Growing Bitshares and discussing its fee structure

[TravelsAsia]

Akado's post about the target market  being the best exchange possible makes sense to me.

"BitShares is about that exchange that will shake the NASDAQ to the core. Then, around BitShares, business will sprout, adapt and grow. Those same businesses will be into the payment services stuff and will adapt."

[Pheonike]

Can we setup profiles. The user chooses the type of account they want to be and the fees a then set to match that kind of account. The user pays a fee to switch account profile but can only switch once every two weeks or month. A user could have a dedicated trading account or a dedicated basic account. Also make the fee for transferring between account types high so users won't try to bypass fees by constantly going between types.

[jakub]

If you are talking to an average joe  who doesn't really have any need for BitShares (at this point) vs talking to a crypto/trader person.

That's why we need targeting. I don't want to waste my time on average joe.

The thing is, BitShares is not for "average joe". Get used to it. It will be massive but it does not mean "everybody" using it.
If we manage to acquire just 3% of the global population is will be a massive success and we'll all be rich. Even 1% will be spectacular.

EDIT: This above selective targeting is needed at this initial stage.
Once everything works smoothly we will be able to loosen up this targeting and eventually reach to average joe.
But let us not start with "average joe". Let us start with "smart joe".

First few times you transfer funds to another account, you will think about it...not to mention trading fees.

Yes, I will think about it but by comparing the cost of the fees with the usefulness of the product.
If I don't find it useful enough I won't use it. And in most cases not because of the fees but because I don't find it useful in the first place.

The actual indication that our transfer fees are too high will be this: people creating new accounts, starting some initial activity and then giving up. And this syndrome would have to be happening once SmartCoins are fully liquid - so there is no other excuse for the user to give up on us.

[rgcrypto]

My 2 BTS.

I sincerely believe that our main target market and where we can make great stride is in the exchange businesses.
I do not have enough knowledge in that kind of business to know what is the correct fee structure.

If ccedk or other exchanges came forward and told us how they would set the fees in their "ideal world", it could give us insights on this debate. I will support any fee structure that is maximized to attract exchanges.
Exchanges know better what traders want.

[EstefanTT]

And those who want lowering transfer fees - how many times has this happened to you:

You present the BitShares GUI to someone new (who has never heard of BitShares before).
Under your supervision this person creates a new account and you send her/him some BTS/USD/CNY to start with.
First you show them how quickly and easy it is to send payments back and forth. And how easy it is to find somebody else's account and add it to the dashboard.
Then you show them the explorer page, the witnesses, briefly explain the voting concept, and can even show them the trading page.
Finally, if there is enough interest, you show them how to "create" new USD or CNY out of their BTS.
And at the end of the demo, this person says: "It's pretty cool and quite amazing. But you know what? The transfer fees are way too expensive to me. So it's cool but sorry, I can't afford it."

Sounds pretty absurd, doesn't it?

I've presented our GUI to several people and it generallay comes down to these two cases:
- they're not interested because it's a concept that is too strange for them ("Why would I need this?")
- they are very impressed and raise a lot of issues (e.g. "How come everybody see my account?") but they never complain about the fees (and I guess it's because they see value in the product).

I made this very same introduction of the wallet to a friend but unfortunately he won't use it.
He thinks that's an amazing piece of technology but the fees are to high, if only it was 0.09€ instead of 0.12 ...

Lol 

[GaltReport]

And those who want lowering transfer fees - how many times has this happened to you:

You present the BitShares GUI to someone new (who has never heard of BitShares before).
Under your supervision this person creates a new account and you send her/him some BTS/USD/CNY to start with.
First you show them how quickly and easy it is to send payments back and forth. And how easy it is to find somebody else's account and add it to the dashboard.
Then you show them the explorer page, the witnesses, briefly explain the voting concept, and can even show them the trading page.
Finally, if there is enough interest, you show them how to "create" new USD or CNY out of their BTS.
And at the end of the demo, this person says: "It's pretty cool and quite amazing. But you know what? The transfer fees are way too expensive to me. So it's cool but sorry, I can't afford it."

Sounds pretty absurd, doesn't it?

I've presented our GUI to several people and it generallay comes down to these two cases:
- they're not interested because it's a concept that is too strange for them ("Why would I need this?")
- they are very impressed and raise a lot of issues (e.g. "How come everybody see my account?") but never ever complain about the fees (and I guess it's because they see value in the product).

I would think it depends on who you are talking to.  If you are talking to an average joe  who doesn't really have any need for BitShares (at this point) vs talking to a crypto/trader person.  The latter may be interested in the fees.  First few times you transfer funds to another account, you will think about it...not to mention trading fees.

[jakub]

And those who want lowering transfer fees - how many times has this happened to you:

You present the BitShares GUI to someone new (who has never heard of BitShares before).
Under your supervision this person creates a new account and you send her/him some BTS/USD/CNY to start with.
First you show them how quickly and easy it is to send payments back and forth. And how easy it is to find somebody else's account and add it to the dashboard.
Then you show them the explorer page, the witnesses, briefly explain the voting concept, and can even show them the trading page.
Finally, if there is enough interest, you show them how to "create" new USD or CNY out of their BTS.
And at the end of the demo, this person says: "It's pretty cool and quite amazing. But you know what? The transfer fees are way too expensive to me. So it's cool but sorry, I can't afford it."

