It seems like every time I try to re-start a clipstore by updating daily clips, life punishes me by letting me have less visits and less sales than the days before I re-activated. It doesn’t make sense at all. More updates and newsletter sending should result in more visits and that should eventually mean more earnings.
It’s a phenomenon that I’ll skip trying to explain and just focus on still doing the updates for now, knowing that the negative effects I am seeing are out of the ordinary. It still bugs me that it happens again. This could be the death-blow to some producers just starting out. You lack some updates, then try to save up to re-start the store again, fully motivated, but then you see sales and visits go down. Right in your face. Right when you updated for the first time.
However, I have experienced this before and there is no way around it. You have to fight through this, even if it’s not paying off right now. Giving up too early is still one of the main reasons many producers don’t get to make the money they would need, although they have promising material.
Of course there is a big chance that this has nothing to do with the updates and is just pure bad luck on exactly those crucial first days where you need the motivation to carry on. I’ll have to accept this as another challenge on my way back to $1000 / month in this store. An average of more than $33 / day is a decent amount of money if you look at it like that. It’s supposed to be hard work.
One thing that annoys me is that I couldn’t update today. I really wanted to update daily this month and now I already didn’t do it. There is this feeling that the motivation trap got me. I can’t say for sure that I wouldn’t have pushed harder to get a new clip up if it weren’t for the 0$ day and lower visits right at the beginning of my comeback. A $50 day the first day, after the first update and I might have had the power to pull another clip out of my hat and keep the store rolling.
Yes, sure, I cheated a little by posting the SD file version of the clip the next day. But it’s just not the same as a unique clip update. Both in satisfaction and effect on sales. A new clip does much better. Still, it’s often good to hit the main page with a new update, even if it’s just another version of an already posted clip.
That feeling sucks though. It means that my inner motivation could still be attached to the earnings and that is something I’d like to separate. For it can really bring you down to levels where it’s near impossible to get back up. I once had very high earnings and it was hard to realize that, with the kids, I wouldn’t be able to keep going on that level.
I had to reduce my daily expectancy in terms of sales. Now I am at a good level and not easily shocked by a bad sales day or even a few low days in a row. However, with this new store trying to grow towards my $1000 goal, I sense that there is a new psychological challenge ahead.
Sinna, I want to put out a HUGE thank you. This blog motivated me to restart/kickstart my Clips4Sale store that I’d opened 2 years prior. I was highly motivated by your words and did the daily updates just as you outlined. In the beginning of the month, it was hard, I was seeing nothing but visits. Xvideos gave me a boost to views, but nothing still in sales. I had 1 sale close to the beginning of the month, and that was a great high for me. But then weeks went with nothing. I was feeling the pressure, but I kept reading your motivational post and dusted myself off to get back on the horse. Powering through at least a few unique updates a week. Then a few days ago I had back to back sales (both bought the same 2 clips!) and then a third sale the next day. I’m noticing some trend that morning updates or very late at night updates are best for my content. So, at the end of the month I’ve broken my first goal of 5 sales, and it’s all thanks to powering through even when you feel hopeless. Here’s to hoping you can dig deep and find your strength and will to keep going as well. Thank you!
Thank you for those kind words, they mean a lot to me! Your store looks amazing. It has a style to it that is easily recognizable and your update rate has become really good. You have shown yourself that you can get on even when it’s hard. That is the most important virtue. I hope you had more sales and things will remain positive next month 🙂
I did! In fact, I rounded out May with 12 sales and over $90. I already have this week’s worth of filming done, just have to edit. Tomorrow’s is already scheduled to post. The hardest part now is the rendering, converting, and uploading which take FOREVER! It’s even longer if I have a 20+ min clip. I’m definitely going to stick to a variety of long and short clips. It’s easier on myself that way. I’ve even got a few regular customers already. 😀
Nice! 🙂 I know about the editing.. one of the fist things I did with my earnings was buying a good processing computer. It cost a lot of money but it has been well worth it considering time savings alone. It used to take me like 5-10 hours to compile and encode a 20 minute clip, not to think about a 30 or 40 minute one. Then, with my old internet speed, upload would take a day. Imagine you got the file length problem after the upload.. yeah. I had to do everything again, taking another day.. ages of time (thus money) wasted.
