Pro Pricing Discussion and recommendations

[fulcrum9]

Originally Posted by esp1000

lets Be Real Here Folks! If Mogulus Had Disclosed The Pricing Plan They Have Now Put Forth Do You Think For One Minute That They Would Have Had The Numbers Of Beta Testers? I Think Not That Being Said People Would Have Ran For The Woods And Mogulus Would Have Been Left Standing Alone. I Don't Expect A Free Pro Version But I Also Don't Expect To Pay Such High Fees. I Mogulus Was Smart They Would Keep Their Prices All Under $50 Including Pro Plan With The Offer Of Profit Sharing On Adverts And Unlimited Bandwidth They Do That And They Would Take The Market By Storm. Google, Yahoo And The Like Did Not Get To Be Giants Off The Backs Of Their Customers But By Being Fair And Offering Great Products And Basically Partnering With Their Clients. Mogulus Should Consider The Same Strategy. In Doing That Within A Very Short Time Mogulus Would Be A Household Name And They Would Be Reaping The Rewards Of Their Hard Work And Investments And I'm Sure Their Backers Would Be Wearing A Smile As Well.

Amen To That!

[fulcrum9]

Another Amen to that!

[xpeditions]

Originally Posted by benhomer

We put considerable thought into setting the price for Mogulus Pro, and while we are continuing to evaluate the pricing options we do feel it is a reasonable and competitive offering when compared to the other professional live streaming services out there.
-Ben
Mogulus Support

I've had a couple of days to think about this and have become increasingly angry with Mogulus. After reading Ben's response it became clear to me Mogulus is not thinking about those of us who are attempting to build our channel. Instead, it looks as if they are after the large corporations. After all, who else can afford these crazy prices?!

Come on, Mogulus... Really... Who do you think among us can afford thousands of dollars a month? Have you watched CNN or FOX News lately? I doubt that there are any wealthy corporations left who would opt for fee's like those I have read mentioned here. If they're that well off they likely have their own servers and in house production and streaming systems.

Let's face it, Ben. If your company were really interested to serve those of us who are trying - in these troubling times where folks are loosing their homes, cars, jobs and families - that your service is really meant for the common person attempting to build a following and broadcast, the pricing and your vision for Mogulus would reflect this. It does not.

It is ridiculous to me and others when we calculate the costs and come up with thousands of dollars per month should our channel gain greater support and viewership. This means we are basically going to be off the air shortly after we become successful unless we acquire advertisers. Have any of you thought about this?

Those who hold a job don't have time or the skills to become an advertising salesperson. It requires travel, many cold calls and an accounting system to track who paid, when the next payment is due and so forth. Advertising sales and accounting are a full time job for someone within the channels organization. This is not very likely within a small operation like ours and many others out there.

Had I known Mogulus were needing beta testers to develop a service only the wealthy could afford I never would have gotten involved. I was under the impression this was meant to help the small people out there who needed a place to share their vision and reach for their dreams. A place where folks like myself who might never have a chance at the Discovery or History Channel might polish their skills and provide programs the public is interested in. The only way I could go Pro is if I had NO VIEWERS! What's the point?

Sure, you still have the free aspect for now. I have a feeling this will change.

It's not too late to tell us you made a mistake. We're still here for now but I suspect many of us will be gone within a couple of months.

To stay in good faith and serve the rest of us who ambitiously attempt to reach the world you need to come up with a plan that is realistic. What you have now is fantasy for the greater lot of us. And keep in mind that even $100 a month is steep for many. You should examine this more closely to arrive at a selection of services you can offer across the board.

Mogulus has alienated most of us with its Pro service offer. Let's see if they realize this and offer something different before their ship sinks.

If any of you reading this agree please let Mogulus know. And, if you have an alternative I certainly am interested to investigate it - so please let ME know.

Jerry Wills
executive producer
Xpeditions TV (channel_u)

[HereticX]

Originally Posted by xpeditions

Had I known Mogulus were needing beta testers to develop a service only the wealthy could afford I never would have gotten involved.

Quoted for emphasis.

[aefox]

hi! ...

Just wondering...

How many channels we can create with the FREE account?


thanks!

[olivierjansen]

1. Not much professional users want the HD option, so that could lower the price (because of lesser bandwith), and the HD could stay as an option. Even SD is a too high option for professionals. 300K 480-384 is a serious scale at the moment.

