To sell or monetize unique Web App / Service website with ~2.000 active members base? (need help / advice)

[signorm68]

Hi everybody, I need small advice, so hope someone here can give me some good tip, so I will try to explain in few words what is all about.


I am for more than 10 years developer/SEO/affiliate marketing person, and my business always was in that "direction": making sites related to products or product groups, doing SEO, driving free traffic, making sales , taking commission for that and so on.


Last year, after getting some extra money, decided to make one web app that I tough it can be popular and useful, and of course monetized (from membership fees) and I made some market research, and everything else before start, found coders and published that web service or web app within 6 months (that was 13 months ago, when app become "public")


Web app/service has 3 different membership packages + 1 free. Idea was to give users, for some time, (6 months or something) to use full functionality in that "free" package and latter to switch them slowly to paid packages.


People started to come from search engines, and everything is great, all traffic is 100% targeted and free, about 50% (yes HALF) people who come open account and use web app in "free plan" what is for me one more fact that I hit a goal: app is useful, better than competition, easy to use, something that people need and perfectly SEO that brings free traffic, etc...


Only problem was/is that I don't have time, and when find some time, never know from where to start from with converting existing free users into "paid" and forcing new users to buy paid packages (packages are from $5 - $50, everything automated, all kind of payments accepted, everything works smooth and easy)


Summary: about 2.000 active members / service users for now, increasing 10-20 daily, all from search engines, didn't spent CENT EVER on advertising. All keywords that site got traffic, are real keywords for service I am providing, everything is perfect 30-40 unique daily + 5-10 from refferals, mostly from US / UK. Also traffic from SE (and conversions ) increase 10-20% for every month. In one word: again - perfect!


From tech side, everything is fast, simple, easy to use, low resource consuming (everything is done in ajax) so I suppose that is one of the reasons why people like my service more than competition, also there is a fact that is free , I mean have paid packages but EVERYBODY use free packages (I would too on their place ) There is a lot of space for increasing free traffic (for example text on site is written by my, didn't hired professional writers, wanted to see conversions and than to improve SEO on even higher level, also UX/UI design is something that I wanted to improve latter when service starts to earn money )


Also, not to mention, since I developed this for myself (idea / architecture and part of code + freelancing for another part of code) I done my best, so everything runs on $3/month hosts, can handle thousands of users without any delays, easy to scale, improve add new options,etc...


==============
THE PROBLEM
==============
I hope I didn't bored you, but wanted just to explain to understand what is all about. Now problem as you can see is:


- I am not earning singe $ from this service / web app


- I tried to find and found partner to share 50%-50%. His job was to take care, make monetization strategy and start making "sales" (paid mamberships) but what he done was just wasting of time, so we "broke up" after 15 days, i can freely say that is my mistake I didn't look closer and choose better partner.


- I didn't check support requests for 3 months, usually don't look stats for 15-20 days, simply don't have a time. It was chalange to build and test, but don't know to manage/monetize


- got some offers ($3K-$4K) so sell, but didn't want to sell for less than $7K, what are my expenses + my time


- got some offers ($1K-$2k) to sell source code, man wanted same business under another name(brand) but I refused this, because I don't want to have more competition for few $K. (Few months latter guy spent few $K on some ugly and primitive system than somebody make for him, and PM-ed my that he makes $1.000/month, and if I changed my mind to migrate/sell him my users for $1.000, I refused that too. But figured out that everybody need todo what know best and that I DON'T KNOW TO MANAGE membership site, I know to make it and that's it)


- tried to put adSense just see what will happend, and sites conversions gone down and adSense earnings was $4-$5 daily. Off curse it is STUPID to sell ads to my competitors, so that was just experiment for 1 week) I made web app to sell service, not content site where services will buy targeted visitors for me. So when removed ads, conversions (into free members) back to normal


- I even see in google keywords that competition pays ~$2 per CLICK on MY SERVICE name , It has only 200-300 searches monthly, but it is good indicator that I made nice app/service. (some popular blogs and web app review sites wrote about app so i suppose that people know my brand from there)


So, THE PROBLEM is that I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH THIS SITE!
To sell it? To find partner again? To leave people to use forever and make money from adsense or something? To sell 10 clones for $2K? To BURN it ? I am sometime so frustrated that I would like that this "problem" is piece of paper and I would burn it in second and solve problem forever! That's always happens once in 2 months, when I say "Ok I have few days free, lets what to do with xyz project"




This is 3rd or 4th time that I am trying to "do something" with this, and this time, at least I am going step further: I AM ASKING YOU. Because my "brainstorming" on this problem always finish with my wishes to "burn the damn thing "


On the other side, I have very nice business, that from simple affiliate marketing, grew up into price compare business, so not to mention what is priority in my life and what is more lucrative. But then again, I back to this "damn thing" that I love and hate and don't know what to do with. It is not all about money, I am simply frustrated that something I CAN'T FIGURE OUT WHAT TO DO.


