Alex, I may be forced to put this in my LinkedIn profile and my web page just to share with the world your slide # 36 and 40.
Maybe I will have a poster made of # 36 and put it up when I go speak to starter's groups. I agree with you, there is a remarkable coincidence of pricing right across the Netherlands. However I will say that the pricing -- if you bring it down to square meterage and cost per member -- is pretty much spot on, nobody's pulling down a huge profit margin or anything. I figured my pricing four different ways to get the spread and the spread was not all that big. Which made it easier, of course. But as people are coming in here -- and as you know I am a total tyro -- I find that they are far more creative than I am. I recently had a discussion with a web shop owner, they want to have a physical shop once a quarter or so, a sort of bytes back to bricks thing. But not all the time, just occasionally. And the open markets here are not the right fit for them, which leaves them me or a shop-in-shop concept somewhere as options. Well, where does that fit in? I have a group of alternative medicing folks who want to book the space together, so they can do acupressure and massage and so forth in a group once a week and bring their clients together. Going to talk with them after carnaval (no one is doing business in the south of Holland right now, everybody is getting ready for carnaval), it's surely community but they want to reserve the space. Not really fitting into the options described above, nope. I even heard recently from a bunch of people -- the only thing they have in common is that they want to have their dogs at work. I said as long as the dogs get on it's okay with me. So we may be declaring dog day afternoon every Thursday pretty soon. Haven't decided quite what to do if the hookers show up wanting to cowork, lol. But the regs on that front will probably make it impossible and nobody has asked me yet, alas. Always wanted to run a brothrel to be honest. I have a small space in a small town and so I expected to be flexible. But these guys are a lot cleverer than me, here I was thinking about desks and things. Anyway, on pricing: First I looked at what everybody else was doing. Then I looked at a per square meter thingie based on the spreadsheet which is floating around here somewhere. Then I looked at relative value to the members based on what was available in the market, including working at home. And finally, well, the truth is, I have to visualize everything because I am slow on the uptake. So I got poker chips which represented the smallest unit of service I could provide and figured out how many of those I needed to run the space. Then I worked out the exchange of chips just as you do when playing poker. Those prices came out very close to each other. But now what I do is meet with people, and chat with them, talk to them about what they want and how they want it and how long they want it and then I send them a quote. Usually it is based on the poker chip model. Jeannine On Feb 27, 9:32 pm, Alex Hillman <[email protected]> wrote: > This is an interesting conversation - I've seen a lot of pricepoint > replication as new spaces emerge. That is to say, people pick price points > based on what other spaces charge rather than what their members (or > potential members) value. This affects price points, functional offerings, > locations, and more. > > I'm very interested in how people are coming to develop their membership > models and their price points. > > For reference, we developed ours based on a blend of inspiration from a > variety of sources, but almost all were introspected from our community's > interests. We continued to offer the same 3 levels - basic, lite, and full > time - along with drop-in (which almost always turns into a basic membership > for us) for the last 3 and a half years, only recently adding one more level > called a "Six Pack" after a number of our basic members were coming in ~6 > times a month and we wanted to cut down on paperwork for them and for us. > > I gave a presentation a couple of weeks ago on finding markets/audiences > before building a business (the "build the community first" approach for > other businesses, essentially). > > It covers a lot of ground but it also covers where price points come from > when there isn't a relevant point of reference to copy. > > Obviously the slides miss out on the rest of the content context, but if > anyone sees anything particularly interesting and wants to know more about > what it means, I'd be happy to answer any questions. > > http://www.slideshare.net/alexknowshtml/competitive-analysis-finding-... > > -Alex > > /ah > indyhall.org > coworking in philadelphia > > On Sun, Feb 27, 2011 at 3:17 PM, Jeannine <[email protected]>wrote: > > > > > > > > > +1 to Angel, I have recently taken my standard pricing down from my > > website as nobody actually wants the "standard package" except drop > > ins. I