Sounds pretty absurd, doesn't it?

I've presented our GUI to several people and it generallay comes down to these two cases:
- they're not interested because it's a concept that is too strange for them ("Why would I need this?")
- they are very impressed and raise a lot of issues (e.g. "How come everybody see my account?") but they never complain about the fees (and I guess it's because they see value in the product).

[EstefanTT]

Let's imagine Mr. X is thinking to create a BitShares project and his future incomes will be coming from the referral fees.

He think about it, plan everything and when he is finally ready to start  ... he sees that (after only one month) the fees are decreased by 25% ...

What do you think Mr. X will do ? Keep going on with his project ? NO ! That's too risky ! Maybe fees will decrease again and again and when he would have his project running, he would win anything. That's too much of a risk, why would he take it ?

Lower from 40 to 30 bts changes nothing for the perception of the fee price. On the other hand, it would have a disastrous effect on the incentive to build projects on BitShares.

One person who decide to wait or abandon his project is a lot of new potentials users lost !

I know with my team (BitShares French ConneXion) we are waiting to see what is going to happen before to start reaching people.

Let's think about it.  If we had started with 50 bts / Tx we would be having these conversations about lowering it to 40. If we had starred with 30 bts / Tx we would be having these conversations about lowering it to 20. This is not a problem until we can prove its actually one.

If BTS would be valued  at 2$ each, would a transaction fee of 0.045 bts be really different of a 0.06 one

The effect on changing it, IMHO, is 5% happy people and 95% bad stuff for BitShares future. Not because of the sum of bts paid for a Tx but because of the perception of BitShares as an unstable ground to build on.

[Samupaha]

[...] and reduce the fee for free accounts to encourage development on the platform

For this purpose we should have the demo/test network where users and developers can try whatever they want for free. It would propably lower the pressure to lower the fees so I'd put it in high priority.

Does anybody know when it will be up and running?

[kuro112]

honestly i dont do alot of trading on the bts platform, mostly just transfering (and api calls there in)

i think the most important fees are to reduce lifetime account costs, and reduce the fee for free accounts to encourage development on the platform

it would be awesome to see a 5-10 bts fee for transfers

[carpet ride]

Regarding transfer fee...
Some think that the fee should be high enough to sustain referral system.
Some other think that the current fee is too high so we need to decrease the fee.

Can we make an agreement in between? I suggested 30 BTS because it decrease the fee somewhat significantly and is still high.

I believe our problem stems from the idea that fees are considered in USD and BTS.  In BTS terms 60 is high for anyone bullish on the token. In USD terms it's really godamn cheap.  I'm okay with a compromise but would prefer to always try to price the fee in USD.  That's what SmartCoins are all about after all.

[clayop]

Regarding transfer fee...
Some think that the fee should be high enough to sustain referral system.
Some other think that the current fee is too high so we need to decrease the fee.

Can we make an agreement in between? I suggested 30 BTS because it decrease the fee somewhat significantly and is still high.

[clayop]

To offer you a bit of the referral business perspective.
The biggest operating cost is marketing and advertising. Initially I'll have very low income from referral fees but huge expenses for marketing.
And I assume it will take several months or even a year before I have a chance to see a balance between those two cash-flows.

So businesses like mine are going to invest heavily in promoting BitShares and they cannot do it without some kind of guarantee about the stability of their business model.

Thanks for sharing your opinion and plan.

BitShares always have been increasing fees for now. From 0.5 BTS to 20 BTS, to 40 BTS. And now we need to increase the fee to 60 BTS again. IMHO, we need to show to market that we can go to another direction. Also, Chinese members really want to their voice to be heard.

[cube]

I'm in agreement with cube's OP.
And thank you @cube for stepping in and trying to find a common ground.

I am glad to be of help in bridging the two groups - markerters/referers and traders/trading businesses, who are both passionately supporting bitshares.

To offer you a bit of the referral business perspective.
The biggest operating cost is marketing and advertising. Initially I'll have very low income from referral fees but huge expenses for marketing.
And I assume it will take several months or even a year before I have a chance to see a balance between those two cash-flows.

So businesses like mine are going to invest heavily in promoting BitShares and they cannot do it without some kind of guarantee about the stability of their business model.

Thanks for sharing an insight into your working as a referrer.  This goes a long way in helping others understand your business and the difficulties that you face.

And you are absolutely right.  We need a stable good business model for which all our business partners can depend on - without which none of them can flourish.

[jakub]

To offer you a bit of the referral business perspective.
The biggest operating cost is marketing and advertising. Initially I'll have very low income from referral fees but huge expenses for marketing.
And I assume it will take several months or even a year before I have a chance to see a balance between those two cash-flows.

So businesses like mine are going to invest heavily in promoting BitShares and they cannot do it without some kind of guarantee about the stability of their business model.