OT: UM Hoops moving to subscription model
Today Dylan from UM Hoops posted about the site moving to a subscription model. Apparently, site growth and advertising revenue aren't enough to continue making it worthwhile to cover so many games, write so much content, etc.
I've wondered about the subscription model coming here to MGoBlog. I know Matt Pargoff uses it for his site, though I don't know how much traffic he gets. Obviously, Rivals, Scout, and 247 all have sites that offer subscriptions. I think ad revenue is dropping across the board, so people are having to come up with new ways to make a go of it.
Anyway, Dylan wants to get to $2,500/month in subscriptions/donations. Feel free to contribute if you like their content. Here's the link:
The Sullivan situation, coupled with the poor performance of the team in the late Hoke era and the generally awful mood amongst the blog community at the time, caused me to wonder if the biggest threat to the blog was essentially Brian rage-quitting due to frustration or discouragement (we're talking 2013-2014, when voting was broken and things were kinda ugly). I could see it happening, because after a frustrating Michigan loss I wanted to forget that football existed and Brian was required to pump out 10,000 words of content every week about something that was profoundly saddening.
Seth firmly stated that such an event was not a significant possibility, and the last 2-3 years have bourne that out. But this is still an institution that is largely dependent upon the health, creative energy, financial viability, and interest of one person. It's part of why it has succeeded, but it has its potential downfalls.
I wonder if he has a succession plan?
MGoBlog has reached the level where it's not just some thing some guy is doing in his basement. It's an ongoing enterprise.
Like many ongoing enterprises ranging from the corner store to Microsoft, the original proprietor wants to see it live on even after he/she is no longer involved on a daily basis.
The nice thing about Michigan sports is that there's constantly new information. New players, new recruits, new coaches, new business-related items, new drama in the sports world, etc. Because of that, I think it's kind of difficult to get burned out, but then again, I'm a lifelong sports nut, just like a lot of others here. Sports are soap operas for men (and some women).
What I don't get is blogs that think they can make it by being "home organization" resources, mommy blogs, do-it-yourself home improvement stuff, etc. At some point you're just recycling ideas or reshuffling previously used material, or you're regurgitation information that could be found in 500 other places. I mean, obviously some people do make a living with those types of things, but after a short while, I think it would be very creatively limited.
mommy blogs: it's not the money, it's the power
There is more truth to that statement than there should be.
I don't think they can offer much premium content without losing something essential to the site. Something like what Brian suggested (HTTV, tshirt, ad-free navigation, maybe an interactive feature* open to subscribers only but viewable by all after the fact) would work fine, because the essential elements of the site remain for everyone.
*Perhaps a weekly subscriber / writer Slack where subscribers can get in on the banter and ask questions, with an edited transcript posted same day, something like that.
I have donated to UM Hoops during its last two "blog" drives and if I recall, neither time did it hit its target number. I know it didn't last year (I believe the goal was $10,000 and it ended up a couple thousand short).
While I really like the stie, I'm not sure if I'll become a patron. I always donated around $20 and I'm not sure I would personally get enough value to subscribe for more than double that (e.g., I don't need a weekly recruiting roundup for a sport with so few schollies available).
It will be interesting to see if there are 600 or so "hard-core" UM basketball fans willing to pay; I'm not sure. In my experience, we're not a passionate basketball school like Indiana or Purdue, not mention Kentucky, Duke, Kansas, etc; there are not thousands of die-hards. Our fan base does have a lot of money, though.
Good luck. I really hope it works out.
Our model works though because there are enough readers coming through to support a lot of ads, and for the regular donations to be substantial (and in my case HTTV is a huge deal).
UMHoops is pretty niche, though excellent. I'd rather they go to a sub model than shut down.
Can you estimate the loss of revenue from someone logging in a couple times daily who has an adblocker turned on?
I'll own up that I put up adblockers on every site. I've "whitelisted" sites before only to be served malware. So, I don't trust ads. With that said, I want to be fair and will gladly pay for the content on this site.
And don't call me Shirley.
I'm not Seth, but Google AdSense, for example, supposedly gives about $1.00 for every 1,000 ad impressions. (I think it's lower now, but I'll use that number because it's round.) You can have up to three AdSense ads per page.
So if you click on, say, ten MGoBlog pages per day, that's a potential 30 ad impressions. 30 x 365 = roughly 11,000. So that's about $11 per year just from AdSense. Other ad networks have higher RPMs, so it could be a good chunk more. It doesn't seem like a huge amount for one person, but I know I produce way more than 10 pageviews per day, and so do a lot of other people.
Bottom line, I guess: If you don't like ads because they're ugly or they slow your browser down or whatever, you should probably donate $15/year or so to make up for lost ad revenue.
I was thinking more like $25... About $2/month is a bargain to say the least for the content provided. I made use of the beveled guilt for myself (and my wife who frequents the site too).
Just charge WD to post.
Instant riches.
This place can be an echo chamber and bastion of groupthink at times. Subscription would probably only make that worse... Sometimes I don't know which is worse: the trolls or the self-appointed "post police" who are busy telling everyone their post stinks, that it's not "off-topic" or that it was posted three years ago and should never be brought up again.
Or that you are not allowed to ask where to watch the game in XXX, even though dozens of people here on MGoBlog have been to XXX, know exactly which bars in XXX will show Michigan games, and can even tell you if Michigan will be on the big TVs or the little TVs and if they will have the sound on.
Meanwhile Google points you to 30,000 static links that give you beer menus and 3 year-old Yelp reviews.
Some of the thread police stuff will probably go away with an updated design that makes it easier to find new content; the fact that board pagination doesn't work reliably in the sidebar is a serious usability issue.
Some of it won't, because people.
That's temporary. If you were an MSU student, it could be permanent.
March 28th, 2017 at 10:04 PM ^
will just move to another free site. The loyal fanbase will probably pay for a little bit but then another MGoBlog will pop up and everyone will leave for the free stuff.
As of this morning, UM Hoops is at $852 of their $2,500 goal.