New Funding Idea

angel7 · 02-18-2002, 02:22 PM

Dr. Young,

I just read your synopsis of the Care/Cure site. Given the heavy traffic maybe it's time to let certain companies advertise on our site. The companies could be geared toward SCI issues. The advertising monies could be used for research.
'
Has anyone addressed this yet?

Deb

Wise Young · 02-21-2002, 04:41 PM

Debbie7, the monies that can be gained from advertising would be sufficient to support this site but not enough to support much research. We have to get into the millions of hits a day before ad banner revenues get into the hundreds of thousands per year. At our current rate of about 10,000-12,000 page views per day, we might get $5,000 per year. For this kind of money, I think that many people would prefer to have a faster site without all the ads.

Let me give a specific example. Cando.com was a commercial site and they sold ad banners through several standard internet mechanisms. Every page of the forums had an ad on top, adding perhaps 5-10 seconds of delay in page loading for an average person with a modem connection. When they could not find an ad sponsor, they used the space to sell their own ads, for products within their site. Carecure is not yet up to the level that Cando was at the time of its crash. At the time of its demise, I believe that Cando were getting about 5000 visitors per day. Our site is getting about 1100-1200 visitors per day but our visitors are probably spending a lot more time on the site. With 5000 visitors per day, I believe that their ad revenues were in the range of $30,000 per year. Along with their e-commerce sales of supplies and other goods, Cando probably was averaging $150,000 per year of income. This is clearly not enough for the company to survive and they folded. The original concept behind Cando was that they would donate 10% of their revenues to spinal cord injury research that is chosen by the members of the forums. Well, as we all know, that turned out to be a pipedream.

I have been working hard getting sponsorship funds for this site. For example, Johnson & Johnson provided a $50,000 donation to get this site going. I am hoping that we will be able to get about $100,000 per year so that the site can hire a person to run the site (which I am now doing), allow us to pay members of the community to write articles, and to organize some of the valuable information that is being posted on this site. I also want to make sure that the site has sufficient funds so that even if all sponsorship money were to disappear, it will be able to run for a long time (5 years... hehe, long enough for a cure?).

There are several potential sources of revenues that I have been thinking of, that may generate research funds:

1. The contents of this forum and the articles that we are generating in the carecure community site can be edited, cleaned up a bit, organized, and put into books or CD's. For example, I was thinking that we can produce a CD/book called FAQ SCI which contains all the most frequently asked questions and the best answers to these questions. Do you think that there will be a market for such a book. If say 10% of the SCI population and their families (if this population is 1 million people, 10% would be 100,000) were to buy the book and it generated $5 profit per book, that could generate as much as $500,000. We can also generate regular volumes that would contain all the articles that I have been putting into the carecure web site. This might generate some revenues as well.

2. We may be able to sell the forums to other web sites that are aiming towards the disability market. For example, it would cost the CRPF, CSRO, PVA, and other organizations $5000-$10,000 per year to field a fast, secure, well-run bulletin board like this one. We can place a forum on each of their web sites (and of course the forums would be available from this site as well). This would help drive traffic to us and to them. If we were to form alliances with such sites and charged them $5000 per year for the service, I think that perhaps a ten or so sites would agree. This could potentially generate $50,000 per year.

3. Corporate Sponsorship. This is of course the reason why this site is running right now... because Johnson & Johnson provided us with a donation (without demanding an ad banner, by the way). We can try to get additional sponsors. As I pointed out above, I am hoping to generate $100,000 per year from such sponsorship. If we get several more sponsors, it could provide sufficient funds so that the site can support some research. The above, however, takes time and also traffic. If this site begins to attract a large percentage of the spinal cord injury community, multiple sclerosis, and related spinal disorders, it should not be hard to get corporate sponsorship.

In the meantime, this site is doing well. We are growing steadily at about 1% per day of page views, 200-300 registrants per month. I did not want our growth to be so fast that this site loses its community feeling. At a growth rate of about 1% per day, we should be able to achieve 5000 visitors per day and 1,000,000 page-views per month. When we get to that level, some of the above ideas will be easier to implement.

There was some discussion amongst the moderators about the possibility of charging a membership fee. Most of the moderators felt that this would strongly discourage people from registering. If we do anything like that, it would be in the form of voluntary tax deductible donations.

Wise.

Webber · 02-22-2002, 07:52 AM

DR. Young,

I didn't realize until you mentioned in your post, that Johnson and Johnson donated $50,000.00 for the start up of this site. That really says alot about the company and I for one am extremely proud of their contribution towards helping the SCI community. Hopefully others will follow their lead (larger corporations) for SCI sponsership and funds for research. Wheelchair manufacturer's, and all related suppliers of medical needs the SCI community needs and uses on a daily basis, hopefully will join in with funds directed towards research. What better advertising could a wheelchair manufacturer want, glad you chose our chair, but we'd like to see you out of it!!

angel7 · 02-22-2002, 03:00 PM

Dr. Young:

When your ready to start implementing some of this ideas let me know. I have a lot of time on my hands right now (ha, ha) and am a pretty good organizer and writer - I will be glad to help in any way.

Deb

Wise Young · 02-23-2002, 02:37 AM

You are on my list! Wise.

