Pay per listen

PierG-

If you guys would stop asking such great questions, I could go to the beach TOO!!! :lol: (Totally kidding - tell your wife thank you.)

We haven't been 100% clear about charging for some things, so let me say what we're thinking.

Right now, we're not thinking of releasing shows more frequently for a fee. In other words, we're going to continue with a weekly show and a monthly show, always free.

What we're going to charge a subscription for is the supporting documentation for all the shows - transcripts, and detailed slide shows of all the key points and recommendations. Also, any forms or related documents. All will be available for downloading to all subscribers, and you will be able to print them.

(Your use of the documentation, of course, will be restricted to you as an individual - you can't print them out for your organization. We know there will be abuse, but we believe in trust.)

We will also be offering documentation in support of older casts on a per cast basis. At first (very soon!), we will be making some of the important early casts' documents available as a benefit of subscribing early.

There WILL be some casts -sets, probably, like the interviewing ones - that will be for sale for a lump sum, sort of like a product. We'll do that periodically, because it would take us two years to release them, and they have value immediately for some people.

There will, at some point in the future, be TOOLS as well, that you will be able to USE online for retention, or interviewing, or being interviewed, or hiring, or coaching, or communications. Those are already designed. When you see some of them, you will be VERY excited. My clients SWEAR by them. Probably, that will be some additional subscription cost, but we don't know yet.

Hope this helps!

Mark

Mark/Mike,

I've been a listener for many months now, but I forced myself to start from the beginning. I'm now up to March 2006 where you mentioned the 15-ish podcasts on interviewing for a set price. And you asked for feedback on that. Here's mine...

Two options:
1. Put out specialized content on a 'whatever' time frame and charge for it individually (like you mentioned in the podcast).

2. Make the member area (or another specialized area...the "super member" area or whatever). Then have that area part of the pay-for content.

Personally, I'd rather see the "Members Only" area be a pay-for area, an annual fee, say $30-$40 a year. Not so much that it scares everyone away, but enough to encourage membership. I think your discussion boards, members-only casts, and links to the tools are easily worth that. Then if you have specialized content (like the interview casts) sell them to the world at retail or to members at half off.

After my first month of listening, I began to wonder how you "paid" for all of this. You deserve something for the work put in (other than the goodwill!!!). I would think any current listener would be willing to pay something, though, for the members-only area.

Anyway, that's my 2 cents!

I'm not too concerned about you guys' ability to monetize your success. Besides, don't you always make fun of those managers who say "give me a raise and then I'll take on the additional responsibility?" :)

Still, I do get a lot of psychic benefit and am a fan of enlightened self-interest, so, here's a couple ideas, such as they are.

1) I know you emphasize practicality over theory. But people like to read theory. With your clout, you could probably land some good interviews with business authors or CEOs where they discuss their success philosophies. Maybe these could be premium paid-for content.

2) A lot of people aren't on the podcast bandwagon yet and due to technophobia issues may never be. But, they may still be interested in the "greatest hits." It might make an interesting gift package to buy that special manager in your life a set of CDs and supporting forms for the most popular podcasts.

3) Similar to above, sell MP3 players. I'm not sure about the logistical issues here, but one way to kickstart people's interest in the technology and the content and get them over the initial hump would be to sell MP3 players pre-loaded with the "back-issues." Even as a lowly peon I've found that the biggest bottleneck in the podcasting process is the time it takes. Anything that would save someone time should be worth their money. People can be weird though, I had a discussion at work where most people wouldn't spend a buck fifty to save 30 minutes by taking a toll road.

4) Manager Tools the home edition. This may be completely nuts, but make it into a board game. I'm not sure exactly how this would work, but one thing that is difficult is to remember all the steps from each podcast. A game would help with this. The cards in the game could serve double-duty as memory joggers. Folks might feel a little silly playing a management board game, but there were at least two different board games simulating manufacturing at my last company. And getting into the selling to corporate seems like a good strategy.

scbioengineer,

Thanks ... we've thought about many, but not all of these (the board game in particular ;-) ). For a number of reasons, I REALLY like that idea ... kind of like Robert Kiyosaki's Cashflow game, but for management.

Any game designers out there? ;-)

Mike

I love the idea of a board game.

On a light hearted note and from the dilbert game
....where the most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage: management.
Welcome to the absurdities of the business world: a place of rightsizing, vision statements, bungee bosses, peer reviews, total quality management and team-building exercises; a place where millennia of evolution is put to use in the struggle for the best cubicle and competition over office furniture. In Dilbert the Board Game you and up to five friends toil in an office of evil HR directors, accounting trolls, canine consultants, and a boss who bears a suspicious resemblance to the devil. Every project assigned to you is doomed from the start, so your best bet is to dump it on someone else or try to get it killed before it eats away any more of your life. In fact, the only thing that really matters in the end is your own happiness. So why bother with work? :lol:

I don't know how excited I am about taking monetization advice from someone who doesn't care about our monetization!

:wink:

Mark, who regrets his absence.