Raising funds - how should we?

guitars4you

@Ttony can we move this on to 'Gear' and 'Guitars' - or start a new blog

Seymour1

Bridgehouse said:

Of course, there's a fretboard PayPal gift address that people could donate to at any time in lieu of a formal membership fee..

And I suspect the cost is more that people realise - remember, fees go up as traffic increases.. 

The bit people forget about is the time and effort that goes in to keep it running which would cost a hell of a lot if it were charged for which the admin team give freely at the moment..

Considering the entire forum and not just the classified, I think that one problem is that the PPG address isn't well advertised. Last time I can recall this being identified was as a payment address for the 2016 calendar (or the mugs?). Also a lot of new members are joining. Why not add a sticky / announcement to the major sections (Guitar, Guitars £, Off Topic) simply saying that if people wish to contribute to forum running costs they can do so via this address (or PM the admin team if they don't have a paypal account). Then review how much this brings in compared to the one offs like calendars and assess future options at that time.

IvisonGuitars

guitars4you said:

@Ttony can we move this on to 'Gear' and 'Guitars' - or start a new blog

@guitars4you You can do that Mark, just click the black cog and edit :-)

Deadman

Glad to see this moved appropriately. To add to what I've already said, I'd support some kind of funding 100%. I'm up for whatever comes and still vote for something like 'buying' stars for your profile similar to what the FDP does.

stickyfiddle

I'd be interested to see some figures on user and visit numbers & patterns combined with costs. I'll be honest and say I didn't buy a calendar because my desk is too small and I wouldn't be home for xmas to pick it up, but I am very happy to do the ad hoc donation every so often.

A more obviously-signposted voluntary donation system would probably a good idea; even having a "donate" button at the top might go some way.

TTony

Deadman said:

I'm up for whatever comes and still vote for something like 'buying' stars for your profile similar to what the FDP does.

Does anyone see any downside to the "donor badge" type approach?

The other option that appealed (not least because I'd suggested it elsewhere!) is putting the Classifieds behind some sort of paywall.

Free to view so everyone can still see what's being advertised, but we might remove the option for someone to send PMs and to post replies on Classifieds threads until they'd made the donation ....

BRISTOL86

I know people don't like them but would banner ads generate a healthy revenue boost? You could then have a 'Fretboard Premium' membership for a nominal annual fee whereby one of the perks is no ads? 

I use plenty of forums which do have ads and although they can be a little annoying they're never intrusive enough to make me consider not using the forum. 

Sporky

Could go the Ravelry route. Banner ads from selected partners that have to be relevant and unobtrusive.

Shame the knuckle-draggers managed to shut down any prospect of support from Andertons.

Seymour1

BRISTOL86 said:

I know people don't like them but would banner ads generate a healthy revenue boost? You could then have a 'Fretboard Premium' membership for a nominal annual fee whereby one of the perks is no ads? 

Providing that banner ads weren't open to anyone then the banner ad maybe of interest to all members so missing ads via premium membership might actually be a disadvantage

boogieman

Why not put out an appeal for an annual donation? I'd happily bung in some dosh every year to keep the place going. 

guitarfishbay

I don't want any more 'stuff' so that's why I don't buy calendars. I've donated in the past but to be honest the main reason I've not given more is I forget and just assume things are running ok. 

TimmyO

Copy the basschat model - I agree. I just paid for years classifieds there as I have an amp and some pedals to sell. 

TimmyO

TimmyO said:

Copy the basschat model - I agree. I just paid for years classifieds there as I have an amp and some pedals to sell. 

but find an existing tool (forum/plugin) that already allows for this - don't roll your own. 

Winny_Pooh

Charge for viewing/selling in the classifieds for a 12 month period is fair. I'd pay £10-15. You should start at the price you plan to charge in 5 years though or you will get monumental gripes if you increase it. 

bluechargeboy

Sevenstring.org have an optional subscription and vendor system with various bits and bobs of extras that get unlocked.

EricTheWeary

Let's assume there was £300 cleared profit from the calendars. I have no idea whether that covers costs for a day, month, year, whatever. Maybe other people do but I have no sense of it at all. I'm not including admin time, I understand that once you started calculating that in then it would go through the roof. Partly I'm just curious about it but partly it would give us an idea of the size of the problem.

