Ask HN: Is providing a forum enough reason to ask people to pay? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Is providing a forum enough reason to ask people to pay?

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Taking inspiration from this idea from steven poland http://blog.stevepoland.com/idea-99-group-learning-of-anything-in-weeks/ i am planning to build a social learning site. However i am also believe that a business needs to generate money from Day 1. So i want to charge a fees to the users on a per course basis. Also i think people would be more motivated to finish something when they have paid for it. So i wanted to ask the HN community this question, Is providing a forum enough to ask people for money? Can you cite examples of any businesses which do that?

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http://www.seobook.com springs to mind.

Also keep in mind that even if the forum is the main thing you are known for, a lot of people learn in different ways. So it is helpful to offer a variety of formats to be more remarkable. In addition to our forum we offer: a monthly newsletter, private paid tools, free public tools, blog regularly, videos & training modules.

Another point I would add are that brand matters a lot ... if you are asking people to pay for something were there are free offerings in the marketplace (even if the free ones are far worse) then people really need to believe in you to want to buy from you. Thus we offer a good number of things for free, including some tools & our blog.

The last thing I would say is that many private membership websites are quickly ghost towns that die. The hardest part is building up the initial critical mass. You can always raise rates later, but sometimes it helps to have lower rates off the start to buy that marketshare and help build momentum. For example, we charged only $50 a month for the first 100 customers & gave our ebook customers a free trial...these meant we had a vast active community right out of the gate. Then over time as we kept adding more value (more tools, bigger archives of information, etc.) we raised prices.

thanks for all your advice.

Not sure what kind of "social learning site" you intend to start, but the short answer to your question is yes.

A sites like ExpertsExchange comes to mind. Also, there is another company which I recently became aware of that offers "social learning" college classes. There are no instructors, but instead a social network of tutors and mentors. They are gaining some ground. http://www.straighterline.com/ I have no affiliation with them, but recently read about them and sounds like an interesting idea.

thanks.. and i kept reminding myself not to write "social learning" and instead use group learning. Because that was the idea. There was nothing social about it.

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