So please give me your advice, ideas, solutions, experiences, anything.


I am new on this forum and not sure is it allowed to post URL so you can see website (web app), if it is I will. if it is not allowed, and you want to help, pm so I will send you. Also tell me what are chances to get fair price without earnings, if I decide to offer on sale (here, flippa or somewhere else) with all those facts that I mentioned ?


I know that if I get just 20 paid members in lowest price package it would be $100/monthly what makes site with this type income at least $2K-3K in worst case. Contacted some brokers to get price estimation and got $0-$xx.000 but that are just estimations.
Also, now remembered and need to tell you, this will be funny and educative for you especially if you are site buyer: one of "brokers" that I asked for estimation and to manage sale,etc,told me that site is perfect and small problem that site don't make money isn't problem at all in this case, because he will "invest" $2.500 into making paid members (open free email, then open "user" account on my service with that email, then purchase paid package for that "virtual" user), then we will show stats from payment provider on flippa auction after one month, and if we reach $60K (what was his estimation) I will refund him $2.500 + pay $20K for making whole that strategy and sale. Wise plan, isn't it?


Point is that I am now in closed circle: 1) I want to monetize-> 2)find out that I don't know how-> 3)then I am angree and want to sell -> 4) any price that someone offer don't satisfies me -> 5) I said ok put on side, we will see what will do. >>> Than after 2 months I "go to step 1"


Help me leave this "circle"

[chockfactor]

Since you seem like a scary-cat with this, either keep letting it not making you any money(which I guess you don't want) or try to move your members on to the paid membership. Just warm them up a little through emails and news as to why they should become paying customers. If the paid version isn't different enough from the free one, to make them want to jump on the paid bandwagon.

I would do it in another way, limit some of the features in the free version. Remember to update people about that, so chances of them getting mad is less and then you can presell them on the idea of a paid membership.

And maybe start to over 14 days free trials or 30, to new members. And tell the old ones if they refer at least 2 people who become paying they'll get the paid version free them selves.

[signorm68]

chockfactor thanks for your time and advice. free package is limited in 'quantity' but not in quality, or in other words they have everything in free package but can scale while they are in free package, so that is some kind of limited functionality. Partner that I mentioned tried another strategy, he closed free package for new users and bombed 3 times weekly existing users base to upgrade to paid plains with some story, result was that there was no new members and existing didn't responded to this 'call' at all. After that I rolled back on beginning - no forcing to paid plans...


Others?

[Clinton]

signorm68, I've been watching this thread and hoping that you'd get some more replies, but seeing as there isn't a great deal of suggestions here for you I thought I'd chip in.

To summarise your post, you've created this app which has become quite popular but your original plan to transition people from the free version to the paid version isn't working. You tried other options such as Adsense and have considered selling copies of the script etc., and selling the site itself (which is a problem as you don't have proof of earnings).

My first suggestion: Forget free traffic. While visitors from Google SERPs may show high conversion, they are showing high conversion for FREE stuff. Dump that! Reduce the facilities available for free and provide incentives for people to take paid subscription from day one i.e. a better version of the free option (as chockfactor suggested)! Sign up affiliates and offer them a good commission to drive to your site those people who are going to convert to the paid version. Advertise in multiple locations and track the ad spend to see where it is most effective (in terms of paid conversions). You have an "asset" and you need to convert that to a "business".

BTW, feel free to post the link if you want.

I know most of the brokers in this industry. I'm curious as to who came up with the suggestion that he'd invest money in creating the fake stats required to make your site look profitable and attractive to a buyer (PM me this information if you wish to share).

[Kay]

I also read this thread with interest but didn't join in before because I don't know much about apps and don't even know what niche the project is in. It would be great to see the site as long as you're not concerned about competitors getting any benefit from any information that might be posted on a public forum. Personally, I think it would be better for you to keep this public discussion general and move to a more private area for discussion which might involve your trade secrets.

I don't think you yet have the 'rank' to create your own group on EP. However, I would be prepared to create a private, invitation-only group and invite you and anyone else you want to that group. Then you could speak more freely about this subject. Does that sound like a good idea or not?