I know we've covered this ground before and I can only give the same suggestion that I've done. On other specialist forums you get preferred dealers, something like a shop window with cards ( I'm not very IT literate but you get the idea)that pops up when you log on. I'm presuming they pay to be there and those links are in turn relatively useful to forum members. Going on the Mazda Bongo site and need a new exhaust, aha there's a Bongo parts dealer with a card in the window. 

I'm fairly sure we don't currently have commercial advertising on here. However, the original Discussion this span off from was selling £10k of guitars by a guitar dealer. This isn't a dig at Guitars4You but essentially the forum allows participants to commercially advertise if they do all the right other stuff. If you make ' the right other stuff' £250 ( or whatever) to be a preferred dealer for a year then that seems relatively easy to administrate and reduces the policing of the classifieds. As long as they pay for the card then if there are subsequent Discussions about how shit their service is then they can reply or not or withdraw. Up to them at no cost to TheFB. 

A lot of the percentage or fee based ideas seem like a lot of work and, let's face it, easily got around if so minded. 

Bygone_Tones

Something I've noticed a few forums doing thesedays is they auto convert all ebay and amazon links to affiliated links. Worth looking into in my opinion, it would be a very big earner for you. Just means putting a bit of code into the HTML and you sit back and watch the earnings come in. Lets face it there are tonnes of links on here daily. It would make you a stack more money than selling calendars in my opinion.

Also you could sell banner ad space to businesses, and do the subscription thing for the classifieds section.

A lot of forums are very strict about businesses/dealers using their classifieds and plain do not allow it . Some have a separate classifeds section for businesses (that no-one ever visits). I think on the gear page they do allow businesses but as part of their subscription.

Strat_a_tat_tat

@Ttony. I quite like the idea of an annual fee for placing ads in the classifieds. However, you might want to find some clever words to exclude the type of pro dealers / shops that could totally spam the site.

I believe that dealers like @Guitars4you are an asset to the site. Mark doesn't spam us. Yes, occasionally, he posts about special deals (and they can be very special at times - so learning about those is usually welcome)... but he also contributes knowledge, experience and opinion to other areas of the site. Would be good to encourage this type of dealer - but discourage those that might seek to advertise every item of stock they have etc.

Thinking about it, perhaps an annual fee to advertise could be subject to 'abuse'. How about something like... your first ad (one item per ad) is free... then you can buy the rights to advertise 10 items (as when you want to sell something) for a fixed fee. When you've used up your 10 items... you buy another set of 10 ads. Would that be difficult to administer? Perhaps another option would be a 6 month fee... which entitles user to place ads for 10-15 items in a 6 month period. If the user abuses this and places ads for 50 items in the period, they could be banned from classifieds or charged a higher fee for the next 6 months???

Would WTB ads incur a fee?

In addition to charging for placing ads... I think it would be good to publicise the fact that general users can make a donation as well.

Perhaps mention optional donations in the rules (although lots of people don't read the rules!)... then, after a new user has been active on the site for 3 months (without advertising), send the user an email... saying you hope they're enjoying the site - and letting them know it costs cash to run and inviting them to make a small donation.

In addition, I wouldn't be upset if I got a regular six-monthly email reminding me that this place costs cash to run.

I've been on this site for a few years... and always intended to make some small donation/s... but, until recently, I hadn't. Partly as I don't have a PayPal account (so it's a bit of a faff - but I know that's a poor excuse)... and partly coz good intentions are easily forgotten (hence, a six-monthly reminder email could be a good idea... to prick the consciences of people like me). The recent desk calendar gave me a chance to buy an item and I also included a very small additional donation. It's my intention to make further small donations in the future... I just need a reminder!

Sporky

Maybe there could be fines for making logical fallacies.

TimmyO

The more complicate the functionality the more likely that updates to other areas will break it, and the more work you have to do to admin it.

Access to classifieds to post ads is the one thing that the larger group of people will find it easy to place a value on, and can therefore justify to themselves handing over money.