LFGSS survives by donations

@Velocio Any clues why affiliate revenue has dropped so much? I know there used to be an active thread to buy things through the forum, haven't seen it for a while...

How can i check i still donate? I think i do but i`m not 100%

Dont worry I have figured it out

For almost every reason you can imagine. All at the same time.

1. A lot of companies that offered affiliates have stopped doing so because cashback sites and coupon sites are eating the revenue without sending them new customers (why give up margin on existing customers? affiliates are to win new business, an acquisition play rather than a retention play)
   
2. A lot of affiliate revenue we should get has been lost to browser plugins offering cashback purchases (we attempt to place a cookie, the browser extension changes the tracking code and place their own)
   
3. The companies that have stayed are offering less of a cut
   
4. The companies that have stayed are offering affiliate revenue on less than the total revenue... i.e. some sales, some products, etc are not eligible
   
5. The terms have changed, cookies are shorter meaning that if someone does click a link, put it in their basket, but doesn't buy immediately, then if they return and buy it 31 days later, still as a result of reading about it here... then unless they clicked the link on here again, we don't get a slice
   
6. The terms have changed on the type of sale, i.e. eBay in 2008 was almost 100% of the revenue on LFGSS and we made profit enough to fund T-shirts, etc... but, now they only give a decent cut of the "Buy It Now" revenue, the rest isn't eligible at a decent rate and who uses BIN anyway?
   
7. Incognito and private browsing in some browsers (Safari on all platforms is most noticeable) is so aggressive that it prevents the 3rd party cookie that tracks affiliates, so we don't get credited as the source
   
8. The terms have changed on the geo applicability of a sale, i.e. we aren't credited with Amazon.com sales, only Amazon.co.uk sales.
   
9. People are buying less. This one is so simple, but appears to be true... revenue has dropped for this audience (LFGSS) and so the slices are smaller.
   
   

Some of this has been happening for a while, I can look at the eBay reports for the last decade and see the revenue go from covering all costs in 2009 to some months recently where it was literally £3.61 and I had to triple-check to make sure I hadn't broken some code somewhere.

The premise for affiliates still sounds good... if we build this massive audience and send you customers, you give us a slice of the revenue attributable to that audience.

But it doesn't work if the terms and availability of it is much reduced, and if people are also spending less.

I'm not really sure what the answer is there, that market seems to be constantly evolving.

I'm just glad that our raw costs are really low, and that we have people here who care, and that this means it is very viable for the entire costs to be met by small donations from many people.

The donation drive over the last 4 days pretty much means we're done already. Mission accomplished. I'm only leaving this up to ensure that really... even if the £ slides further (increasing our costs as bills are nearly all USD), and even if everyone stops spending (totally wiping out the last of the affiliate revenue), that it's cool... and who cares... that the stream of small £2-£8 donations, that no-one really notices... that it's enough.

That's pretty comprehensive! I'll sort out my recurring donation shortly.

£10 donation sent.

Don't spend it all at once @Velocio ;-)

I set up a monthly donation so small it's embarassing. But my reasoning was to pick a number that I'll never look twice at it in my future bank statements – regardless of how skint I am.

So who's with me in the Lufguss Monthly Single Digit Club™?

Sold some bikes here, had the intention to donate but never did untill some minutes ago.

I just changed my dontation from a small amount every 3 months to a slightly smaller amount overy month!

Likewise - Hopefully lots more can do the same.

Once I can remember my paypal login, monthly donation will be heading your way..

@starfish&coffee me toooo I've signed up for a wee monthly donation.

I set up a monthly donation so small it's embarassing. But my reasoning was to pick a number that I'll never look twice at it in my future bank statements – regardless of how skint I am.

So who's with me in the Lufguss Monthly Single Digit Club™?

That's exactly the spirit! :)

Just don't go too low. The smallest worthwhile amount is £2.

Someone added a £0.50 one earlier, but at this point we're just giving too much to PayPal and we'd have to have thousands of donors.

The sweet spot is "one drink a month" for whatever amount seems to be fair for a drink.

Some people clearly think the server is an alcoholic, others think it will appreciate a shot of espresso. It's all good, and extremely appreciated, because this is exactly how to make the revenue strong, stable, predictable.

Done. spend far too much time on here. Out of interest - have you ever considered advertising / sponsorship. Can think of a few brands who could be interested in being involved...

I'm going to leave this conversation pinned to the front page for a week or so longer, because what we really need is to restore a stable income, which means encouraging people to donate as little as £2 every month.

I sort of understand why you want to move it, but OTOH its really not very intrusive, and if it nets you even one more £5 a month donation every month, then surely it justifies remaining?

On a related note, is there any way to see how much of the costs go on classifieds vs the rest of the forum? Would be interesting to see the split (and if the core membership here is effectively subsidising all the people who only sign up to sell sell sell)

On a related note, is there any way to see how much of the costs go on classifieds vs the rest of the forum?

I haven't got any metrics or analytics set up to measure this thing over other things.

Yes people post the most in classifieds, but even the high level metrics I have still suggest that mostly guests look for "help! what's the best..." and active users live their life on the following page checking out which conversations they're involved in have been updated. I don't see any abnormal or high amount of traffic viewing classifieds, I think it only appears that way if you're on here because that section requires interaction to be of any value. You can read the other sections and those are valuable... but classifieds is only valuable if you are putting up adverts or replying to them, you actually have to interact there, but it doesn't mean more people are in there... it's just that elsewhere you don't have to interact.

It's probably worth remembering, 70-80% of visitors don't even sign-in.

it's just that elsewhere you don't have to interact.

So basically, it's the bloody lurkers ruining it ...
:p

https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/139122

I was always a troll.

haha...
In all seriousness - maybe consider a sponsored section / channel - a few orgs could be interested, and there could be some value in it for forum members. You might even be able to do a deal that doesn't make it look like you're selling out ;)

If I ever do that, I totally want to do it in a sell out way.

https://youtu.be/voKihZAN4ng

Thanks for reminder. I'm not sure what happened to my Paypal subs. I will reinstate.

Beer is £2 in London??

An espresso is.