Innovative idea's...

[syanet]

I need them. I'm going to relaunch a free web host in the forseeable future and don't want to make the same mistakes I made last time.

What kind of add-on's would you want in a host? A support chat room? Preinstalled scripts? If so, which ones? Do you want a topsites for member sites, or maybe a banner exchange for hosted sites?

How about advertisments? Pop-up? Pop behind? Exit pop-up?Banner? Ad bar? I don't know, you tell me. Should they be user placeable? Or maybe forced in a frame?

Extra features? Is MySQL and PHP necessary? Would lack of those prevent you from taking on a chance on a free host? Do you want a online editor? Or should I just target experienced users?

What about a pay option to remove advertisments? What's a quality price? $4? $6? $10? Maybe more or less?

How much space and bandwidth is really necessary? Should you get a little with an option to upgrade later? Do you want it all at once? Is 20MB to little, but will 100MB make me a target for warez freeloaders? How much bandwidth does a site hosted on a free server need? Should sites be sgut off during a week they go over? Maybe shut off if they go over a months allowance?

Like I said before, I don't want this next project to fail like my first did. I need everything to be perfect and that's why I want everyone's opinions. Let me know what you think. I also want to offer a paid option to remove advertisments. How would you like to see that implemented?

[Edited by syanet on 03-05-2001 at 11:58 PM]

[Gayowulf]

It sounds like you dont know what you want. Tell us the base sort of thing we will be dealing with. I say keep it simple. maybe one of those pop behinds, or user placeable, or maybe a banner at the bottom. I think a topsites, and a banner exchange among member's sites would be cool; but only if it isnt too much work. maybe even the sites that make you the most money. FTP is a must. CGI would be good. I,personally, dont care about PHP or MYSQL. Pay for removing banners would be good, but only if its worth it. Its hard to quote a good price because i dont know what you will be offering.

Make your own decisions about bandwidth and space. Maybe have a starting point and increase it if it looks like you will be able to handle it.

maybe you should go for unlimited bandwidth and space ;)

[Webdude]

Well, we're about to offer an option for $1 per month billed yearly to remove the ads..

And stay away from Plops...you will lose potential members using them. Many people wont even bother checking you out if they hear you have popups. Put an inline banner at the bottom, ones that pay CPM....and then offer your members a price per month option to remove the banners. If your sevice is good, you'll make more money from the $1 per month deal than you do off the banners themselves....plus your members will be happier....plus you will get a LOT more members just because the banner is at the bottom (-:

[Coolin]

Inline banners are a good idea. Making them user placable or placed at the bottom by default if not user placed would also be cool. Personally, I find SSI or PHP to be a must, since includes are critical to many sites, including mine. CGI would also be nice, but not too necessary unless you are targeting advanced users. PHP/MySQL is something that I would want, but I don't think many people would agree with me on that subject. Supporting that would also be nice, since there aren't many hosts that support MySQL.

[Chris]

Yeah, don't do that search deal again, that was so unprofessional looking.

[Zitech_Industries]

For your ads, make sure there is a way users can select a banner that has something to do with their site. That way we can avoid the problem of ads for femine hygeine products all over the place (dont ask). 50- mb is good. FTP. And throw in some good extras, like after a certain number of page views a day, give'em a domain name or upgrade their service.

[syanet]

I think I'll make avilable 5 different methods of placing advertisments. The user would select which on and where to insert the code. If they don't choose, they'll get pop-ups by default.

As for space, I'm thinking start at 50MB and with good reason upgrade to 100MB? Sound good? I'm looking into an automatic way to create MySQL databases so there's a very good chance that will be included.

Any other input?

[Nick]

Originally posted by syanet
What kind of add-on's would you want in a host?


Availability of space, bandwidth, and scripting languages.


Originally posted by syanet
A support chat room?


For people who need it.


Originally posted by syanet
Preinstalled scripts?


Only if they don't cut into my allowed space.


Originally posted by syanet
If so, which ones?


