Inquire about success of anyone whose adult entertainment business is thriving — or at least maintaining an even keel — in the currently distressing economic climate, and it’s likely you’ll hear one key phrase before almost anything else: “Retain your customers.” Expanding a client list is important, sure, but keeping the customers one already has is even more important … and less expensive.
Think of customers like water in an irrigation pond or stock tank: The more drops the basin collects, the fewer have to rounded up from outside sources. By collecting rainwater during the monsoon season, farmers and ranchers are not as subject to the whims of nature as they might be otherwise. In addition, it’s much less expensive to water crops and animals with collected rainwater than it is to buy the life-giving liquid from a local utility.
The same is true of businesses who sell goods to consumers: Those that retain their customers over the long haul need to expend far fewer resources to maintain the status quo. Although some customer attrition will occur no matter what a business does, generally it’s true that retaining customers requires less investment of time and money than acquiring new ones. When customer levels remain at or above the break-even point, business owners can relax (somewhat) about advertising and promotion and focus their efforts on expanding their offerings, moving into new markets or investigating other opportunities. Porn purveyors who let known buyers slip through their fingers find themselves spending most of their time throwing up quick, enticing material to lure new money instead of perfecting their approach to the market that already exists.
The big question
“Retain your customers” sounds deceptively simple, doesn’t it? Most really important aphorisms do. The complexities begin piling up quickly, though, once the listener attempts to dig below the surface of the maxim. Digging usually begins with the equally deceptively simple question, “How?”
According to retention experts, giving buyers what they want — instead of what the seller thinks they want or should want — is the single biggest key to ensuring customers stick around even in hard economic times. It’s more difficult for a consumer to abandon a website he or she has come to view as a friend than to skip out on a faceless, nameless automaton with a “here’s what I’ve got; take it or leave it” attitude.
The key to knowing customers is research.
“Knowing your members’ likes and dislikes always works best,” said marketing consultant Robert “The Legacy” Warren, who has worked with some of the largest affiliate programs in the adult industry. “Simply to say ‘if I build it, they will come’ doesn’t work. Always try new and creative approaches and watch what happens. Sometimes the simplest tweak works the best before spending hours of time coming up with a ‘sure-fire’ idea that ultimately leaves you scratching your head when it doesn’t work.”
Embarking upon research with an open mind, instead of pre-conceived notions, is important, too. Sometimes the results are surprising.
“When we launched Twistys in 2001, we did extensive research,” said Shap, owner of Twistys, which retains its users for an average of more than three months. “Thanks to that initial extensive research, our retention from Day One has been very good. We knew content was key, and delivering what the surfer wanted and plenty of it was going to be important. That part was obvious. What was less obvious, especially in 2001, was how important site navigation was. I am a firm believer that it’s important for a user to find all the content they want to find — and all the content you want them to find — easily. We built the site with that in mind.”
Traffic, too, can present some surprises.
“What simply works the best is becoming intimate with your traffic — know where it comes from, how it travels through your sites, and what sources result in the most purchases,” Warren noted. “Having that knowledge, you can focus your attention on drawing more of the same. For example, I worked with one company that had a gay website, and what I found was that many straight men were purchasing off of a bisexual site. We started adding gay banners to more of our bisexual sites and sure enough, traffic and profit increased.”
And remember: Research isn’t a one-shot deal. Like learning, research should be lifelong.
“We never stop moving and never rest on our laurels,” said Lea Busick, marketing and sales manager for subscription sites and affiliate programs at TopBucks, which retains customers an average of anywhere from two to more than four months. “We know the things that worked yesterday may not work tomorrow, so you have to keep adjusting and keep your eyes on the marketplace.
“Our efforts in the mobile porn market are a prime example of that forward thinking. When we launched iPinkVisual.com, there were people within the company who were highly skeptical of its prospects, and for months it looked like the skeptics might be right. Then — wham! — the iPhone takes off, and we’re well-positioned to take advantage because we were ahead of the curve. We had a site optimized for the iPhone already rolling and ideally situated to capitalize on the iPhone frenzy in the consumer space.”
Busick said TopBucks’ mobile sites now are outperforming many of the company’s traditional websites. “Our mobile sites are retaining so well, I sometimes wonder if the cancel mechanism is broken,” she said with a laugh.
