If you use Passionfruit Ads, you got an email this weekend announcing a new pricing structure. Basically in a nutshell, a service that used to charge $1 for every paid ad (and $0 for every swap), is now charging a flat fee of $9 a month. Which... if you're making money on ads is really a drop in the bucket and will actually cost you less money. But... if you're like me and really only ever do swaps... which were free under the old system... this now means ad swaps will cost me $9 a month. Which I really, really don't want to pay.
All this to say that I will honor my current swaps and continue them through the end of August (which is when PF starts being a paid service). If you would like me to continue offering ads on my sidebar, you will now need to pay for them. Honestly as much ease as PF puts into swapping, I really can't justify paying for something that I'm not making any money off of. So for that reason, I will no longer be accepting any swaps, and will be removing myself from PF Ads completely in September provided that I don't get any interest in paid ads. So really... it's up to you! ;D
No guilt though, if you don't feel like paying to advertise here. I don't blame you. I will probably implement a blogroll instead and post buttons of my favorite blogs, so if you're one of those... yeah for you! You'll still get free advertising! ;P
Anyway, I really don't blame Jason at PF for wanting to get paid for all his hard work. I get that. So I really don't blame him for changing up his pricing structure. PF is still the most amazing way to serve up ads on your blog - it really does take the hassle out of managing all those bloggers. It's a smart business move on his part, really, since most of the users now are basically not paying him anything (since a lot of us are primarily just using his service for swapping ads). So I get it. Really. But I also can't justify paying to swap ads either. For me it just isn't worth it. I'd rather not swap at all than pay to have free ad swaps. Honestly swapping is kind of a pain, and PF made it much more bearable, but paying for something that's just bearable really isn't worth it to me.
So yeah... that's the latest news around these parts.
*****
Do you use PF Ads? Do you mainly get swaps or paid spots? Now that PF is charging, will you continue using it? Why or why not?
All this to say that I will honor my current swaps and continue them through the end of August (which is when PF starts being a paid service). If you would like me to continue offering ads on my sidebar, you will now need to pay for them. Honestly as much ease as PF puts into swapping, I really can't justify paying for something that I'm not making any money off of. So for that reason, I will no longer be accepting any swaps, and will be removing myself from PF Ads completely in September provided that I don't get any interest in paid ads. So really... it's up to you! ;D
No guilt though, if you don't feel like paying to advertise here. I don't blame you. I will probably implement a blogroll instead and post buttons of my favorite blogs, so if you're one of those... yeah for you! You'll still get free advertising! ;P
Anyway, I really don't blame Jason at PF for wanting to get paid for all his hard work. I get that. So I really don't blame him for changing up his pricing structure. PF is still the most amazing way to serve up ads on your blog - it really does take the hassle out of managing all those bloggers. It's a smart business move on his part, really, since most of the users now are basically not paying him anything (since a lot of us are primarily just using his service for swapping ads). So I get it. Really. But I also can't justify paying to swap ads either. For me it just isn't worth it. I'd rather not swap at all than pay to have free ad swaps. Honestly swapping is kind of a pain, and PF made it much more bearable, but paying for something that's just bearable really isn't worth it to me.
So yeah... that's the latest news around these parts.
*****
Do you use PF Ads? Do you mainly get swaps or paid spots? Now that PF is charging, will you continue using it? Why or why not?
While I totally understand why PF is going to a paid structure, I can't merit spending $9 on it either. I only ever used it for swaps, and I'm not really all that interested in doing advertising otherwise on my site so I'll probably end up dropping it entirely.
ReplyDeleteI thought the same thing when I heard about the new $9 per month change.
ReplyDelete