WWWBoard, Counter, FormMail, Date/Time, Countdown.


Originally posted by syanet
Do you want a topsites for member sites, or maybe a banner exchange for hosted sites?


Both are good, but only for sites who want to join. No automatic joining like the SpacePorts topsites.


Originally posted by syanet
How about advertisments?


None would be what I want, but I know it's unfair to ask for so...


Originally posted by syanet
Pop-up?


No.


Originally posted by syanet
Pop behind?


NO.


Originally posted by syanet
Exit pop-up?


HELL NO.


Originally posted by syanet
Banner?


Yes, has to be placable.


Originally posted by syanet
Ad bar?


Show me...


Originally posted by syanet
I don't know, you tell me.


[Placeable] Banner.


Originally posted by syanet
Should they be user placeable?


Of course.


Originally posted by syanet
Or maybe forced in a frame?


Adframe bad.


Originally posted by syanet
Extra features?


Lots of them.


Originally posted by syanet
Is MySQL and PHP necessary?


Sure as hell is.


Originally posted by syanet
Would lack of those prevent you from taking on a chance on a free host?


Sure would.


Originally posted by syanet
Do you want a online editor?


Nope


Originally posted by syanet
Or should I just target experienced users?


Target experienced users.


Originally posted by syanet
What about a pay option to remove advertisments? What's a quality price?


$4-5/mo.


Originally posted by syanet
$4? $6? $10? Maybe more or less?


$4


Originally posted by syanet
How much space and bandwidth is really necessary?


20MBs to start with, upgradable via support for valid reason. 4GBs Bandwidth, also upgradable for good reason.


Originally posted by syanet
Should you get a little with an option to upgrade later?


Exactly.


Originally posted by syanet
Do you want it all at once?


Nope. Keep away warez.


Originally posted by syanet
Is 20MB to little, but will 100MB make me a target for warez freeloaders?


20MB is good if upgradable for good reason.


Originally posted by syanet
How much bandwidth does a site hosted on a free server need?


Pesonal: >1GB, Fan Site: 1~3GBs, Education Site: 1~1.5GB (w/o graphics, just text), popular sites; message boards; etc. 5+GBs


Originally posted by syanet
Should sites be sgut off during a week they go over?


NO.


Originally posted by syanet
Maybe shut off if they go over a months allowance?


NO


Originally posted by syanet
Like I said before, I don't want this next project to fail like my first did.


Good to hear.


Originally posted by syanet
I need everything to be perfect and that's why I want everyone's opinions.


You just got mine.


Originally posted by syanet
Let me know what you think.


Follow my direction and you can't go wrong ;).


Originally posted by syanet
I also want to offer a paid option to remove advertisments.


Good idea.


Originally posted by syanet
How would you like to see that implemented?


You get other things with paying that really mean nothing but look good. Example: HyperMart will give you extra space if you get ad free opt.






Damn, that took a while :p.

[Canuckkev]

Here's an idea. Give users an incentive to stay with you. Like say that when users are with you for 3 months, give them something like more space, pre-installed scripts or something. I find that I am hoping areound from host to host too much. Maybe with a reason to stay, I will.

[syanet]

Nick... Nice post. It's all been taken into consideration. I think the base starting point will be 20MB and 3GB.

Canuckkev... One thing I was contemplating was giving more space, bandwidth, databases, etc to the sites with the most hits. It only makes sense since one, the make me the most income, and two, they'll make me even more with more space. So what about an incentive program? Could that work?

[Coolin]

Oh yes, to upgrade to a higher quota, please make it a form instead of email. Not only is it much simpler for the user, it makes the user feel happier. Email is really intimidating for some. (Me included, I dunno what to write.)

[syanet]

Originally posted by Coolin
Oh yes, to upgrade to a higher quota, please make it a form instead of email. Not only is it much simpler for the user, it makes the user feel happier. Email is really intimidating for some. (Me included, I dunno what to write.)

Would have to be a form-email deal then. I don't want to automatically upgrade available space without reviwing the site first.