stil have membership levels, but they are more about what the > > options are than about how much it costs. > > > And I do indeed have more than enough pages to change if the pricing > > changes. Lately unless it's mandatory I just say "call me". > > > Jeannine > > > On Feb 27, 6:47 pm, Angel Kwiatkowski <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Looks like great progress is being made. That's awesome! I'd actually > > > prefer to not have options from which to pick for membership levels. > > > These types of check boxes are what frustrate the heck out of me with > > > current desk sharing sites. It might make more sense to let people > > > input $ranges or similar OR just have that field link out to the > > > space's rates page. Most sites I've seen have a page that lists their > > > different membership levels. Also, it's one fewer place that space > > > owners have to maintain their data. I think I've changed my membership > > > offerings at least 3 times in the past year (not saying that's a great > > > biz practice) but it was my reality as I tried to respond to market > > > needs. > > > > I'd concentrate data collection around the types of people/ > > > personalities in the community and less on the price. People hardly > > > ever inquire first about price. They inquire about people and > > > community first----almost always....even if they aren't aware that's > > > what they're doing. Just looking at my analytics tells me that people > > > hit and stay longer on the pages that have faces on them. They almost > > > always spend the least amount of time on and bounce off the membership > > > rate page as if it's the last page they visit on the site. > > > -Angel > > > > On Feb 26, 5:12 pm, Jonathan Yankovich <[email protected]> > > > wrote: > > > > > Hi All, > > > > > I'm working on adding more metadata to coworkingregistry.org and one > > of > > > > the things we identified was having rates information for various > > > > membership levels. Now, I KNOW that each facility has different > > > > membership levels that offer different levels of service, access, etc, > > > > but for the purposes of standardization and communication, I'd like to > > > > identify some common membership levels. > > > > > Currently, when I look at most spaces' web sites, I see the following > > > > levels: > > > > > 1) Drop-In - A one-day pass to work while the space is open, like > > a > > > > 9-5 Hotdesk member but for one day. (No storage.) > > > > > 2) Hotdesk 9-5 - Access to a desk/chair/resources every day that > > > > the space has open hours. No key. Bring your laptop, take it when you > > > > leave. "Leave no trace" coworking, unless a project locker is > > provided. > > > > > 3) Hotdesk 24/7 - Access to a desk/chair/resources as well as a > > > > key/card/code so you can access the space whenever you want. > > > > > 4) Permadesk - Your own established desk with whatever storage is > > > > provided. Commonly you might leave a laptop or desktop computer at > > your > > > > desk. Permadesk generally includes 24/7 access (key/card/code). > > > > > There are generally higher "tenant" or "anchor tenant" types of > > members, > > > > but these are usually custom/contract relationships and not something > > > > that needs advertising. It might be valuable to have a "Looking for > > > > anchor tenant" option on coworkingregistry, but saying more than that > > is > > > > probably not necessary. > > > > > So what does everyone think of these 4 general levels of membership? > > > > > Are these good names, or are there better names for these things? Do > > > > these names translate well into other languages? > > > > > Remember that the exact offering will vary from space to space in terms > > > > of the hours of availability, additional amenities, access to > > > > meetup/conference room spaces, and so on. I dont propose that we try > > to > > > > agree on those, or get spaces to change what they offer. What I'm > > > > trying to establish is a few general/base levels of membership that we > > > > can use to talk about membership across spaces in a general way. For > > > > example, everyone generally knows what a day-pass or drop-in is. Does > > > > this make sense? > > > > > See you in Austin, > > > > > -- > > > > -Jonathan Yankovich @tronathan > > > > Community Advocate, Madison Coworking > > > > Preferred contact: > > > > 1. skype: jonathanyankovich > > > > 2. twitter: tronathan > > > > 3. gtalk/email: [email protected] > > > > 4. phone: (608) 513 2012 > > > > more info:http://coworkingregistry.org > > > > more info:http://madisoncoworking.com > > > > please follow @tronathan @coworkregistry @coworkmadison > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "Coworking" group. > > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > > [email protected]. > > For more options, visit this group at > >http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. 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