Shandra Stark wrote:
I don't think people would want to pay for artistic nudes.  Otherwise, I'd be all over that.  Start-up costs, and all. 

I know how to market, and if there's money involved, I can be perfectly organized.  I'd update every night if that's what it took.  I'd have to fix my camera first, of course.  I've been too lazy, but...I'd totally get it going ASAP if I had anything people wanted to pay for.

People do pay to see artistic nudes,  I don't know about paying to see it online.  However, I do know people pay to see beautiful naked women online, no matter what you call it.  If a pretty girl can find 1000 guys to give her a dollar month to see her naked....What might be her rate of success in doing that?

Belk Media Group wrote:

People do pay to see artistic nudes,  I don't know about paying to see it online.  However, I do know people pay to see beautiful naked women online, no matter what you call it.  If a pretty girl can find 1000 guys to give her a dollar month to see her naked....What might be her rate of success in doing that?

If I could figure out how to make money at it I would start a paysite. I would want to use the work of other photographers, maybe five or six of them, and we would all be equal partners in the venture. I just don't know how to make it profitable.

Shandra Stark wrote:
I don't think people would want to pay for artistic nudes.  Otherwise, I'd be all over that.  Start-up costs, and all.

I've implemented a compromise strategy.  My web site features my fine art nude photography.  Rather than making it a pay site, I accept voluntary donations from folks.  My "public" galleries contain dozens of images from each of my sittings, and my "patrons" have access to an Out Takes gallery, which contains more images & more commentary.

I am an amateur, and I'm not interested in making my living via photography.  If I had a bonafide pay site, I figure that I'd have to produce images that sold rather than following my muse wherever she leads me.  Still, as it is, the web site does bring in enough revenue to pay for all my photography expenses, so that's gratifying.

Patrick Walberg wrote:
I have a paysite with over 50 models on it ..  www.InternetModelClub.com   People who browse model sites can join for only $10 a month and get lots of free stuff!
Models from ModelMayhem can join free at http://www.internetmodelclub.com/sign_up_model.php

You can join the Myspace profile for the "Club" site at www.myspace.com/InternetModelClub

This is something related to your post that I wrote, it's posted in my blog;


What makes a model website great?

Models, photographer and webmasters have been trying to create successful paysites of years now! I've been observing this Internet model phenomena since early 2001. Just going through my old favorites list is a reality check of how fickle this 'net modeling business really is! Link after link is a dead one, often after 4 months or less. In my opinion, it is more useful to focus on what causes those few websites to be successful rather than what causes most to fail.

There are five keys to having a successful modeling website in my opinion.  Those are; Talent, Consistency, Involvement, Business Ethics, and Networking. Those five keys can also be true of models websites that are NOT paysites too!

TALENT; Attractiveness is subjective. One can look physically attractive, yet it's not enough if critical areas which make the whole package are lacking.  Talent is much more than looking good!  Talent means playing up your strongest features and having a knack for getting your personality across in your images, writing, videos, and sometimes in personal appearances. Just looking good does not complete the whole picture. It takes talent to visualize your website and make it something that attracts people to you!  That takes talent!

Certain "looks" might be more popular, but the people who buy subscriptions to model websites and online publications are very diverse. So there is room for models of many shapes, sizes, ages, and ethnicities.  It really depends on imagination and targeting the correct market for ones look.  Being able to act, dance or have artistic ability can greatly help a model.  It is the combination of ones look, ability, knowledge and creative energy that bring together the talent needed to succeed. 

CONSISTENCY; Do things in a timely manner. Updates should be done as scheduled on the website. Customer service should also be consistent and timely. Customers do expect things to be there when scheduled or else they may grow impatient and move on.

The sets of photos, videos, and any other product offered should be at a certain quality level that customers can expect to be consistent with the website.  If quality fluctuates, then the customers will have doubts as to the worth of the site. Certainly the quality should be kept at the highest level of production in which the website production team can stay at. So set a quality level and schedule then stick to it!

INVOLVEMENT; Most people who are going to join model websites don't care about the photographer, or the process of creating the content.  They are there for the models!  Any model website must have involvement from the model to be successful. The more involved the model is in the website, the closer the customers feel to that model.  In other words, personality counts!

There is no need to give personal information on the website, but having a message board or forum in which the model drops in to post on a regular basis helps. Giving the members some information as to hobbies, likes, and dislikes can also help.  Some members would like to send birthday greetings or buy presents. However models do need to take precautions against stalkers or creepy obsessive people. Set limits of involvement and stick to it.   