[jiminsd]

All good ideas above... I might of missed it but having a domain option is a must for me. I'd go to a pay host before going with a pop-up or a non ftp free host. You might study Netcabins... they started off looking great but I think they lost credibility by not having it right in the first place.

[BiteTheBugByte]

.. you should give an option to host an adult site... then the members would have to display a bigger banner (or more than one) for you to cover the traffic costs that come with it.

[JacklePoP]

I would really love if users had upgrades to their space allocation, after a period of time. I'm constantly hopping from host to host. But currently, i'm with F2S.

About banners, user placeable banners would be really nice, as we could intergrate it together with our site layout and stuff. Yup. Most of the stuff have been said already...so...

[syanet]

FTP and CGI as well as domain hosting are all going to be avilable. About adult hosting: I don't know if it will be possible due the advertisers policies, but I'll see what I can do.

[gyrbo]

OK just an idee i'm playing with.
What is you hace about 100 credits for every MB of space you want you pay 1 credit. For 1GB bandwidth you pay also 1 credit. For CGI, you pay 10credits, For MySQL you also pay 10 credits. No ads 100 credits. And so on. Good idee?
At that way people can choose what they want. If you don't need CGI or PHP, you don't ask for it and you can get more space. If you need mutch banwidth you just cut in the space.

BTW that 100 credits are free. And you can buy more if you want (4$ for 100).

[Satelk]

I suggest also having ASP, 'cause some good scripts use it, like Snitz Forum (http://forum.snitz.com).

[jimmacr]

ASP support on linux/bsd is kinda shaky and also expensive. Mabe not mod_asp, but I havn't seem much about it.

[syanet]

Originally posted by gyrbo
BTW that 100 credits are free. And you can buy more if you want (4$ for 100).

Why bother converting money to credits. I could just charge $2 for this feature, $3 for that feaures, etc.

ASP probaly isn't worth the trouble.

[newmodel]

I believe what gyrbo's main idea was that a lot of free servers have stuff that some people don't use....a user might not use cgi and prefer some more space in return for not using cgi...

All these ideas would be good, but let's see if it can be done or not. Are you up to the challenge?

[Canuckkev]

Yeah, good idea, gyrbro. And lets say they get more credits for the amout of traffic they bring, or how long they stay with the host. And I don't think converting it to money would be good, like $3 for this, $2 for that, because like many people on fee hosts, they donn't have the means of getting you the money. Pretty much anyone without a credit card would have this problem. The internet needs more things like Beenz, where you can colect credits, and buy stuff with it online, without ever converting it to real money.

[Coolin]

I don't understand what all this credit fuss is for. If you want to offer the feature, why ask them to do all this stuff for a simple feature? This will only turn away your visitors. The only site I've seen implement this system successfully is Neopets, but then again, Neopets' users are usually kids who fall for this stuff.

[syanet]

I think it would be to confusing for many people, so I want even bother. To tell you the truth, it's to confusing for me :). If I can arrange it, how many MySQL databases should be offered unnder a free plan? how about under a $5 a month plan?

[LeX]

About the credit thing...

If it's possible, then you can tempt your members into clicking on your banners by offering 1 credit or point for each click, then when you've collected like 1000 credits you get ad-free hosting for a month or however much clicks is needed to survive for a month, etc. And you can have plans for 2 months, 3 months, a year...

Just an idea.

[syanet]

Originally posted by LeX
About the credit thing...

If it's possible, then you can tempt your members into clicking on your banners by offering 1 credit or point for each click, then when you've collected like 1000 credits you get ad-free hosting for a month or however much clicks is needed to survive for a month, etc. And you can have plans for 2 months, 3 months, a year...

Just an idea.

It would be to hard to track individual clicks though. Lets forget the credit idea was ever mentioned. It's to complicated to implement.