So now I can edit, compile, encode, recode and upload a 20 minute clip in about 3 hours, if everything goes smoothly.
If you sense that you will be doing this for a while, maybe in a few more months, I would definitely buy a computer with a solid state drive, at least 12 GB of ram and a powerful graphics card (2GB>) and processor (I got an i7). It will save you a lot of stress, anxiety and you’ll be less frustrated and annoyed if something goes wrong (you can do it over much quicker).
I’ll probably write about what I am using in one of the next articles.
I’d like to see your tech setup. I’m very tech savvy and I’m going to school for my BS in Graphic Design, so I already have all the Adobe CC Suites products. I’ll be paying for that for quite some time.
Just wanted to update you also…. getting close to the end of the month, and I’m already shattering goals and taking names. I used your suggested goals: 1st month 6 sales, 2nd 20 sales, 3rd 50… Well month 1 I hit double the goal with exactly 12 clips sold. Now even though it’s not the end of the month, I already have 33 clips sold!! I have been keeping up with the daily updates more religiously and have seen a world of difference. On top of the clips, my customers are contacting me direct through my messengers I put at the end of my vids to request customs or sessions or to just tribute me directly (as I am a Pro FinDomme).
I can’t tell you how much I appreciate how well I’ve gotten off because of your site!! Thank you! Thank YOU!! THANK YOU!!!!!!
Hey Sinna great blog. I definitely learned a lot from it. Im guilty of uploading all my clips at once, didn’t know about the negative impact that would have on front page features. I have just over 250 vids in my store now having started in 2014.. I do really well selling hardcore stuff but I was wondering if you had any advice for breaking into fetishes.Im currently the top store in squirting and impregnation fantasy. Squirting vids I can’t update daily bc they exhaust me but I think I could do impregnation fantasy vids daily. The problem is you run out of ideas. How are you able to update everyday? I definitely do notice a bump in sales everytime I update. I saw your advice of updating between 9-2. Have you ever tried updating at night? I notice most of my sales are overnight. I don’t know how much one can really make on c4s but my all time record was $2K last summer one month. I consistently make $1000-1200 which is fine for me bc its just supplemental to my cam income. In your opinion are the other sites worth using as well? The problem is its so time consuming to upload vids and I don’t wanna waste time with the other sites if its not worth it. Im on Iwantclips and sell maybe a clip a month its just a waste of time imo. Thanks again for the great blog
I have the fetish myself, so I have a lot of naughty ideas. However, customers often suggest new things. Be sure to be reachable by email. Don’t believe every customer saying that their idea will be the biggest seller ever. That’s often not the case. I went from requests to taking suggestions from customers that I am free to make. You can also get fresh ideas from browsing niche sites, reading on forums (for that particular fetish) and sometimes just not thinking about it, taking a shower, relaxing.. can give you a new idea.
Updating at night: yes, I often try to update around 9pm. It’s not been as good as 5pm for me, but that might depend on my content, which a lot of Europeans buy. 2am can really work sometimes, but I don’t find it better than 5pm.
Most of the top 50 stores on the main page make more than 3k / month. There are more studios making those amounts in the categories.
Other sites worth using are, at the moment, manyvids and that’s it. Manyvids is slow as well, but you can throw your clips up fairly easily and you don’t have to do anything to make the odd sale. I made more on there, doing nothing, than on c4s, doing nothing for a month. But if you update, c4s is far better.
I also felt that iwantclips was not worth it for me. After the recent changes it should be very difficult for new studios to make any money there. Especially if you are not doing domination clips.