BUSINESS ETHICS; Run the website like a business!  So many websites are started by models, photographers and webmasters with stars in their eyes.  They think it's a "get rich quick and easy" sort of scheme, but it's not.  They give up after a few months because they didn't realize how much hard work it takes to build and keep a successful website going. 

Don't outright lie to the customers.  They will not be happy about being lied to and will not come back!  Don't start in this model website business unless the commitment is strong.  It takes commitment and business sense to keep the website going longer than 6 months. If the honesty and commitment are not there, then the business ethics wont be there either. 

NETWORKING; It is absolutely critical to network and market!  It is how the members or fan base is built.  Doing banner exchanges with other sites, getting in affiliate programs, and feeding the search engines with meta tags are important to the success of a website.  Advertising and person to person promotions are also a part of networking too!

It's important to have a business plan on paper or at least in mind with web hosting and billing worked out.  The web server and billing are also a component of the networking.  Without good hosting, the website might crash or not be online all the time like it should. Without reliable billing, then the money might not be there. It's better to have a business plan that includes the leasing or purchase of servers, but at least get a strong hosting plan.  Get a merchant account if possible.  Third party billers can be very expensive!

Bring this all together with careful planning and that is what makes a successful model paysite!   One that can last for years running as a legitimate business! 

-Patrick Walberg, 7/25/06

+1!!!

///Leah

Tony Lawrence wrote:
Years ago you could make some decent cash but in a day where people
can use torrents to download porn plus see free porn/art/soft-core nudes why pay.
Magazines like Playboy are failing partly because of the web.  That said there
are MM members with pay sites that do make money. One features young Asian
girls another bondage and another fetish images.  These are people I know of.
They are a lot of work.  I know some sisters who started a adult themed site
with great nudes of Black women.  Classy, sexy stuff.  It also featured well
written reviews of films and books. 

They never made a dime.  People would share passwords, paying members
only joined for a month or so and after hosting costs, etc. They were lucky to
break even.  Paid sites seem to require serious networking, constant upkeep
and ever changing content.  It may be more work then most people would
want to do.

Porn is just one of many content on the web but doesn't define the internet when it comes to pay. Playboy has been going down hill way before the web. More harder core magazines and video is what help push Playboy down the hill. And the fact that porn is more mainstream, people are coming out of the closet to buy it compare to 20 plus years ago, where people wouldn't dare be seen inside an adult book store.


Internet, yes, the majority of internet porn is free. BUT, back on the paysite topic. It's going to boil down to the content, how you go by selling it and who is your target. I'm currently working on a pay website. But this something that I had planned for a few years and finally got everything that I need including the right software. Anyways, the point in bold is what you will have to take into consideration before you do anything.

Tony Lawrence wrote:
Years ago you could make some decent cash but in a day where people
can use torrents to download porn plus see free porn/art/soft-core nudes why pay.
Magazines like Playboy are failing partly because of the web.  That said there
are MM members with pay sites that do make money. One features young Asian
girls another bondage and another fetish images.  These are people I know of.
They are a lot of work.  I know some sisters who started a adult themed site
with great nudes of Black women.  Classy, sexy stuff.  It also featured well
written reviews of films and books. 

They never made a dime.  People would share passwords, paying members
only joined for a month or so and after hosting costs, etc. They were lucky to
break even.  Paid sites seem to require serious networking, constant upkeep
and ever changing content.  It may be more work then most people would
want to do.

Well my website is not a porn site, or else I wouldn't post the link on Mayhem.  That said, OMP could be considered a "paysite" because they charge members in order for them to have a profile and to view other pages.  ModelMayhem is free, but people set up profiles and browse this website for pictures!  For that reason I don't believe that all the profiles that get accepted on Mayhem are legit either.

The basis for what I wrote is from one model whose site I highly admire.  Patty has an extreme "tease" site.  I met her off OMP back in 2001 when she was getting ready to launch it.   Her site was a non nude modeling site featuring mostly her, but sometimes friends too. She teased us for years!  Only now are members getting more than glimpses of her beautiful breasts, and behind  .. and even then it's not anymore graphic or a pornographic than what you would find in Playboy for example.  Very softcore, but some how she has kept her fans attention so much longer than any other solo model website I've ever heard of.  She made a success of it!

Tony, you are correct in that to start a paysite is a lot of hard work, and there is no guarantee of success.  My hat is off to any one who is able to do it and make a living, especially today!