2. There is still no scheduler. By using a play-out scheduler it is much easier to attrack advertisers, also for the non-prof users who can't afford selling their airtime themselfs, others can do that for them. With the scheduler your channel behaves like a tv station and you have to advertise your programming. When people missed your scheduled airplay, they can watch it on demand,

Today, after hours of searching, I have found a scheduler for 500 bucks. Need to buy also an extra plugin card for 600. 1100 to get your tv station running! (OK, plus an extra PC 300,- makes it 1400 euro, to run your station.) The lowest Gigabite stream price is 5,6 dollarcent at the moment.

Com on, Mogulus, here are your benefits. Bring up the scheduler and lower your CDN costs to a reasanble level.

[simonben]

I run and operate a website that is currently ranked on Alexa as the 45,000th most popular in the world. A few days ago we were ranked 8,000th. Not bad when you consider there are over 108 million websites on the net.

Our site even out-ranked Barak Obama's presidential campaign website. We are the most visited website of our nature on the face of the planet as recognised by all the main stream media in the UK (BBC, ITV, SKY, etc).

Mogulus have pitched their pricing out of even our reach. I'd be happy to allow Mogulus to cream the revenue of advertising from a Pro account if Pro was a reasonable price, we are not interested in advertising whatsoever. I even sent an email to Max Hoat explaining this as we have been with Mogulus (despite the many technical problems) for most of 2008.

As yet, I have had no reply. It looks as if Mogulus have made their bed (or coffin), and intend on laying in it.

On Monday the 15th of December I will break all ties with Mogulus and switch to one of the twenty or so up and coming providers that are prepared to listen to their customers, or at least respond to email.

For the record, if we were listed in the Mogulus directory we would be one of their most successful channels (or damn close to it). Our website has around 1.5 million unique visitors per month.

P.S. Just checking the Alexa stats, our website is TWICE as popular as the Mogulus website in the UK, (we are ranked 1,400th, mogulus are over 3,000th). Food for thought.

[simonben]

"I wonder if it has something to do with you people being bought out by the mainstream media. Hmm?"

It certainly looks that way to me too! The main stream media are dying. Max Hoat has backed the wrong horse!

Have Mogulus considered what happens if (or when) the likes of Google start offering cheap alternatives, probably at a loss in order to dominate the market. Mogulus have the chance to dominate but seem intent on blowing the opportunity.

Why?

[olivierjansen]

Quote:"They talked about Mogulus as broadcasting for the common person, but priced it for medium to large businesses."

Hello folks, putting video into the internet somebody has to pay for. Ordinary people pay up to 40 euro's (60 dollars) a month to stay connected. This is the consumer point of view.
They get 80 lousty tv channels with a lot of crap. They pay for it.

Now we should calculate the PRODUCERS point of view.

This is quit simple: WHATEVER we broadcast, nobody woul like to pay for it.

So WHEN do we get some money? By moneytizing it.

That's when Mogulus is coming in, with a solution (the PRO version)
that makes it possible to deliver content. Not a big deal, but it is working. It is not working fine in the beta experience, there is a lot of trouble. Nobody knows if this trouble is away in the pro version.

When I buy a pro ticket I don't espect the quality they exposed in the free version.
If so, I am out. So I want to know if this is so.
Is there a BETA PRO?

And then....
I am not interested in 16:9 widescreen
I am not interested in HD
I am not interested in a chat box
I want all title and scroll options not interfere with google advertisements.

For some reason I am thinking to set up this whole idea myself and I started hiring talent to do the solutions. Why not?

[MStepelton]

Well I'm not any happier about this than anyone else. But the bottom line is folks that if you keep your channels running there is no reason for Mogulus to change anything. As long as the over all channel count stays the same Mogulus still looks like a "Going" service.

In short, STOP COMPLAINING ! Delete your channels ! Then see if Mogulus can market this joke. No Users = No market appeal. As I said before, Mogulus could have offset costs by getting REAL avertisers ( Ustream has Chase just to mention one ) instead of the easy low return Google ads. They didn't even try ! Much easier to shove the costs up our butts. And to hear them ( in another post ) talk about the 2 Mil they have spent really gets to me. HEY Mogulus !!! You got 2 Mil in GRANTS , you didn't even earn THAT !

Mogulus you have a lazy business model ! The whole priceing issue is mute compared to the fact that you are not even trying to offset costs with any REAL marketing efforts to get advertisers on board. Seems like a case of too many techs and not enough business people in your ranks.

That said, My channels are gone! I will not be used as a statistic for Mogulus to futher advance themselves ( they done quite enough of that already to all of us ) .