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Community Profile - 10 Questions for Colin |
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How many years have you been involved with the adult industry?
We started by the seat of our pants in 1994 as an online bondage garment and
toy vendor, so much to my amazement; we are now in our ninth year! My, how
time flies!
Wasteland.com is the flagship site of your Spice Cash program - can
you give us a little background on Wasteland, what niche(s) it encompasses
and how it got started?
In 1994, my wife and I were running a mail order bondage and fetish gear
business and decided to put a bit of it up on that "new thing", the web to
solicit catalogue requests. After getting a listing in Yahoo and a few other
early search engines, we suddenly had a good amount of traffic coming in,
but no catalogue requests - just surfers looking at the pictures of the
models in leather "kinkwear." So, we decided if they wanted it that bad, to
charge $10 for the year to view the online catalogue.
Money started pouring in, but still no catalogue requests. As an experiment, we created an early version of an e-zine, filled it up with photos and charged $50 a year for
it. Lo and behold, the perception of value kicked in, the memberships rolled
in, and Wasteland was born. We stayed at this rate for the first 2 years and
then went to the recurring monthly billing model, which was probably the
smartest thing we ever did.
Since that time, wasteland has grown and has a
substantial worldwide community of members that retain for many months. As
for wasteland's niches, we cover all aspects of BDSM and fetish interest.
The list is too long to write here, but, if it's a fetish, it's covered in
the site.
You have some amazing photography on Wasteland.com - both in the
quality of the photos, the artistic nature of them if you will - and in the
extremeness of their fetish. How important would you say the quality of
this content has been to the success of your site?
VERY important. One of the major factors contributing to the success of any
niche site is the uniqueness and quality of the photography and video work.
Our goal is to "make it real, and make it shine" and this has worked out
very well in attracting and retaining members over the years. The other
benefit of taking the time to produce high quality, artistic content is that
it builds a recognizable brand which goes a long way in helping a site rise
above the throng of free porn and cheaply made paysites.
What would you say is the biggest mistake that webmasters make when
creating a fetish niche site? Why are so many missing the mark?
Not to over-generalize here, but I'd have to say that it is folks trying to
produce a "fetish niche" site, but are not actually interested in or
actively involved in that fetish. There was a very humorous sequence that
occurred around 1999 when every paysite operator, big ones through small,
decided to take a crack at producing a BDSM or fetish site. All the stops
were pulled out for marketing these: beautiful tours, stunning graphics and
all the "right verbage" (which looked suspiciously like Wasteland's - go
figure!), but the member areas stunk.
Thousands of canned images with no stories, member forums, how-to guides, etc. - all those things that the fetish niche crowd demands for their money. So, most of them simply went
away over the next few years. The lesson here is that if you don't know
anything about a particular niche or fetish, don't try to produce a site in
that niche unless you can hire or partner with someone who is actively
involved in that activity to manage your editorial content and interact with
the community on their interest level.
What are some of the niche sites offered in your Spice Cash
affiliate program - and how much can webmasters make promoting your suite of
sites?
Aside from wasteland.com, we also produce bdsmhardcore.com (a less artistic,
more edgy version), forbiddeneast.com (our Japanese bondage and erotica
site), eroticaxxx.com (a mainstream porn broadband video site) and two new
ones that are being launched this fall, one "for women/by women" erotica
site, and a gay BDSM community site. For these, we have folks from those
communities running the editorial for us and they are looking like they will
take off in a big way. As for payouts, we pay $30-35 on trial conversions.
We are adding back in the option for revshare later this month as many of
our older affiliates said they made more money when we had that system due
to our long retention rates.
An avid participant in the educational seminars at industry events
over the years, how important do you feel it is for webmasters to attend the
workshops provided at these events?
Aside from working hard on all aspects of building and marketing your sites,
industry events are probably the most valuable thing any webmaster can do to
grow his or her business. Most of the "real deals" for traffic and such are
made at these conferences and to not take advantage of them is just plain
bad business! As for attending the workshops, absolutely essential! For the
new webmaster, there is invaluable information presented. For the seasoned
webmaster, there are a lot of new tricks and developments discussed to keep
us at the top of our game. The seminars are also a unique opportunity to get
a glimpse into the thinking of some of the pros that are on the panels.
Many webmasters are finally beginning to back away from extreme
hardcore content in their tours and free areas. Do you feel that this is
helpful to the industry, as far as reducing the amount of free porn
available on the 'Net - or is it too little too late?
Aside from the fact that it is a good thing not to be shotgun broadcasting
hardcore porn in free sites where there is no way to keep it off the screens
of kids and law enforcement, the old saying "why buy the cow if you can get
the milk for free?" really applies here. If the surfer has gotten enough
content to "be satisfied" (as it were), why would anyone think that they
would then spend money to see more, rather than have a smoke and go to bed?
I believe having a lot of very small teaser free sites is a good thing to
get as much exposure on the search engines and link lists as possible, but
keeping these sites small and not giving away the farm is just common sense
from a marketing viewpoint. Think of your freesites as a pre-sell. It's not
free porn; it's a sneak peek at what the premium site has to offer.
What do you feel is the biggest challenge that the adult online
industry is facing today?
Payment systems, payment systems, payment systems. This industry basically
sabotaged itself over a 5-year period with the credit card companies by
practicing fast and loose financial and customer service practices. Now, the
chickens have come home to roost. Amex bailed years ago. Visa and Master
Card have clamped down to the point where over the next 12 months it is
going to be more and more difficult for the current billing models to stay
within their new regulations. Alternative billing methods (checks, SMS,
etc.) are fine ideas, but combined, constitute less than 5% of the billing
revenues so are not a real hopeful solution at present. So, I have no
particular wisdom or prophecies to state on this topic, but I do know that
it's going to get a lot harder after October 1st, 2003.
If you were to offer advice to a new webmaster, just getting started
in today's market - what would you tell him?
Get passionate about it. Read as much as is available online. Go to trade
shows and talk to people. Participate in the newbie discussion boards
online. Get together as much money as you can, but don't spend ANY of it
without running the idea past at least two experienced people. Launch a few
AVS and free sites and learn how traffic works. Understand how to read
server logs and visitor stats. Don't plan to make a cent for the first six
months.
At the end of six months, try a small paysite: One time,
non-recurring billing at a cheap price (REAL CHEAP! like $5.00 for 30 days)
to get your hand into the billing and customer service aspects of the
business at a minimum risk. If at that point in time, you feel that you are
able and passionate about running a paysite that has large weekly updates
and a few new little things every day, go ahead and start recurring billing
on your now established site. I've missed about 99% of what needs to happen
here, but those are the major weigh points.
Where do you see the adult industry a year from now - what changes
do you think will most likely come about in 2004?
More film. Lots more film. As broadband propagates around the globe,
viewers' tastes and interests are now demanding it. I also suspect that as
the recurring billing model becomes more difficult to maintain, there will
be a lot of room for one-time purchase sites that give a little bit of
content. And then the "premium" content (i.e. full-length movies), as
up-sells for a reasonable one-time pay-per-view fee.
Think cable TV billing structure here. Consumers are accustomed to it, and this system drastically reduces chargeback ratios. Keep your recurring billing sites, of course, but
add on as many one-time-for-small-fee sites as possible to offset your
chargeback rates.
Colin Rowntree is the President of Wasteland.com and its affiliate program SpiceCash.com, which encompasses five unique and original BDSM/fetish niche sites. Well-known throughout the industry and credited as one of the leading innovators of processing, off-shore commerce and niche marketing, Colin is a regular speaker at industry seminars and an avid contributor to industry eduational news sources.
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