The three major credit cards will no longer allow payments to Backpage

Slinky Bender

The All Powerful Moderator
#21
One thing about the internet is that the barriers to entry are extremely low. The cost to start up a site like backpage isn't a lot when compared to starting up any brick and mortar business. Most often someone just gets lucky (is in this case where backpage wasnt much of anything but then craigslist discontinued adult advertising and backpage began its meteoric ascent). If someone else came along and offered cc processing, then whenever backpage gives up because they have no revenue stream that aite will get all the business.

What the backpage model did seem to prove is that most women in this business are cheap and penny wise but pound foolish because they would rather spend $300 to $500 amonth as long as they get to pay for it 1 day at a time rather than pay much less but have to pay for the whole month up front.
 
#22
As I mentioned before, that is a smart stopgap measure to retain market share, but it's not a solution. As far as I know, backpage gets almost ALL of its revenue from escort ads because it doesn't charge for the other ads. So how do they stay in business by giving away free ads and having zero revenue? I couldn't find current numbers but this article will give you some idea of their revenue:

http://aimgroup.com/2013/04/01/backpage-raises-rates-again-escort-ad-revenue-jumps-55-percent/
BP is fighting it's way back. It started charging $1 for adult Ads renewal. New Ads posting still remain free in order to retain market share. The $1 charge will however give BP some insight on how many advertisers are able and willing to pay. By giving away free Ads, BP is buying a few more days to settle the payment issue and also get advertisers on board with the new payment approach, which is not easy at all...
 

Slinky Bender

The All Powerful Moderator
#23
No argument there. However my guess is that the women will just keep posting "new" ads even if they are just copies of the exact same ad. However if they actually get people to use a new payment method I agree that they will probably be able to raise prices back up to the old level without much push back.
 
#24
.......What the backpage model did seem to prove is that most women in this business are cheap and penny wise but pound foolish because they would rather spend $300 to $500 amonth as long as they get to pay for it 1 day at a time rather than pay much less but have to pay for the whole month up front.
The reason, IMHO, is that most are "women in the business" and are not business women.
 
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