Thaivisa Forum Will Remain A Free Service

[george]

Thaivisa forum will remain a free service

A plan to launch a new range of value added services at thaivisa.com to be financed via member fees for new signups has been abolished.

The plan was to charge new registered members a low subscription fee to gain access to several new services, including unlimited free international SMS messages.

The new planned services will later be introduced, but as free services, financed by advertising revenue instead.

Bangkok 2006-10-23

Edited October 23, 2006 by george

[mocean]

I would really like a free sms service, I now use the payed sms service already a lot!

[udon]

Why not ban free email addresses by new members.

ISP email address only?

It works for a lot of forums and might make the re-signing members think twice. (ie: banned members)

Just a thought!

[taxexile]

good decision to keep it a free forum , after all its the input of the posters that make this forum so good.

without the posters there is no forum , so who should be paying who ?

by all means charge for sms , e mail services , or downloadable visa information packs , but to charge members for offering opinions would in my opinion have been the death knell for this forum.

[Bizz]

Advertizing would be huge income gainer with free SMS.

[udon]

Advertizing would be huge income gainer with free SMS.

How?

[Old Croc]

At least the whole thing gave the inmates in the asylum something to have an orgasm over (the first time for many). Losers.com managed to rack up 16 pages of mainly inane dribble in a thread created for the purpose of discussing events on Thaivisa.

[Chang_paarp]

George

By all means sell value added services to improve your business, however it is usually a good practice to advise your customers of a change of trading terms in advance.

If you want to improve your take up of the valued added services it would be advisable to sell the services and the benefits of them rather than presenting your customers with a screen saying "give us some money to use a service you have had for free in the past". With no further information.

If you are looking at developing some services, use your customer base to do some market research prior to launching the product. You have a very loyal customer base that are not afraid of giving feedback. Although given the length of the thread that the credit card idea created you may want to use an anonymous user name to get the feed back.

In a phrase "talk to us"

[Bizz]

Advertizing would be huge income gainer with free SMS.

How?

This should be a tread on its own.

[OneeyedJohn]

I have more than one Email , but they are all free

Where and why do u want to pay for one ?? Genuine Qu.

[Barney_the_Dinosaur]

I'd be happy to pay 20 guineas a year for membership.

[lingling]

Good move, charging a subscription fee would have been stupid. This "value" of this forum is the hard work that the moderators and many volunteers (lopburi3, sunbelt, indo-siam etc) put in by sharing their knowledge. Unless the surplus of the subscription fee would be shared with the moderators I think it would discourage many from volunteering their time and energy...

Although I understand that someone has to pay for the servers, software, isp etc it would make no sense to charge a subscription fee. Instead, look over the advertising system and try to make it work.

For example, I have tried to set up google adwords campaigns targeted for this website, but they resulted in 0 impressions and 0 clicks. I also don't see any ads (except for the "sponsored by" banners) on the website, so if your advertising revenue is not as expected maybe the reason is that something is wrong with how the adwords ads are served...?

[Thaipwriter]

and so it should.

We provide the content and if it gets sold we should profit.

[Barney_the_Dinosaur]

Good move, charging a subscription fee would have been stupid. This "value" of this forum is the hard work that the moderators and many volunteers (lopburi3, sunbelt, indo-siam etc) put in by sharing their knowledge. Unless the surplus of the subscription fee would be shared with the moderators I think it would discourage many from volunteering their time and energy...

I'd be happy to pay a fee if I knew it was going to the Moderators ! These guys are very well-informed about all Thai matters

Though I assume they are already getting paid some stipend from all the ads.

[dantilley]

Advertizing would be huge income gainer with free SMS.

How?

Someone could pay to have their comany name tacked onto the end of each SMS, e.g. "... sent by ThaiVisa with Sunbelt" or whatever.

[Soju]

Perhaps a good move would be to add a "donation" link up top where people who feel like they're receiving a valuable service can choose to donate something to help offset the costs of running the servers. People visiting this board come from all different financial situations and any membership costs are going to be too expensive for some and pocket change for others. Maybe if you donate more than a certain amount it would get you something - some extra service, free from ads, special forums just for paying members, etc.

[Barney_the_Dinosaur]

Perhaps a good move would be to add a "donation" link up top where people who feel like they're receiving a valuable service can choose to donate something to help offset the costs of running the servers. People visiting this board come from all different financial situations and any membership costs are going to be too expensive for some and pocket change for others. Maybe if you donate more than a certain amount it would get you something - some extra service, free from ads, special forums just for paying members, etc.

You make it sound like a rubdown.

