DMs Guild Pay What You Want on the DMs Guild - An Analysis and Explanation

hawkeyefan · Feb 25, 2016

It seems to me that the PWYW method works when it is designed to support later purchases, or attention to other products. All the anecdotal evidence given in the thread support that. So while PWYW may not be the best idea for an individual product, or even a series of unrelated individual products, I think there is certainly a place for it.

As with most things, there are pros and cons to both options and neither is universally correct.

Gnarl45 · Feb 25, 2016

Jester Canuck said:
I'm not going to just work for free so people who don't think my work is worthwhile because it's not a brand name product stay happy. I shouldn't be expected to work for exposure.

What about paying for marketing? You know, things like ads on ENWorld, a stand at GenCon, or a free promotional product.

Matthan · Feb 25, 2016

Matthan said:
If reviews are really that hard to come by, I'll offer some of my free time. I'm not anyone special, but if you'll send me a PM with a link to your PWYW product, I'll take a look and write up a review. If I suddenly get hit with dozens of these, it'll take a while, but if it's just a few (and your products are short), I'll get through them in a week or so.

As a follow-up to myself, I had one person take me up on this offer so far. Here's the review: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product_reviews.php?products_id=174637

Offer's still open.

Right now, my browser is telling me ENworld isn't safe whenever I go advanced to embed the link so I'll have to come back and make that prettier later when it dies down.

Jester David · Feb 25, 2016

Gnarl45 said:
What about paying for marketing? You know, things like ads on ENWorld, a stand at GenCon, or a free promotional product.

I've thought of advertising my webcomic on the site. But my webcomic isn't monetized and is a big giant hole I throw money into, so advertising would just be widening the hole.

Advertising my 3rd Party Products is not impossible. I've made a few clams. I imagine I could invest all the money I've made and put that into an ad... that will likely run for 24-hours before vanishing. But isn't it automated? And I still might not generate significantly more sales...

Bupp · Feb 25, 2016

I've got two PWYW up, about to put up a third. Stuff I would put on my blog for free anyway. I'm not in it to make money, or get exposure. I'd be writing this stuff anyway even if just for myself. The few bucks I've made I won't cash out, I'll just use it to support other authors.

Interestingly enough, I put my affiliate number on all my links. About a third of the money I have made is through affiliate sales.

Giant2005 · Feb 25, 2016

Matthan said:
Offer's still open.

Well I only have one product left that is still PWYW (The rest all have some kind of price tag, even if it is just 50c), but I'll gladly take a review on the one item that does qualify! Give it an honest opinion - I'm not going to be upset if you don't like it and your rating reflects that. Dm's Guild has taught me that the adage of "any press is good press" isn't as full of crap as it sounds. But when you are rating it, treat it as if you were downloading it without actually being asked to, so treat it as if you were actually interested in the subject matter enough to bother downloading it in the first place (even if the subject matter doesn't actually interest you).

Anyway, here is the link.

Giant2005 · Feb 25, 2016

Jester Canuck said:
I've thought of advertising my webcomic on the site. But my webcomic isn't monetized and is a big giant hole I throw money into, so advertising would just be widening the hole.

You can use DM's Guild to advertise your webcomic. Just make a PDF with a few samples and upload it there as PWYW and make sure to stick a link to your webpage at the end of the PDF so people can see more.

Storyteller Hero · Feb 26, 2016

Jester Canuck said:
I've thought of advertising my webcomic on the site. But my webcomic isn't monetized and is a big giant hole I throw money into, so advertising would just be widening the hole.

Giant2005 said:
You can use DM's Guild to advertise your webcomic. Just make a PDF with a few samples and upload it there as PWYW and make sure to stick a link to your webpage at the end of the PDF so people can see more.

Just so you know, the staff at DM Guild will take down anything that is not RPG material - they pointed out in their FAQ. If you want to advertise a webcomic there, you'd have to upload it as part of an actual DnD 5th edition supplement entry.

Giant2005 · Feb 26, 2016

Storyteller Hero said:
Just so you know, the staff at DM Guild will take down anything that is not RPG material - they pointed out in their FAQ. If you want to advertise a webcomic there, you'd have to upload it as part of an actual DnD 5th edition supplement entry.

They have an actual section that is purely dedicated to comics. Is that not there for us to use? (Not a rhetorical question)

ZzarkLinux · Feb 26, 2016

What about the "Exclusivity Rule", where content posted on DMGuild cannot be sold or redistributed on any other site? Does that apply to comics too?

Storyteller Hero said:
Just so you know, the staff at DM Guild will take down anything that is not RPG material - they pointed out in their FAQ.

Apple does the same thing with their app store. A while back I wrote an App for a company I worked at, because they were interested. I submitted the app, and after a month of waiting it got declined with the message "Advertising Apps for a business are not permitted in the Apps Store". On the plus side, I got to learn how to write Apps / Objective C in 2 months !

DMs Guild Pay What You Want on the DMs Guild - An Analysis and Explanation

hawkeyefan

Legend

Gnarl45

First Post

Matthan

Explorer

Jester David

Hero

Bupp

Adventurer

Giant2005

First Post

Giant2005

First Post

Storyteller Hero

Adventurer

Giant2005

First Post

ZzarkLinux

First Post

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