Bad news for Ogletree, Craigo, and for us

Bad news, Ogletree Football has switched to a pay subscription model. That's bad news for us Cougar fans.



Bad news for 'Tree is that he thinks he'll be able to charge $10/month for his blog. I'm afraid that with BYU fans being as stingy as they are it's not very likely that he will keep much in the way of readership. Plus, who's going to want to pay $10/month during Feb - July?



Bad news for Craigo, fewer readers going to the site will mean less return on advertising costs. Not sure it's fair for a site to charge both a subscription and have predominate advertising. Fans are going to get a little sick of that.

i don't blame ogletree for what he has done but he over estimated the worth of the content on his website as well as the cheapness of byu fans.



there are better ways to monetize his site than charge 10 a month. i am shocked that he thought this wouldn't destroy his site. but maybe he knows that and has a plan. who knows.



lawbow suggested 25 bucks for the season. that way you pay a few bucks a month and then get it free during the off season. that is a better model i would think. no question though his readership will tank.

I haven't followed Oggletree that much and I surely would not pay anything for a subscription. I get enough from my current sources that are free. I think he'll have a difficult time selling subscriptions at that price based on my experience with BYU fans.

Lets contact tree and see if we can get a CC subscription :crazy:

Too much too soon. It's now apparent his primary goal of the blog is to make money not disseminate information. Does his blog even get that much traffic?



A better approach would have been to offer a "free" version supported by ads and a subscriber version void of ads (yearly pass would be nice). He could create some "exclusive" content for subscribers similar to what ESPN does.



Either way, new methods of monetization should have been introduced slowly. Subscribing for content on the Internet is doomed to fail. Even the WSJ is struggling with it.



Tree should keep it free, work on building the SEO/SEM aspects of his site, and drive visitors. Advertisers will then follow. But, that takes time and it's clear Tree wants his money now.

Good guy. Good write ups--not great write-ups. I hope he isn't depending on that income.

I give him less than 2 months under that model. Even if he gets 200 people to bite, that's only $2K in additional revenue per month, and his advertising value is going to take a hit as well.



He'll spend more than $2K a month in the early going just in attorneys' fees trying to clamp down on people copying and pasting his material to protect the subscription value for the site.



I wish him all the luck, cuz he'll need every bit of it.

It's a good site, but pointing out that the Oline is bad doesn't make you a savant. It just means you objectively watch BYU football.



I mean, I told you all the Oline was the worst part of the team 3 years ago, for free. ;)

How does this relate to our beloved, entrepreneurial, blue goggled Craig O?



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Gunk wrote:
Does his blog even get that much traffic?

He's claiming 6,500 hits a day. No idea how many unique visitors.

Cougarbib wrote:
How does this relate to our beloved, entrepreneurial, blue goggled Craig O?



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CraigO's wife advertises on Tree's site, so if readership tanks, so does his/her ROI.

hawkwing wrote:
Bad news, Oggletree Football has switched to a pay subscription model. That's bad news for us Cougar fans.



Bad news for 'Tree is that he thinks he'll be able to charge $10/month for his blog. I'm afraid that with BYU fans being as stingy as they are it's not very likely that he will keep much in the way of readership. Plus, who's going to want to pay $10/month during Feb - July?



Bad news for Craigo, fewer readers going to the site will mean less return on advertising costs. Not sure it's fair for a site to charge both a subscription and have predominate advertising. Fans are going to get a little sick of that.

Hawk. You gotta stick with calling him Tree or The Tree, or learn how to spell Ogle!



;)



Also - how does this tie to Craig O?



Added thought.



What poor timing. The season is 2/3 over. He should have finishrd the year and tried this going into 2014 season - if at all.



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Someone needs to tell him that his logo looks like a reproductive part, at least when viewed on a small screen, like a phone



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Ogletree has an overinflated opinion of himself. $10 a month? Hell to the no... No chance I pay that much for a weekly pre-game analysis and post-game breakdown.

ABYUFAN wrote:
Someone needs to tell him that his logo looks like a reproductive part, at least when viewed on a small screen, like a phone



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Rorschach much? ;-)

Cougarbib wrote:

Bad news, Oggletree Football has switched to a pay subscription model. That's bad news for us Cougar fans.



Bad news for 'Tree is that he thinks he'll be able to charge $10/month for his blog. I'm afraid that with BYU fans being as stingy as they are it's not very likely that he will keep much in the way of readership. Plus, who's going to want to pay $10/month during Feb - July?



Bad news for Craigo, fewer readers going to the site will mean less return on advertising costs. Not sure it's fair for a site to charge both a subscription and have predominate advertising. Fans are going to get a little sick of that.

Hawk. You gotta stick with calling him Tree or The Tree, or learn how to spell Ogle!



;)



Also - how does this tie to Craig O?



Added thought.



What poor timing. The season is 2/3 over. He should have finishrd the year and tried this going into 2014 season - if at all.



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He missed both marketing and branding classes ;-)

Cougs_Rule wrote:

Someone needs to tell him that his logo looks like a reproductive part, at least when viewed on a small screen, like a phone



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Rorschach much? ;-)

POTD.

snoscythe wrote:

Does his blog even get that much traffic?

He's claiming 6,500 hits a day. No idea how many unique visitors.

More likely it's 6,500 page views a day. The site doesn't have enough traffic to be listed on Alexa.com, the premiere web tracking site.



I think he's in for a rude awakening.

His analysis was by far the best free content out there on BYU.



I have no idea how he compares with pay sites. And I doubt I'll ever find out.

snoscythe wrote:

Does his blog even get that much traffic?

He's claiming 6,500 hits a day. No idea how many unique visitors.

Hmmm...That includes repeat visitors. Also, how many of those visitors go to the site on a regular (weekly) basis. I've been there once.



He could either have a few really active visitors or a whole bunch of casual visitors. I'm going to guess it's the later.



Subscription rates are really low for online publications. Really low.



Assuming he manages to get 100 subscribers and they subscribe all year. That will be $12,000 on the year. If that's just vacation and Christmas money, that's not too bad. If he's trying to feed a family off of that, he better not quit the day job.