I am not a big fan of corporate fluffy words. I think most of you are adults and should be treated as such, so, I’ll be straightforward with you: We have to start generating revenue if we are to keep Voat running, open, and free.
Your generous donations have helped keep Voat afloat (and at times brought tears in my eyes) for far too long (looking back, I can’t believe I purchased voat.co domain back in 2014), and both me and @PuttItOut have agreed that asking for donations is not something we want to keep doing; It just doesn’t feel right. Voat was originally a side-project and I think that Voat has turned into something pretty damn amazing. As of March 2016, Voat had a total of 309.960 registered user accounts, over 800.000 unique monthly visitors, 125.281.033 requests, transferred 913 GB of data/month, a total of 918.886 submissions, 9.784.388 submission votes, 4.724.905 comments and 13.574.029 comment votes.
Voat has been mentioned in Wired UK, Business Insider, Time, The Verge, Marketwatch, International Business Times, Ilta-Sanomat, Washington Post, Forbes, The Guardian, Vice Motherboard, Le Monde, The Independent, Venturebeat, Mashable, BBC, Coin Telegraph, The Christian Science Monitor, Fortune, Daily Dot, CNET, Engadget… We have had interview requests from Bloomberg TV, Swiss national TV, BBC and about 30 other, all of which we’ve declined because we had to work hard to bring Voat back online and keep it running. Running and maintaining Voat takes time, a lot of time.
We also received a ton of inquiries from investors, but for what it’s worth, we never accepted any offers as most investors simply didn’t share our vision.
So, what is our ultimate goal and the point of this announcement? We want to be able to work full time on Voat. We love Voat, we love doing what we do and we want to focus all of our energy on Voat. We’ve spent a lot of time writing a new Voat API which will eventually help replace all existing logic and open the door to 3rd party developers to create fully functional mobile applications as well as allow us to implement new & meaningful features. This effort will also help us bring the costs of hosting Voat down, way down, but we don’t think that it will be possible to go lower than 5k/month in operating costs in the near future. We think there is a lot of room for improvement and innovation (we have a bunch of really weird ideas) and we’d love dedicate our attention full time to Voat and this community.
To this end, we will start selling sidebar ad space. Our ad criteria are very strict. Ads cannot have animations, ads cannot embed 3rd party scripts. We will not track ad impressions and we won’t track clicks on the ads. We will offer 2 types of ads: site-wide default ads, and single subverse ads. Demand will dictate the pricing. For more information about advertising on Voat visit https://voat.co/advertize
As a courtesy to everyone who donated, we will allow you to turn-off ads in your user preferences (pending a software update), but of course you are always free to block our ads.
So, what do you guys think? Are we doing the right thing?
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Say_What ago
First, I want to say how much I appreciate your transparency, candid tone, and willingness to communicate with the user base. This is a piece of the puzzle you're getting very right. Being frank with the community and soliciting our opinions gives people a sense of ownership and reason to be committed as users, content creators, and investors.
Regarding ads, I think you have to do whatever it takes to keep the site up. If this allows you to make Voat your full time occupation, I think you should work toward solutions to restore Voat to an ad free or ad light zone.
$60k a year is pretty doable. You need the obvious merchandise line; t-shirts, hats, mugs, bumper stickers, plush toys, etc. If you've already got that, I missed it. This stuff not only brings revenue, but spreads your brand.
I still think Voat Cheese, like reddit gold, is a no brainer. Same vehicle, no lame subverse, just recognition and an ad free experience for 30 days.
Another Web based product you could add would be a monthly or bi-monthly podcast. Pick a few of Voat's hot topics, invite a guest, and discuss for 60-90 minutes. You could feature audio ads in this vehicle that would be less intrusive than on site ads. 30-60 second spots every 10 minutes are more tolerable than sidebar and banner ads. This has the benefit of providing unique original content to Voat, and if you're funny or charming at all your cult of personality could draw interest to the site. It could be a fun diversion for you guys. Have a subverse that helps pick topics, with their help write up some questions and points of interest to add structure, and line up some interesting guests. A little bumper music to open and close, and you're done. You don't even need prerecorded ads, just read them. It's done all the time. Suddenly Voat has its own brand of AMAesque exclusive content. Give away the first three, then sell an annual subscription for $20-$30. Then again, the in-podcast revenue might be better if it was free to listen and reached a wider audience.
I think you need to think outside the site too. It's tricky finding ways to generate revenue on the site proper. Even harder without being obnoxious. I know you're trying to transition from your day job to full time voat, but having a side business, Voat centric or not, could be the answer. Small batch microbrew, lightly-worn Swedish panties with a signed photo, escort goats rented to migrants...there are things you could sell on the side that would support Voat without wrecking the vibe.
Finally, you might try a letter writing campaign for donations outside of Voat. Free speech groups, Constitutionalists, Gun rights groups, libertarians, PEGIDA or other immigration reform groups, etc. There are a plethora of organizations who will value the open expression forum you're marketing, but you're not going to reach them through VOAT. You must cast a wider net. You're one wealthy silent benefactor away. You just have to let him know you're here and incorruptible.