02-18-2002, 02:22 PM	#1
angel7 Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Alvin,Texas Posts: 1,961	New Funding Idea Dr. Young, I just read your synopsis of the Care/Cure site. Given the heavy traffic maybe it's time to let certain companies advertise on our site. The companies could be geared toward SCI issues. The advertising monies could be used for research. ' Has anyone addressed this yet? Deb

02-22-2002, 07:52 AM	#3
Webber Member Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 95	Hats off to J & J DR. Young, I didn't realize until you mentioned in your post, that Johnson and Johnson donated $50,000.00 for the start up of this site. That really says alot about the company and I for one am extremely proud of their contribution towards helping the SCI community. Hopefully others will follow their lead (larger corporations) for SCI sponsership and funds for research. Wheelchair manufacturer's, and all related suppliers of medical needs the SCI community needs and uses on a daily basis, hopefully will join in with funds directed towards research. What better advertising could a wheelchair manufacturer want, glad you chose our chair, but we'd like to see you out of it!!

02-22-2002, 03:00 PM	#4
angel7 Senior Member Join Date: Oct 2001 Location: Alvin,Texas Posts: 1,961	Great Ideas Dr. Young: When your ready to start implementing some of this ideas let me know. I have a lot of time on my hands right now (ha, ha) and am a pretty good organizer and writer - I will be glad to help in any way. Deb

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02-21-2002, 04:41 PM	#2
Wise Young Administrator Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: New Brunswick, NJ, USA Posts: 37,975	Debbie7, the monies that can be gained from advertising would be sufficient to support this site but not enough to support much research. We have to get into the millions of hits a day before ad banner revenues get into the hundreds of thousands per year. At our current rate of about 10,000-12,000 page views per day, we might get $5,000 per year. For this kind of money, I think that many people would prefer to have a faster site without all the ads. Let me give a specific example. Cando.com was a commercial site and they sold ad banners through several standard internet mechanisms. Every page of the forums had an ad on top, adding perhaps 5-10 seconds of delay in page loading for an average person with a modem connection. When they could not find an ad sponsor, they used the space to sell their own ads, for products within their site. Carecure is not yet up to the level that Cando was at the time of its crash. At the time of its demise, I believe that Cando were getting about 5000 visitors per day. Our site is getting about 1100-1200 visitors per day but our visitors are probably spending a lot more time on the site. With 5000 visitors per day, I believe that their ad revenues were in the range of $30,000 per year. Along with their e-commerce sales of supplies and other goods, Cando probably was averaging $150,000 per year of income. This is clearly not enough for the company to survive and they folded. The original concept behind Cando was that they would donate 10% of their revenues to spinal cord injury research that is chosen by the members of the forums. Well, as we all know, that turned out to be a pipedream. I have been working hard getting sponsorship funds for this site. For example, Johnson & Johnson provided a $50,000 donation to get this site going. I am hoping that we will be able to get about $100,000 per year so that the site can hire a person to run the site (which I am now doing), allow us to pay members of the community to write articles, and to organize some of the valuable information that is being posted on this site. I also want to make sure that the site has sufficient funds so that even if all sponsorship money were to disappear, it will be able to run for a long time (5 years... hehe, long enough for a cure?). There are several potential sources of revenues that I have been thinking of, that may generate research funds: 1. The contents of this forum and the articles that we are generating in the carecure community site can be edited, cleaned up a bit, organized, and put into books or CD's. For example, I was thinking that we can produce a CD/book called FAQ SCI which contains all the most frequently asked questions and the best answers to these questions. Do you think that there will be a market for such a book. If say 10% of the SCI population and their families (if this population is 1 million people, 10% would be 100,000) were to buy the book and it generated $5 profit per book, that could generate as much as $500,000. We can also generate regular volumes that would contain all the articles that I have been putting into the carecure web site. This might generate some revenues as well. 2. We may be able to sell the forums to other web sites that are aiming towards the disability market. For example, it would cost the CRPF, CSRO, PVA, and other organizations $5000-$10,000 per year to field a fast, secure, well-run bulletin board like this one. We can place a forum on each of their web sites (and of course the forums would be available from this site as well). This would help drive traffic to us and to them. If we were to form alliances with such sites and charged them $5000 per year for the service, I think that perhaps a ten or so sites would agree. This could potentially generate $50,000 per year. 3. Corporate Sponsorship. This is of course the reason why this site is running right now... because Johnson & Johnson provided us with a donation (without demanding an ad banner, by the way). We can try to get additional sponsors. As I pointed out above, I am hoping to generate $100,000 per year from such sponsorship. If we get several more sponsors, it could provide sufficient funds so that the site can support some research. The above, however, takes time and also traffic. If this site begins to attract a large percentage of the spinal cord injury community, multiple sclerosis, and related spinal disorders, it should not be hard to get corporate sponsorship. In the meantime, this site is doing well. We are growing steadily at about 1% per day of page views, 200-300 registrants per month. I did not want our growth to be so fast that this site loses its community feeling. At a growth rate of about 1% per day, we should be able to achieve 5000 visitors per day and 1,000,000 page-views per month. When we get to that level, some of the above ideas will be easier to implement. There was some discussion amongst the moderators about the possibility of charging a membership fee. Most of the moderators felt that this would strongly discourage people from registering. If we do anything like that, it would be in the form of voluntary tax deductible donations. Wise.

02-23-2002, 02:37 AM	#5
Wise Young Administrator Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: New Brunswick, NJ, USA Posts: 37,975	You are on my list! Wise.