With prices in an ever decreasing spiral, is it time to investigate using the freemium model for your internet marketing?

It seems that every time you blink, most prices have dropped.

A bit like electronics…

When the Sinclair ZX80 computer came out in the UK in 1980 (hence the name) it was £99.95, unless you wanted to save money and make it from kit form. Adjusted for inflation that’s £362.95 now. For a computer with a 3.25Mhz processor and 1kB of memory, optionally expandable to a (then) gigantic 16kB.

Now you can get a complete laptop or desktop computer for less than the original price adjusted for inflation.

But internet marketing prices are dropping further, faster.

Most prices are dropping like a stone.

Early on in my internet marketing days, a lot of big product launches were $2,000 or more. Now it’s quite common for a large launch to barely cost $100.

Regular products are often launched at between $5 and $30.

Software, with the notable exception of games for consoles, has been dropping in price.

Most apps are either a handful of dollars or free.

The free ones are sometimes supported by advertising.

Other times, they’re on a freemium model.

Basic features are free, add-ons (or even just removing the adverts) cost money.

I think at least some areas of internet marketing are moving the same way.

Actually, they’ve been around for quite a while with sites like bum marketing.

But they’re becoming more and more common as prices drift ever closer to zero.

What does that mean for internet marketers?

Essentially, it means we have to adapt.

As usual, the adult industry is leading the way.

They led the way on credit card acceptance, streaming video and lots of other innovations.

Because historically it’s been a market where people are happy to pay.

The adult industry has pretty much gone the freemium route. Sampler videos with the option of removing the adverts and/or getting higher resolution and/or longer films.

We’re in a different subject area but I think the internet marketing arena is heading the same direction.

Free information for almost any topic under the sun exists on YouTube. Often in quite considerable depth.

That means you could maybe go down the advertising supported route on YouTube and offer consulting or more specialist offerings that hadn’t been hit by “free” as badly.

Yoast does it with his WordPress SEO solution: it’s the mass market free option (there’s not even an upgrade as such) and you’re then introduced to the quality of the product. So if you want SEO consulting or a video SEO plugin, that’s where you turn.

I haven’t got insider knowledge of Yoast’s figures but my guess is that they’re rather nice.

WordPress is another site that makes a lot of money from giving stuff away for free.

This post looks at it in more detail but WordPress has lots of different revenue streams that add up to a lot of money generated by a “free” product.

I think that internet marketing is due for this kind of freemium approach.

Probably other markets as well – self help would be ideal as they are usually repeat purchasers and the confidence that would be built from offering free first already works in that market, often with free seminars.

The trick is going to be what to offer.

I’m not totally sure yet – webinars are something I’m investigating but a lot of people don’t like the idea of being “on stage” live in front of a crowd, so I can understand if that doesn’t appeal to most people.

An intro video or series of videos covering everything but not in depth is another thought.

That would fit the freemium model nicely.

Find out everything you need to do but if you need more knowledge than is available in an hour or so, either go off and do your own research or buy the ready made solution that takes you to the next level.

With a decent quality freemium product, you could even do like Travis did with Bum Marketing and essentially let it get to the stage where other people sent traffic as it was (in its day) one of the best ways for an internet marketing beginner to start making money.

The freemium model works best when nothing important is held back.

Don’t be afraid to let people have everything they need.

They’ve almost certainly already got it anyway.

Your job is to put it all in one convenient place but offer more for the small number of people who want more.

Going back to WordPress, most people using their site for a blog will do just that – they won’t spend any extra money and their blog will likely be so small there’s no advertising revenue generated either.

With Yoast, most people will install the free plugin, nothing more.

But 1 in 100 or 1 in 1,000 (or whatever the figure is) will spend money.

Which is the goal of internet marketing.

So, put your thinking cap on.

Could you turn what you’re doing into a freemium model?

Should you?

Or should you at least test the idea?

I don’t know the correct answer and I suspect it will be different for different people anyway.

If you’ve got some thoughts on this, feel free to use the comments box below.