Legacys 7 wrote:
Porn is just one of many content on the web but doesn't define the internet when it comes to pay. Playboy has been going down hill way before the web. More harder core magazines and video is what help push Playboy down the hill. And the fact that porn is more mainstream, people are coming out of the closet to buy it compare to 20 plus years ago, where people wouldn't dare be seen inside an adult book store.


Internet, yes, the majority of internet porn is free. BUT, back on the paysite topic. It's going to boil down to the content, how you go by selling it and who is your target. I'm currently working on a pay website. But this something that I had planned for a few years and finally got everything that I need including the right software. Anyways, the point in bold is what you will have to take into consideration before you do anything.

You are right!  I think a better word to use is "Subscription" website.  There are reasons to charge for subscriptions to many websites that are not "porn" in nature.   I'm involved in the music industry, and one of the industry websites that I must belong to in order to get pertinent information that can make me money or cause me to lose money.  The website costs twice as much as OMP does for photographers to subscribe to!   But the music business is like the stock market, and some artists devaluate or inflate in value depending on details that the public is not privy to.   I simply MUST be a member of it!

Patrick Walberg wrote:

You are right!  I think a better word to use is "Subscription" website.  There are reasons to charge for subscriptions to many websites that are not "porn" in nature.   I'm involved in the music industry, and one of the industry websites that I must belong to in order to get pertinent information that can make me money or cause me to lose money.  The website costs twice as much as OMP does for photographers to subscribe to!   But the music business is like the stock market, and some artists devaluate or inflate in value depending on details that the public is not privy to.   I simply MUST be a member of it!

One of the other benefits in school is that I had took an e-commerce class. I made sure that marketing in general would be on my resume. So far, I've taken business marketing, e-commerce and business marketing for photographers. It's a necessity.

Shandra Stark wrote:
I don't think people would want to pay for artistic nudes.

+1

Belk Media Group wrote:

People do pay to see artistic nudes,  I don't know about paying to see it online.  However, I do know people pay to see beautiful naked women online, no matter what you call it.  If a pretty girl can find 1000 guys to give her a dollar month to see her naked....What might be her rate of success in doing that?

Yeah but in the internet world, artistic nude come a dime a dozen. In order for an nude artist to get that 1 per 1000 guys, he or she is going to have to bring in something that is unique. This is no more different than Tony's point about paying for porn vs free porn online. It's no contest, free porn rules the net and most aren't going to pay for something that they can see for free.

I've seen some very good artist nude online, but not enough to make me want to join just to pay for it. There are some nude artist work that I wouldn't mind having on my wall, but it's a certain type of female, but it wouldn't be enough or worth that member(s) to start a website to make money. Well, the membership part.

Shandra Stark wrote:
I don't think people would want to pay for artistic nudes.

I wouldn't be so sure, although you'd probably get a different clientele. You would get people signing up because they want to see good art, rather than porn, but whether that would be enough to make it viable is another matter, IMO.

Sabrina Maddison wrote:
I was going to...
until, working in the industry, I asked around about what the most successful paysites were making in this tube-site days. It's pitiful. I can make that little in an administrative job, forget softcore.

Rather do content and see the money.

Key word, "softcore." That's why Playboy is going down hill and will eventually meet it's demise. Most viewers like hardcore sites. There a lot of it out there. Some more harder than others. Pick your poison. Point, the internet has made a lot of taboo stuff easy to get because no one can see most of the viewers face unless they choose to be seen. Stuff that people always wanted to see, but were or are afraid to do it out in the open. Direct Tv can testify to this; their biggest clients are the porn buyers.

I guess a good compare and contrast would be, sex in the bedroom. Missionary position is boring to most that want to get buck wild and freak in the bed.

The only way to make a softcore site successful is that you'll have to bring something that is not common on the net and will arouse the viewers senses. And arouse doesn't just mean their dicks. That's one of the biggest mistakes that some of these female make when they start these type of sites.

I know an MM female member that has her own semi softcore site and is making a good dime from it.

Ed Stringbourne wrote:

I wouldn't be so sure, although you'd probably get a different clientele. You would get people signing up because they want to see good art, rather than porn, but whether that would be enough to make it viable is another matter, IMO.

Maybe, but she would have to bring something to the table that will make the viewers not say, "What's so different about this individual compared to the thousands of nude art out there?" Not easy to do.

Legacys 7 wrote:

Maybe, but she would have to bring something to the table that will make the viewers not say, "What's so different about this individual compared to the thousands of nude art out there?" Not easy to do.

