Which way now?

[glypo]

There is serious money in advertising if you chase up the right people and sort it out.

Locking anything out to paid members is a MASSIVE turn-off and totally against what most people expect with the web. I think if there is paid subscription it should only enhance existing options - not remove others. As people said, bigger PM inbox, perhaps something fancy under their avatar and maybe remove adverts for people that subscribe. Anything locked out would be rubbish though I think.

And also, as someone kind of touched on (t shirts) some products would be dead cool. Stickers, t-shirts etc etc

[rcracer]

yes oople is just fine as it is and you would be hard pushed to find a better forum and a bunch of people who are down to earth and will help you out but also have there feet on the ground, hats off to Jimmy and Vicky for all there hard work,i believe locking out features such as reviews and race reports would put people off but i do think members only in the trade room would be a good thing to keep people safe in the knowledge of who they are dealing with and if the subscription was for just this purpose only i am sure most of the loyal original members would pay it anyway.

Neil..

[mole2k]

Having just read through this thread I mostly agree with people. I think a lot of people would pay a subscription fee but I personally know of quite a lot of people who wont pay a sub fee not because they don't think it's worth it but simply because they are against the idea of paying for things on the internet.

My advice would be to offer additional things to paid members as opposed to taking away things from non-paying members. Say drop the PM limit for non-paid people to 50 and raise it way up for the paid people.

As far as race reports go, would a system whereby you can have the race results live on the web for people who either pay a subscription or paid a nominal fee to view to updates of the event and the daily updates. Then after the event is over make these reports available to non-paying members so paid people have the advantage of getting the same information just quicker. Obviously live results,etc would take quite a bit of organisation and it might get to the point where all the fun is removed from it.

More regional reports done by a select few would work quite well as long as the quality is kept up to oople's high standard.

One thing I would personally love to see more from the events is video footage but this is quite different from photography and would take quite a few more people/equipment and then somebody to cut it together afterwards, would there be the demand to film all of the national series and then release an oople dvd of the nationals?

Corporate sponsorship would help cover the costs of covering events if you can attain it by offering them in return advertising banners on the event coverage pages as well maybe a plug for them in the opening text and possibly a small watermark on the images?

You could try doing some deals with some model shops to have a %discount for members as well as then links on the site too the shop. (for example reviewing a kit or equipment and having a set of links at the end of the review of places to buy the kit within the UK that oople (paid?) members can get discount.)

Try and rope a few top drivers into having semi-regular blogs would be quite good to her the different drivers opinions on general rc car news and what sort of preparation they put into the cars comming up to major events.

Anyway thats enough rambling for now

[telboy]

I think to make it bigger without too much change there needs to be more contributors, to help Vicky and Jimmy.
Obviously sponsorship will bring in the revenue to achieve such heights.
Maybe once there is a good sponsor on board, how about buying a decent movie camera and doing footage on a dvd to sell...or downlad? Maybe even get one of the new (larger) sponsors to provide you with a decent movie cam, and have their name on all the dvd's you sell?

That'd be almost like carrying on how it is now, but with a little extension in services. Plus the sales from the dvd's would bring in dosh too.



edit: Sorry moley I just read your post. lol and realised that I've just mentioned the same as you.

[jimmy]

I want to thank everyone for their suggestions and helpful comments. Truth is I'm no the wiser but its given me something to work with. I've not replied sooner because I just didn't know what or how to reply - so I won't go into specifics, I just appreciate everyones input.

[b4rs]

hey guys, jimmy i think alot of ideas that people have thought of are good and could work, i like the oople video ideas but subscription for me personally could be a toughy. because im a student etc then times are hard lol. but i personally would rather donate through a donate button on occasions when i have money, so say you were thinking of making it £5 annual, then id rather dontate the odd £2 here and there, and if i did it 3 times its £6. but personally a set fee wouldnt be the nicest for me as BRCA, etc and all other annual and monthly fees add up to a silly amount.

i think i nice big paypal donate button would be great.

one major cool add on to this site would be a built in live chat section?

just a thought.

[Lee]

You could close oople down and then do a come back tour like all the greats.

ie boyzone take that, the spice girls

[rcracer]

Originally Posted by Lee

You could close oople down and then do a come back tour like all the greats.

ie boyzone take that, the spice girls

you certainly know your pop bands Lee.. i can just picture you in your new car giving it some spice girls tunezzzzz