• NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.

Free DM's Guild Five-Star Freebies

I do think alot of free/pwyw stuff is simply there to get word out about products no point putting together a 301 page product if they don't know what the quality will be like but if they remember your well formatted freebie etc its more likely.
 

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Free or PWYW can be used as a loss leader. For example, the first adventure in EN Publishing's adventure paths (WotBS and ZEITGEIST) is free. That doesn't mean it has no value - both are excellent adventures, professionally illustrated, very well reviewed - but that value is converted into something else. Whether that works or not is another matter, but free doesn't mean "valueless".
 





@Morris, thank you for your insightful business-oriented explanation. #senpainoticedme

@Connorsrpg, my personal rationale for focusing on free products is the development and support of self-publishers in this industry. Reviews are free promotions, and people who offer quality products for free (for whatever reason) deserve good attention. If every self-publisher reviewed three products for every one they output, each product on the DM's guild would have on average three reviews. I have invited anybody in this thread and community to likewise submit their reviews to help stimulate that mindset.
 
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By the way, I paid at least some money for most of the Pay What You Want products I downloaded (though not for all). I've noticed some authors on DMsGuild actively encourage customers to download for free, and say they are more interested in feedback at this point. Others encourage customers to download for free, and then come back to give some money if the customer liked the product. Others recommend or suggest a small amount be paid, such as $0.50 or $1.00. And yet others give no guidance other than to put up their product as Pay What you Want.
 

Others recommend or suggest a small amount be paid, such as $0.50 or $1.00. And yet others give no guidance other than to put up their product as Pay What you Want.

On their "What is this" page, they do list some recommended price points. But you are right; those numbers are based on successful sales figures, not content to cost ratios.
 

Cheers for this. I "bought" (for free) 30 Rules of Horror after reading this thread. Once I've had a chance to give it a read I'll go back and pay what I think it is worth.
 

Into the Woods

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