[boredboi]

yeah.....
no early releasing when unprepared...

a good helpful community would be very useful
they can help in support, give ideas, like this...

u should haf something that would encourage users to not kill banners... or if you have a good community u could have systems where posting a msg gets u 1 free kb...

or something like SitepointForums... karma... etc...

[bobyx]

About the ads...
Why don't you offer your visitors to choose from user placeable banners and one-time pop behinds (that only pop at the first page - you can use cookies for that).
I know that I like one-time popbehinds more than banners. Plus you get more money with the pops.
And just make sure that you offer SSI :)

Here's also an idea:
Offer domain hosting and free webbased email - so that domain users can offer their visitor free email @their site. You can then put banners in the email and earn even more money.

[syanet]

Originally posted by bobyx
About the ads...
Why don't you offer your visitors to choose from user placeable banners and one-time pop behinds (that only pop at the first page - you can use cookies for that).
I know that I like one-time popbehinds more than banners. Plus you get more money with the pops.
And just make sure that you offer SSI :)

Here's also an idea:
Offer domain hosting and free webbased email - so that domain users can offer their visitor free email @their site. You can then put banners in the email and earn even more money.

Good post. SSI is a most, so it's included. Signups are automatic, so domain or subdomain, it makes no difference. Online e-mail is a question mark right now. I can't find an easy solution (I'm open to suggestion though). However users will get a free POP3 account with multiple aliases. I'm leaning towards giving the user an option for either once per 12 hour pop ups, placeable banners or an ad bar (Any other options are welcome).

[syanet]

What is everyone thoughts on one popup per 12 hour period per unique user?

[Nick]

Originally posted by syanet
What is everyone thoughts on one popup per 12 hour period per unique user?

Popups are BAD!

[Coolin]

Twelve hour popups, in my opinion are good for the user/customer. However, I have trouble seeing how a popup every twelve hours can earn some revenue for you. I'm sure most people click on that little "x" at the top right when they see a new window pop up.

[syanet]

That's the main drawback. It's just that unless I get a great CPM deal, banners are just as worthless. My ad bar was a failure, I just don't know of another method that's good for me and the customer. Hopefully someone here has one?

[Coolin]

I hear that Webdude gets a good click-through rate by placing banners at the bottom of a website. Sorta wierd if you ask me, but perhaps you could get some tips from the pro. ;)

[syanet]

Don't think I want to do that. Especially with the banner market as bad as it is. One thing I was contemplating was placeable search boxes. However http://www.ifreepage.com required only a search box and went under pretty quickly. I also had a lot of people tell me how ugly they looked in my ad bar.

[LeX]

Originally posted by syanet
I also had a lot of people tell me how ugly they looked in my ad bar. [/B]
It was....

You say the ad company doing the search box died? Thought they would.

[Coolin]

A search box is just too small. And people just glaze over it without actually knowing it's there. Perhaps a search box under a banner? That would generate revenue, but then again, such a large thing would turn me off...

[syanet]

Originally posted by Coolin
such a large thing would turn me off...

Exactly why I won't do that. There has to be another effective way of advertising besides banners...

[bobyx]

The popup actually are one of the most effective ways...
I have popups only on my main page and I get about 60 or 70 popups on 100 visitors. I earn way more than with banners.
There was a thread about ad networks for FWP's in the "Ad revenue" forum and people said that it's almost impossible to get accepted.

[Coolin]

Popups, may be effective. But I'm sure absolutely no one would sign up for such a service. (Ok, perhaps I'm exaggerating a little, but no much.)

No users = no popups shown = No money = Dead FWP. It's as simple as that.

[syanet]

How about one exit pop up per unique user per 12 hours?

[BiteTheBugByte]

Well, for me there are two ways .....

1)

You could go to a big and reliable advertising company that offer a banner programm based on impressions. This way you don´t have to rely on a specified clickthrough behaviour of your members, you could combine this with a "User placable" Banner option, so both sides would be satisfied.

or

2)

A banner console that loads in the background of your members pages and it would be controlled through a cookie scriptlet, i.e. the visitors would see it only once in a specific time period...
This would be still acceptable.