[Soju]

Perhaps a good move would be to add a "donation" link up top where people who feel like they're receiving a valuable service can choose to donate something to help offset the costs of running the servers. People visiting this board come from all different financial situations and any membership costs are going to be too expensive for some and pocket change for others. Maybe if you donate more than a certain amount it would get you something - some extra service, free from ads, special forums just for paying members, etc.

You make it sound like a rubdown.

Hahaha. That wasn't my intention, but come to think of it, having a TV massage service as a perk to donating members might be a good incentive for some around here who seem to be quite keen on that sort of thing.

[Mobi]

I am so glad you have decided to rescind your plan to charge new members.

I think it would have been a huge mistake, and would have marked the beginning of the end of one of the best forums I have ever seen - worldwide.

You would have destroyed the whole ethos of the forum if you had made new members pay, and you would have lost forever the very thing that makes this a vibrant, informative, exciting, funny, and sometimes controversial forum.

By all means charge for some "add-on" extra services that have no bearing on day to day members who just wish to post, and if I may be a little controversial, I suggest you crank up your marketing department's efficiency, as you nearly lost a customer that I had to introduce to you twice, due to administrative incompetence. I see he is now happily esconced as a sponsor - but who knows how many you have lost

Edited October 23, 2006 by Mobi D'Ark

[udon]

I have more than one Email , but they are all free

Where and why do u want to pay for one ?? Genuine Qu.

You have a free email address with your ISP?

I have, and never use it, as I prefer gmail.

If admin insisted on a "real" address, I'd provide it, if it meant keeping the dickheads out of the forum.

[taxexile]

You make it sound like a rubdown.

shakedown.

rubdowns are something else entirely.

[Mobi]

Why would anyone want to pay for an email address?

I have free gmail, hotmail (several) and Yahoo. Loads of storage capacity on gmail and Hotmail.

Can someone enlighten me on what I am missing by not paying?

Edited October 23, 2006 by Mobi D'Ark

[udon]

Mobi, I think you're confused.

I know I am, reading yr last post.

Why would anyone want to pay for an email address?

???

Which post are you referring to?

[Mobi]

Mobi, I think you're confused.

I know I am, reading yr last post.

Why would anyone want to pay for an email address?

???

Which post are you referring to?

I almost certainly am - one of my "senior moments" no doubt

Well, Taxexile mentioned 'paying for email services', and OEJ said quote: 'Where and why do u want to pay for one ?? Genuine Qu.'

So I just added 2 and 2 and probably came up with 5.

Better to forget I ever mentioned it

[kayo]

I think I know what was going on:

We've all been bitching at George that he should spend more time going round the different regions of thailand to visit his members.

Not to get to know the man any better, but so that he;ll buy us a few or more drinks each.

Now, forty thousand+ drinks can cut into even Toxin's budget, let alone George, so he figured to charge new people, so that he can buy the old timers lots of drinks.

I'd have no problem with that.

[Ping]

Perhaps a good move would be to add a "donation" link up top where people who feel like they're receiving a valuable service can choose to donate something to help offset the costs of running the servers. People visiting this board come from all different financial situations and any membership costs are going to be too expensive for some and pocket change for others. Maybe if you donate more than a certain amount it would get you something - some extra service, free from ads, special forums just for paying members, etc.

Sounds a tad elitist - something to which I would have thought that TV would not subscribe. The option of dontation (at loggon or wherever) is a reasonable idea provided that financial statements are made available to members. In the final analysis, if advertising can contine to defray costs, isn't this the best option?

[cdnvic]

Perhaps a good move would be to add a "donation" link up top where people who feel like they're receiving a valuable service can choose to donate something to help offset the costs of running the servers. People visiting this board come from all different financial situations and any membership costs are going to be too expensive for some and pocket change for others. Maybe if you donate more than a certain amount it would get you something - some extra service, free from ads, special forums just for paying members, etc.

Sounds a tad elitist - something to which I would have thought that TV would not subscribe. The option of dontation (at loggon or wherever) is a reasonable idea provided that financial statements are made available to members. In the final analysis, if advertising can contine to defray costs, isn't this the best option?

This debate ended about seven months ago.

[Mossfinn]

Thaivisa forum will remain a free service

A plan to launch a new range of value added services at thaivisa.com to be financed via member fees for new signups has been abolished.

This debate ended about seven months ago.

I couldn't understand the debate in the first place, saying it would have been a bad mistake, on a subject that was stated not to proceed in the very first post.

Moss

[Totster]

/Closed

totster

[dr_Pat_Pong]

/Closed

totster

Thank God for that Tot.