Eurorevenue chief Todd Glider was quick to agree with Busick’s assessment of the need for constant information-gathering. “We are always asking ourselves a simple question: What can we offer to our members that they can’t get elsewhere, and that they can’t get for free elsewhere?” he noted, adding that Eurorevenue’s retention period routinely exceeds 90 days. “Everything else follows from that. We continue to offer more content, more updates, more value-added items to our customers. Online and offline, keeping a customer is less expensive than finding a new one. We give our members a first-rate, high-quality experience, one they enjoy; one they can’t get anyplace else. EuroRevenue members know they’re getting their money’s worth, and that’s why they stick around.”
What works?
So you’ve done your homework, you have a clear picture of what consumers want and how they approach and move through your sites, what market segments may be underserved, and … what now? Knowing how to use the information may be the most difficult part of the equation. Much of established programs’ success is based on experience interpreting data, but even without a wealth of experience there are some things to which webmasters and program owners can attend in order to increase the likelihood that customers not only will show up, but also stay put.
Again, consistency and stick-to-itiveness are of paramount importance. So is avoiding the tendency to “slack off” in the energy and innovation realms. In addition, it’s impossible to overstress the importance of ensuring customers never feel taken for granted.
“We’ve done a lot of testing over the years,” Busick said. “We’ve played with a variety of combinations, reviewed the results via measurable statistics, and then moved on to the next concept. It’s a constant process. There is no ‘silver bullet’ combination that will work for all sites or all customer types.
“Having said that, there are some things that are simply good practices to get into, regardless of what manner of site you run. Many of these things are pretty much common sense: Be honest with your customers; don’t advertise something you can’t deliver; be responsive to their complaints and requests; maintain an active, dedicated and professional customer service department … that sort of thing.”
Glider agreed, with an important caveat: If you’ve decided to specialize in a certain type of content, don’t throw your customers a curve without warning. “We continue to focus on offering members 100-percent exclusive content from high-profile production companies like John Thompson and Max Hardcore,” he said. “This has been our modus operandi from the beginning. Today, with the proliferation of so much porn and, perhaps more poignantly, so much free porn, it’s most important to stand out from the crowd.”
Content purveyors can do that without abandoning their loyal customers by updating, upgrading and adding new features that enhance — but don’t supplant — the attractions that drew consumers in the first place, Glider said. “Over the past year we’ve designed, built and implemented a proprietary members-area management system that offers a feature-rich experience. It’s customizable, intuitive and easy to navigate, but more than that, it showcases all of our content brilliantly. When a member logs in he sees all the new movies that have been added that day, and he can find anything and everything he is hungry for easily.”
Staff, talent and affiliates shouldn’t feel taken for granted, either, according to “ASP Albert” Lazarito, president of Adult Star Profits. ASP typically retains customers for more than six months, primarily — according to Lazarito — because it makes success very personal for a tightly integrated team. One of the things ASP discovered early in its one and one-half year history is that investing in models and staff as much as it invests in consumers could pay off in a big way. Instead of the traditional employer-employee relationship, ASP encourages everyone in the loop to consider himself or herself an essential component of the operation’s success by spreading the wealth when success happens. “Everyone in the loop must be an active participant,” he averred. “We train our models in everything they’re willing to learn about running a website, hold weekly conference calls, and do generally anything necessary to make sure everyone in the loop has everything they need to make them — and consequently us — successful. Our girls and our affiliates are true partners in every sense of the word, and you can’t undervalue how important that is in a very competitive market.”
Tips from the trenches
With the basics covered, webmasters and program owners can move on to some of the finer points of customer retention — like figuring out new and creative ways to convince consumers there’s no better place to spend their hard-earned cash.
In Lazarito’s opinion, a slow market is the perfect time to take risks that might seem … well, stupid during high times. “With the way things are now, if it’s not broke, you need to break it,” he urged. “Be aggressive in good times too, sure, but withdrawing into safety and letting anything get static or complacent right now is a big mistake.”
ASP employed that mindset from the outset. Before the company even launched its first website, management and staff studied dating and live-cam sites to learn as much as they could about social networking. “Dating and live cams aren’t bleeding as much as other sites because they offer an interactive experience,” Lazarito said. That’s where ASP saw it could improve on the classic “porn star website” model. The company added social-networking and behind-the-scenes aspects to its 30 sites, making sure everything was as easy to use for performers as it was for consumers. The end result was consumers who feel drawn into the day-to-day lives of the women they admire in adult videos — to the tune of establishing a 10-percent monthly revenue growth rate for the past six months.