Maybe this could help ya a lil...

[syanet]

How about a modified version of my old ad bar minus the search box? I'll make many different colors and people can choose which one to use.

[Edited by syanet on 03-13-2001 at 04:03 PM]

[Satelk]

It could be a good idea, espescially if you make different colors. But some people might find it annoying. I think you should let the users choose from different types of ads, like pop-up, ad bar, banner, etc.

[JacklePoP]

Well, i still think user placeable banners are the best, if ads are to be implemented.

[syanet]

If I can find a decent banner advertiser I'll give the option of an userplaceable ad bar or banner. I also want to give the option of a search box above the fold, but don't know if that will be possible yet. If none are placed on your page, you get a popup by default. how's that sound?

[bobyx]

I think that you should remove the 5gb transfer limit, because that'll turn more people away than the popups...
You actually don't need the limit because the bigger the transfer is, the more visitors the site gets and you get more money then.

[Cracker]

Well, bobyx, if what you say is true, then why do you think Worldzone has a 1 gb monthly transfer limit?

[bobyx]

Because putting a transfer limit is the cheapest way... Why are most of the big hosts without a transfer limit?

Worldzone looks very bad - they don't even have ftp :(

[syanet]

I'm not going to be sicked into offering 'unlimited of everyhing'. 5GB is more than enough.

[Cracker]

Originally posted by bobyx
Why are most of the big hosts without a transfer limit?
Worldzone looks very bad - they don't even have ftp :(

Nbci, Geocities, Angelfire, Tripod, and Fortunecity are owned by multi million dollar corporations; Worldzone is not.

[syanet]

Okay, I've been testing systems and I now have an effective way of offering the following:

1. Pop up once per 24 hours (won't spawn more)
2. Pop behind once per 24 hours (won't spawn more)
3. Exit pop up once per 24 hours (won't spawn more)
4. Ad bar (across the top of page with 3 text links)
5. Search box placed above the fold

Which would be your choice? I want to add banners to the list, but due to the lack of sponsors, don't know if that will be possible.

[Canuckkev]

Exit pop up or pop behind.

[Bruce]

exit pop up

[Coolin]

I find the pop-ups abd the search box to be the least annoying to the user. But they probably won't provide enough revenue. Lets say a site has 30 hits per day, and a pop up goes on 30 times. About one user clicks on the pop-up, per day. That equtes to about 50 cents of revenue a day. Multiply that by 30 days and you have $15/month. Let's say you have 500 users, that's $7500. Erp... Perhaps it will work.

Remember, however, that warez users and abusers will suck up that bandwidth. Also, many sites get less than 30 hits, 30 hits is an extremely optimistic guess.

[syanet]

Maybe an exit pop up opened once a day used in conjunction with a search box? Would that be acceptable? Also, your saying $15 a month per user, but I'm contemplating offer the same package, without the banners for $5 a month. This would make me profit, so I could afford to host sites that don't meet the 30 hit requirement and still be profitable.

[Coolin]

A search box and a once a day pop behind would (in my opinion) be acceptable. But it depends on where the search box is placed, what's the default text in it, and the size of the search box.

[clock]

Remember frame pages

Would they have to have Popups?

[Canuckkev]

I don't think I'd like a search box. It seems like not many people would use them on purpose. They would be trying to search your site, thne leave your site after they search. Prolly they'd just hit the back button afterwards, to return. But some pay to searches only pay once the user clicks a result, not makes a search. One good thing about them is that search boxes load faster than say a banner or pop up.

[Hellbound]

I was thinking, why don't you have two sigups, one pop-up free, one with pop-ups. The one one without pop-ups would be basic, and the one with would be all pimped-out with features. That way, you would be known with the banner-free
crowd, but most would still use the advanced account with pop-ups.

Just a thought.

[Coolin]

That may be a good idea, but no one would use the advanced hosting. (I wouldn't) And syanet would run out of money because all the users are using no banners.