Let me explain. In the early years of The Dispatch, we didn't offer discounted memberships, period. My reasoning was simple: The Dispatch is a premium product—original reporting, fact-based analysis, insightful commentary; all provided by trustworthy, veteran journalists—and it's expensive to produce. And at a cost of just $100 per year—27 cents a day—it's worth every penny.
That wasn't just my opinion. We conducted a survey of our paying members a few years ago and asked them about the cost of their membership. The exact wording of our question: "How would you rate the current value for the price of membership ($100/year, $10/month)?" We received 604 responses, with 50.3 percent describing $100/year as a "fair value" for the work we provided and 48.2 percent saying it was a "great value." If that was true then, it's even more true today. Our staff has doubled in size, we have a more robust network of contributors, we're covering a wider array of topics, and, at the risk of appearing immodest, we've built a well-deserved reputation for accuracy and intellectual honesty.
My other problem with discounts? They can feel so salesy and so … sleazy. It's like I'm deploying my two-finger six-shooters and asking: Hey hey—What's it going to take to get you into this Dispatch membership today?? In mid-October, I got a subscription pitch from a prestigious magazine: "Don't Miss Our Flash Sale: Unlimited Access for $1/week." It was a long flash—I got the same offer five days later, and again a week after that. Two days later: "Last Chance: Subscribe for Just $1 Per Week!" But one week after that? A second last chance. "Subscribe for just $1 a week." And just a few days ago: "Subscribe for Just $1 Per Week: Limited Time Offer." Depends what you mean by "limited," I suppose.
Look, I get it. It's a tough time to be in the media business and subscriptions/memberships are the most stable form of revenue there is. But I can imagine a prospective subscriber asking why he or she should trust the reporting from an outlet that's willing to mislead in its conversion appeals.
So, given all of that, why am I writing to you today to offer you a Dispatch membership for $1? Good question.
Simple answer: People who sign up for Dispatch memberships overwhelmingly remain Dispatch members. They're happy with what they get. Our bet is that the people who sign up for a $1 short-term membership are likely to stick around for a long time. While we're thrilled to have grown our ranks to nearly 50,000 paying members, we want to double that number. And I'm willing to suspend my hostility to discounts—at least in the short term—to experiment with efforts that will accelerate our growth.
And, as you can tell from this email, a candid explanation of our thinking on such discounts, we aren't trying to trick you into signing up. Instead, we're sharing with you the details of our behind-the-scenes conversations about the trade-offs involved with the hope that 1) you'll reward our honesty by taking a no-risk chance, and 2) you'll conclude that you, too, might well become part of the 98.5 percent of Dispatch members pleased with the value they get from their membership.
So here are the facts about our offer. It starts today and it'll end on December 31. If you join us on this $1 membership, that will get you one month of access to everything we do. In one month, if you like our work, you'll become a full-time paying member at $100/year. If you're like the 1.5 percent of folks who told us they didn't think that was a good value, you can cancel anytime, no problem.
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