ASP’s experience is an excellent illustration of what other adult content purveyors also have observed. According to Warren, “customers want more than just porn. They want a connection. The girls and guys [consumers see on the website] need to be available, leaving the customer with an emotional feeling that they want to see more. A simple email to a longtime customer with an attached, signed picture or a special birthday email can work wonders. I remember one model who actually took Christmas photos and mailed them to her customers — with approval, of course. Getting an autographed photo of your favorite girl will almost guarantee another six months or longer of billing.”
Shap agreed: A personal approach and plenty of opportunity for customers to interact not only with models but also with management and each other can work wonders for almost any retention plan. “In addition to adding three photosets and two full video scenes every day, we also have an active members board where our members can chat with me and the other members of the Twistys team,” he said. “We have an open relationship with our members. They can ask us anything, and they’ll get a straight answer. We treat them exactly how we’d want to be treated. We listen to their requests and we use their input to help guide which direction Twistys goes.”
However, he cautioned, be especially careful that any model or staff member who interacts with consumers creates an impression of genuine interest and follows through on any promises made. The best way to convince customers to seek their pleasure elsewhere is to appear “fake” or disinterested. “If you want to have a strong retention, listen to your customers,” Shap said. “Get to know them. Get them to open up, and let them know you care and that you are going to do your best to provide the best damn site possible for them. Times are tough for a lot of people. My philosophy is simple: ‘You may not have money to join Twistys today. That’s fine. My goal is to do enough so that when you do have money, I’m the first place you turn to.’”
Busick put that advice another way. “Always remember to put yourself in the shoes of the customer,” she said. “When you’ve been at this game for a long time, it is easy to get caught up in the ‘industry-side perspective,’ so to speak. You have to set what you know aside, forget about your own preconceived notions, and really try to look at your product through fresh eyes. If you can do that, and couple that approach with a willingness to take risks — and, possibly more importantly, a willingness to fail on occasion — then you will be in good shape.”
Of course, that doesn’t mean TopBucks shirks on offering good customers rewards for their loyalty. In fact, sometimes the company even offers not-so-good customers a reward instead of letting them ride off into the sunset, taking their wallets with them. “When customers cancel we make every reasonable attempt to keep them, from offering to maintain their subscription at a reduced price to offering them free access to completely different sites or products in exchange for staying with us,” she said.
And finally…
Not every approach will work for every website, of course, but improving upon others’ methods to craft something uniquely successful in its own right is one of the great joys of owning and operating a business. Even in tough times, that can be fulfilling. Just be careful not to jump off a cliff with your eyes closed, the experts warned. Sound business judgment still counts.
“Be very careful before starting a new project,” Shap advised. “Times are tough and breaking in is tougher than ever. Do extensive research and make sure you have a chance to succeed and aren’t just throwing money away.” If you’ve already made the leap, “dump the fat and concentrate on your moneymakers,” he added. “Monetize your sites to the maximum. Now is not the time to leave any money on the table. It’s time to roll up your sleeves and get serious.”
Glider expanded on that. “If you are working hard, work harder,” he said. “If you are working smart, work smarter. Once every quarter, perform a self-audit. Keep a log of your work activities for a week. Take copious notes and drill down to minutes. If you’re plugging away for 16 hours a day and taking lunch in front of your computer, find out what exactly is eating up all that time. Is it time well spent? The results may be surprising and will lead to more productivity and money.
“Oh, and if you have been working 16 hours a day for the last year, do the math: Divide those 4,160 hours by your net profit and see if you’re better off filling out an application at Wal-Mart.”
Busick said despite the challenges, she remains upbeat and convinced things will improve. An infectious, positive attitude can be a boon not only to a company’s internal atmosphere, but also to how consumers perceive the entity’s “public face.”
“There’s no question the adult Internet market is a tougher nut to crack than it used to be,” she said. “But if you can ride out these tough times and be one of the survivors who is still standing when the global economy recovers, you will find yourself in the position to seize market share that you can only dream of currently.”
This article originally appeared in the July 2009 issue of AVN Online. To subscribe, visit AVNMediaNetwork.com/subscribe