I also think the idea of affiliates is a good one. Problem - you are finding it difficult to sell sign-ups. Solution - get others to sell for you on commission.

[signorm68]

Clinton thanks for taking part here, also , I am new here, and read a lot on forum in past days, not sure but I think you are owner/founder?
If you are, then congrats from me for creating such great forum! If you are not then just "forward" to forum founder those congrats Ok about forwarding is joke off course.
Also, I am member of many other similar forums for more than 10 years, but never sow some conventions like here, and never sow that they are so strictly respected. And I really like that so much! For example on my first day I made few mistakes, let say i was too "loud" here, since such manners got from some other forums that i am participating, and great admin "KenW3" 2 times explained to me, in details what i am doing wrong (instead of giving me infractions or ban or something), so I would use this chance to give compliments to KenW3 too.
Ok this was a bit of topic but I wanted to say this.


Now back to topic: your summary is correct and your advice/tips looks great to me. Actually you spit so many facts, so until reading your post I was feeling like you are running and I am trying to "catch" you. I don't know, since my English is not very good, did you understand what I am trying to said: simply I want to say that you are just giving advice/tips that have sense and you are doing that with such speed

[*] your suggestion about free traffic and good conversion for users who "look for free" is OK, and I would say same to somebody else, but 1 fact confuses me: when I open last 7-8 month G analytic, select organic, and copy past first 30-40 keywords that Google sending traffic to me, and paste that keywords into AdWords estimator, I see that ALL are nice paying keywords. Most of them about $1.5-$2, and smaller part go to $7-$10. There is NO SINGLE keyword that is lower than $1.5.
On the other side, like I said I tested adSense, and I see that my competitors buying that traffic, for keywords that don't have prefix "free" aBUT ALSO for those which has prefix "free [service]". Someone buying even my domain name kwd (word have generic term but in certain combinations is it clear that someone picking my domain name, no spaces between etc).
So when I look at this as Internet Marketer I KNOW they convert all that people who search for free or without free. I know because everybody buys permanent only those keywords that converts. Don't forget I already said I am for long time in this business and know a lot about PPC and how market define price for certain keyword. Any case, maybe that is problem I am IM, maybe I should'n even try to make 'service' , but now is late and frustrating I have service and don't know what to do. Germans say something like "if you are shoe maker than you should be shoe maker", as I understand that means "do what you know to do, and stay away from things that do not know how to do", so that is problem "deeply" in me but lets back to this very defined and "visible" problem(mean on my website) .
Why I am telling this? For first time I made something that should converts traffic to sale, no matter I didn't all SEO that is planed (something is scheduled for last round) never had such good / profiled keywords: no longtails, no wrong-targeted and similar. Only POSITIVE thing about this site, is that, maybe SOUND ABSURD, I learned something even more about SEO, since always pulled organic traffic for MFA and last years affiliate sites and never ever have such good and 100% "right" keywords on any site and I made tens maybe more than 1 hundred just for own purposes/incomes. This project helped me to understand how even better to do SEO on affiliate sites and attract more traffic.

Now like I said, when I look this as IM I got clear picture how to convert to project that will make from adSense, but I am sure that this can make much more from subscriptions, I hope that you understand what confusing me from those facts above.

[*] what you said about affiliates and <an "asset" and you need to convert that to a "business".> also make sense. Again, I am confused since always I WAS SOMEONE AFFILIATE selling bedding stuffs, auto parts, books, appliances, computers thousands stuffs and now don't have idea how and where to find affiliates that will know how to sell my service subscriptions.

But this is definitely direction where I can try, because I don't see any other option that I can manage, so will definitely look for affiliates specialized in such activity (selling online services or software-as-service), so thanks very much for encouraging me on this step.


[*]what you asked about broker, I hope you don't mind to keep that info, simply I don't mad at him, and he wanted to make maximum profit for both, so I know that is not nice if he do on same way with other sites that sell but that is (will be) his problem.


URL of site is,just search google for: cloud contact forms and go to first result, or just remove spaces between those 3 words and end with .com

EDIT: this is stupid, I didn't want to post directly link here, and started to explain copy paste,remove spaces,blah,blah, simply use this url:<snip>

You can try live demo with opening account(huge button), you have at bottom all links about pricing etc, don't be surprised if you find language mistakes and spelling etc, such stuffs I am polishing in last SEO round which for this site isn't done yet (and will be when I found what to DO WITH TRAFFIC THAT THIS SITE GET! )


Also thanks Kay for taking part in this discussion and advice for getting some affiliates.