! Don't they teach you anything at school? Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 40	I think many people in this business... both affiliates and program owners, whether they know it or not... are thoughtlessly pursuing a short term revenue model. There is such an enormous emphasis and attachment to the word "free" in this industry. In most other businesses, that word is not even in their industry vocabulary. When a newbie comes to this board, or any other board, and asks for advice, they're encouraged to start building free sites and galleries. Submit them to TGPs... and keep doing this day in and day out. The end result of this strategy is over-saturation of every niche and trend that comes along. It gets to be that the only surfer you have a chance of selling is a new one... or one who's not an experienced porn surfer. Because, as surfers become better educated on the adult side of the Net, they find less and less reason or need to purchase porn... especially that which is available through subscription sites. It's no wonder we're seeing higher and higher conversion ratios. Try to make a regular, dyed-in-the-wool, gallery submitter see this point, and they'll boast that they make a sale or two every day. So, for the time being, this MO may be working for some. However, the long term deficiency in this strategy is that eventually internet growth slows down, creativity stagnates, technology languishes, and what worked in the past, fails miserably in the present, and provides no profitable segue to the future. We're intensely involved in a "give away the store" mentality to make a sale, instead of instilling value and worth in what we sell... and that's a very flawed strategy.