I want to give everyone a heads up that the blog’s review price will be going up to $500 next month. If you’re thinking of ordering a review and want it done at the old price of $450, then you must get the order in before March 1.
Even at $500 per review, I am still priced extremely low when compared to the competition and I don’t expect orders to decrease at all. I was talking to Kris Jone of Pepperjam Network and he told me he would have happily paid $1,000 for the review we did for him.
Many readers have emailed me asking why I run my review through ReviewMe instead of handling it myself. The rational being I would make more if I cut them out of the loop. I answered that question way back in April, 2007. If you haven’t read it, please do. It offers a very important lesson.
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{ 56 comments }
this seems like an incredible deal! I plan on ordering one later this year! This is a win-win situation for you and the buyer!
I also plan on having a ReviewMe here, but first I must sell my house, my guitar, my father’s car, and kidnap few of my friends and ask for randsome…
John:
Just out of curiosity, what makes you determine when to raise the price and by how much?
I would assume that trafficis going to be the determining factor, plus scarcity. if Michael can only write x of these, maximise the profit!
That guy Kris… never go shopping with him!
Next time I have something to sell I’ll drop by his weblog!
I think it’s time we renegotiate my rate.
LOL! It’s a mutiny! I better get a review in before they go up to $1000, at the rate their increasing.
That is way to much.
maybe i get a share too for reading
haha. If everyone started getting a share for reading, John will run out of money
We already get quite a lot of shared reading money making tips
Love John, but you should get at least a 10% bumb too. @0% is you have to review anymore horrible e-books
You sure have come a long way from the $300 reviews! I agree with your article and principles though, online industries are all about relationships and the interaction between parties.
He started with $50 reviews
From that raise you can know how good is he.
Nice. I might have to take you up on that.
It’s a tough life when the only way you can increase the money from your blog is to just increase your ad rate
keep up the good work!
Oh damn! I was going to order a review around mid-march… guess I could still make it if I hurry up…
Half a grand, wow! Still a good deal but I gotta wonder if having it at the 500 dollar mark is going to affect potential buyers psychologically. Sorta like how stores like to price things at 39.99 so it doesn’t seem like you’re in the 40 dollar bracket.
Yea, maybe you should increase it to $499 instead.
Wow a discount of $1 there
Anyways deserved price.
Awesome! Maybe this will deter a few reviews while still keeping John’s income from reviews pretty high.
It seems like every other post lately has been a review, and it’s kinda annoying
Heh, I was wondering the same thing when I messaged you about a review John. Wasn’t sure why you wouldn’t cut ReviewMe out of it. I thought maybe you owned part of the company, or were getting large referral fees from them. Now that I’ve read the post you linked to, I understand and also respect you for that decision.
However, I still think that ReviewMe taking 50% is way too much. 30% fine, but 50%? Ouch. Hopefully the trend of networks decreasing their cut, continues.
And the John Chow machine rolls on….
We’re going to order a review for our new Blogvertiser.com (www.blogvertiser.com) site as soon as it’s ready.
I’ve already got close to a thousand hits this month from one little text link on this site, so I think a review will be well worth the money!
;o)
Stewart
lol i am sure next month we’ll see him beating the 30k / month just because of your $500 extra
And the John Chow machine rolls on….
We’re going to order a review for our new Blogvertiser.com site as soon as it’s ready.
I’ve already got close to a thousand hits this month from one little text link on this site, so I think a review will be well worth the money!
;o)
Stewart
John, would you rather build your relationship up with ReviewMe or with all your readers and sponsors? If you cut out ReviewMe and focus on selling the reviews yourself or with Michael Kwan, you not only make more, but you are able to charge us readers/sponsors A LOT less. The key point here is making a relationship with your readers rather than with companies. If there are no readers, there is no John Chow
-Mike
p.s. You could start charging $150-200/per review again if you stop using ReviewMe.
I understand the whole relationship thing John, but my question is why aren’t you negotiating with ReviewMe for a bigger percentage? Shouldn’t the sites that make ReviewMe more money be offered better incentives so their customers don’t just bypass them?
My .02
Sorry, that link should actually correctly be listed as…
Blogvertiser.com
Wowza! I have no doubt that reviews won’t slow down for ya.
Well, with high demand and low price, you could afford to be evil and raise prices. Nice way to earn a few more $$s
If the demand is there the small increase in the price of the review won’t matter much. The same people that were willing and could afford to pay $450 will pay $500.
If you ever plan to raise the price to $1000, Simon Lau makes a good point above, maybe just use $999 instead.
~Terry
Good deal for your blog anyway..that quiet expensive and afford less for someone who running are small business
I’m a blogger newbie, so excuse my ingnorance. But what exactly is this review program? How does it work? And what does it do for you/me?
Mad idea, paying 500 dollars for chow, what do people get from it, just a small increase in traffic. Chow will just go and spend it on some meal
not to mention the affiliate summit trips
Chow is probably going to get around $250 after the ReviewMe fees, but I’m not sure of the exact percentage. Since he uses Michael Kwan’s freelancing services, he probably splits that $250 to 80/20, which gives John about $50. Now if John takes out ReviewMe and only charges $250 for a review, he will receive the same, but he would build the relationship with the sponsors.
-Mike
p.s. As if John would do that…
I think you’re probably WAY off with the 80/20 split for sourcing the reviews to Michael Kwan. I’d imagine John keeps >50% of the payment from ReviewMe.
well i dont see if it would make that much of a difference in advertising … 450 – 500 is not a big deal because people who are willing to pay 450 they won’t mind paying 500 either to get a review on this blog.
Yep, for an advertiser who can pay $450 can pay 50 more for the review without any question
I’m fairly new to this site and was wondering what sort of figures would be mentioned. I must admit that is alot less than I was expecting to see. Great work John.
If those that have been reviewed say that would have happily paid the double, then most likely it is worth that (with no doubts of course).
Well, more money for John
He sure earns a lot.
Is worth it if it is really good.
The flow of supply and demand is a beautiful thing.
I can completely understand why a relationship is better than money. Who knows, you’ve probably earned more from the relationship than by going off on your own.
50$ to 500$ good journey!!!!!!!!!!
$50?
That must be wayyy back. Ever since I came to johnchow.com since last year mid or after that. It is always 450$ ? Or I am mistaken here. Or actually you meant an increase of $50 ?
I can understand the relationship part of it as to why you would want to stick with ReviewMe. If you’re happy with the service from ReviewMe and they bring you business you never would have had otherwise, it makes sense to stick with them. Why mess with a good thing?
~Terry
the price is totally justified, this site probably gets a couple thousand uniques a day, i am getting ready to launch my program and ill def. buy a review i know the ROI for my system would be amazing.
You think just a couple thousand uniques??
It will be a way bigger number than what you estimated.
what should one estimate in regards to the hits that this site gets?
While I understand that many of your reviews come directly through ReviewMe, I don’t get why you don’t just do them directly now. I think your readers would love to see 1/2 the total number of reviews, which would allow you to make the same amount of money. Thoughts?
Yeah i too think going directly would be a good idea John
I kind of agree yeah. A Direct review would be much better rather than using Review Me. I think your voice is much strong now and you have 20,000 subscribers. Plus more must be visiting. It will be more beneficial.
I understand….I may have to double my fee to $0.10
$4000 in reviews only for the month of February is not bad. That is for many people a good salary!