Agreed. My 'you' was a general 'you', not a specific 'you', however. But same idea applies. I'm sure that it would be easier for some art nude models than others due to existent fan base etc.

Jay Cain wrote:
Agreed. My 'you' was a general 'you', not a specific 'you', however. But same idea applies. I'm sure that it would be easier for some art nude models than others due to existent fan base etc.

Yes,

I know that it was general. That's why I said this too. The biggest problem is, many people don't sit back and think these things out. Especially the female that want to do nude paid sites. It's kind of like some of these female MM newbies that show some breast and ass and assume that men on here will pay them for it. Yeah right. I'm not.

Edit. Opps, I thought that I was replying to the same person.

Glamour Dreaming wrote:
Well back inthe 90's I had a few sites all made great money, then the digital age took off and content price feel thru the floor and everyone had a site. The other issue became getting the right models. In order to run a Non failing Paysite is you need great content, but with what the models think they are worth is way over the top.
Paysites are not making the money they did in the 90's. The other issue is a credit card processor most now do not take Adult based sites because of all the charge backs. So in 2009 you would have a hard time making a pay site float.
Would I do it again ?  Hmmmm No.

My 2 cents...

Another excellent point. During the 90's there weren't near as many sites by individuals like you have now. When I had my site up back in 1999, it was something that many individuals were blown away with, (older html site) because the net was still new. Technology has made it easier and cheaper to make sites and now everybody and their mother have a website. Competition, in order to compete bring something that others don't have or be creative with what similar competition have.

Glamour Dreaming wrote:
They other issue is find a Hosting company that will allow adult content. Godaddy will tell you know, enom and many others will tell you no as well. So when you do you will end up paying between 150.00 to 500.00 amonth plus more if you go over the bandwidth they allow. Lots of things to deal with, not just throwing up a few pages with images. The time to shoot, then edit images then place them on the site plus figure out what images to show to get the customers hooked to pay for the site. Then deal with your cc company on charge backs ( because momma saw daddy's CC bill for the month ) and it goes round and round..... 1 avg site will take up to about 80 hrs aweek easy. Also remember out of your CC billing you will only see about 60 - 70% because you have to use a 3rd party processor to do all your billing as Paypal and Verisign ( now paypal also ) will not allow adult sites. Most 3rd party processors will only send money twice a month as long as you receive X amount a month from clients.
With todays paysites avg intake is $10.00 amonth from client now minus you 40% for CC processing that leaves you $6.00 per customer, now it takes a lot of clients to make $400.00 for your hosting fee's for the month then you need to buy your content, avg model for a 4hr shoot at least $500.00 for this type of content and you need at least 3 New models a month to keep them coming back. Good luck...
Like I said been there done that and will never do it again...

Your post is full of misinformation.   It is possible to purchase and use your own server.  Better idea too!  I can tell you where you can get a server set up and maintained for about $100 a month.  If your site takes off, you'll need a bigger one, and that would still be under $200 a month.  You'd have your own server set up and maintained for that price.  No one would hassle you about the content on it.

Average monthly rate is actually closer to $20 per month for most subscriptions, not $10.  As to billing, you don't have many choices, but CCbill does NOT charge 40%!   They "hold back" about 40% for a length of time incase of chargebacks.  They charge closer to 10%, and some long term, and large customers get charged less than that ... closer to 8%.  You do get the other 30% that was held back after that period of time ... which is up to 6 months. 

Please do your research!

Patrick Walberg wrote:

Your post is full of misinformation.   It is possible to purchase and use your own server.  Better idea too!  I can tell you where you can get a server set up and maintained for about $100 a month.  If your site takes off, you'll need a bigger one, and that would still be under $200 a month.  You'd have your own server set up and maintained for that price.  No one would hassle you about the content on it.

Average monthly rate is actually closer to $20 per month for most subscriptions, not $10.  As to billing, you don't have many choices, but CCbill does NOT charge 40%!   They "hold back" about 40% for a length of time incase of chargebacks.  They charge closer to 10%, and some long term, and large customers get charged less than that ... closer to 8%.  You do get the other 30% that was held back after that period of time ... which is up to 6 months. 

Please do your research!

You beat me to it. I was going to say that you can use your own server.

Alchymia Studio Chicago wrote:
What if there was a reality tv show, and they gave you all the money you needed and 30 days to attempt to start a successful (fill in the blank)

They do, It's called "The Real World"...oh, the irony...