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Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

notes.eatonphil.com

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Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#61

Post by guappa »

KolibriFly wrote: post #36
BlackFly wrote: post #21

Author notes that there is still a standing offer to answer questions for free "if time allows" but doesn't get any inquiries. I believe this shows that it isn't due to fame or the payment making the author seem more legitimate. Instead I think that the payment creates the expectation that the inquiry will be answered and when someone expects an answer they are more willing to inquire. When the consultation is free o…

When there's a clear transaction, people feel entitled (in a good way) to your time

Oh no don't worry. They feel entitled also when they're not paying.

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#62

Post by guappa »

jpalomaki wrote: post #26

It's a similar as described in Freakonomics book. Daycare was annoyed with parents picking up their kids late. They introduced a fee for this. As a result, late pick ups increased. Something that was not considered to be socially acceptable, became more acceptable when you put a price tag for it.

What they should have done is call the cops and report abandoned children :)

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#63

Post by gizzlon »

wanderingstan wrote: post #42
HPsquared wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's free, people are suspicious and judge the cost to be something implicit, generally with a higher expected cost than $1. On the other hand if you make the cost explicit, people are more comfortable. It ties in with the story in Freakonomics about the daycare that started to charge a small "fine" to discourage parents picking up the child late, with the effect that these incidents happened more often. Because t…

Counter to Freakononics, my friend’s daycare in SF right now charges parents $2/minute for being late. So it seems to work for them. (Or it works because the cost is relatively high?)

Did they get fewer late pickups? Or do they just make more money?

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#64

Post by p3rls »

wanderingstan wrote: post #42
HPsquared wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's free, people are suspicious and judge the cost to be something implicit, generally with a higher expected cost than $1. On the other hand if you make the cost explicit, people are more comfortable. It ties in with the story in Freakonomics about the daycare that started to charge a small "fine" to discourage parents picking up the child late, with the effect that these incidents happened more often. Because t…

Counter to Freakononics, my friend’s daycare in SF right now charges parents $2/minute for being late. So it seems to work for them. (Or it works because the cost is relatively high?)

Lol, counter to freaknomics, the truth(tm)

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#65

Post by swah »

kimjune01 wrote: post #58
rpastuszak wrote: post #55

OK, this is a very interesting post for me because in the past 5 years I've met 200+ people via my Say Hi page: https://untested.sonnet.io/notes/say-hi/ and many of my speakers suggested that I should charge for the calls. Many of my calls involve tech/product advice (often from people with a ton of experience in other areas, e.g. ex FAANG managers, already accomplished founders, designers). Many of the people who me…

you can simply make another page that is commercially oriented

A/B test it and let us know which group is more interesting...

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#66

Post by bee_rider »

wodenokoto wrote: post #9

This reminds me of video that went simi viral a decade or so back. Not sure how much of it was staged, but the creators went to a public place and stood next to some “free hugs”-people and then put up a sign “Premium hugs $1” and apparently collected more hugs to the chargrin of the free-huggers.

I get the whole “people are skeptical of free stuff” thing. But, I suspect in this case it is more that people are “in on the joke” for the premium hugs.

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#67

Post by eatonphil »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #57
trainerxr50 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The title is ridiculously misleading when people are donating to charity.

It is sort of entertaining to see the gymnastics writers (or LLMs) do to get clicks.

To the contrary, I did not even send this post to my mailing list. It wasn't exactly a throwaway post but it was something more like that. A post I didn't expect anyone to care much about.

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#68

Post by pferde »

guappa wrote: post #62
jpalomaki wrote: post #26

It's a similar as described in Freakonomics book. Daycare was annoyed with parents picking up their kids late. They introduced a fee for this. As a result, late pick ups increased. Something that was not considered to be socially acceptable, became more acceptable when you put a price tag for it.

What they should have done is call the cops and report abandoned children :)

No, what they should have done is to increase the fine progressively for repeat offenders.

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#69

Post by gwbas1c »

rpastuszak wrote: post #55

OK, this is a very interesting post for me because in the past 5 years I've met 200+ people via my Say Hi page: https://untested.sonnet.io/notes/say-hi/ and many of my speakers suggested that I should charge for the calls. Many of my calls involve tech/product advice (often from people with a ton of experience in other areas, e.g. ex FAANG managers, already accomplished founders, designers). Many of the people who me…

> I enjoy serendipitous interactions with beautifully weird people

Gosh, I wish I could articulate that into words when I was younger. I remember having a fun conversation with a batshit insane lady who walked into a porch party, and one of my friends thought that I actually thought she was sane.

Re: Want to meet people, try charging them for it?

#70

Post by bell-cot »

gizzlon wrote: post #63
wanderingstan wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counter to Freakononics, my friend’s daycare in SF right now charges parents $2/minute for being late. So it seems to work for them. (Or it works because the cost is relatively high?)

Did they get fewer late pickups? Or do they just make more money?

Any reason to think their baseline is making money? The arithmetic of daycare - market-minimum hourly pay for the workers, vs. legal minimum per-child staffing levels, vs. tight parental budgets - is damned ruthless.
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