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One of my most enjoyable and probably lucrative short term ventures was in the world of car "raffles". I had the framework down to an art that worked very well - Unlike a lot of them floating about it was a bolt on to my existing business, not a business set up for easy money.
You know the ones, buy $x of product, (usually a 'discount club' or 'community' something that barely actually exists, get in the run for a car/house/cash.
It went pretty well, $100k profit, very low effort on the first outing, the second one less effort, less profit but still peachy.
But I really couldn't shake the "yuck" of it. Some customers were paying $1000 + and won nothing (they had whatever products I was offering so they didn't completely come away empty handed, but still.
A lot of people run the same setups and have ridiculously high odds eg 8000 "participants" who can buy unlimited entries. They then run promotions of "double entries if you buy now" Etc. Meaning that you could effectively have 1 in 2.8m odds in something that they market as (or at least live in the gray about) being a 1:8000 chance.
Some do genuinely limit the odds, more fool them I guess. I tried to deliver a physical product for normal price (and just worked on controlling my margins) And saw it as delivering general sales which worked and I felt less exploitative for - but I could have made much more simply delivering nothing. Opening up to people to spend thousands felt unfair to the people buying a small token and the small sales meant less money. I've thought about doing it again but niching down in lower but still significant value, but it's a hard balance.
Interested to see what different takes are in somewhere like this.
To me, Whilst I see the thought line of 'no one is forcing them to enter' and 'it's a business first', it feels like it crosses a thinly veiled line of gambling, desperation and addiction for the people engaging and I'm not sure if it sits right with me as a model (at least as far as the current trend of giveaways is concerned).
I've met more than a few gambling billionaires and they've been a mix of completely morally shut off and conflicted.
So what is your take?
No harm no foul, or morally questionable?
You know the ones, buy $x of product, (usually a 'discount club' or 'community' something that barely actually exists, get in the run for a car/house/cash.
It went pretty well, $100k profit, very low effort on the first outing, the second one less effort, less profit but still peachy.
But I really couldn't shake the "yuck" of it. Some customers were paying $1000 + and won nothing (they had whatever products I was offering so they didn't completely come away empty handed, but still.
A lot of people run the same setups and have ridiculously high odds eg 8000 "participants" who can buy unlimited entries. They then run promotions of "double entries if you buy now" Etc. Meaning that you could effectively have 1 in 2.8m odds in something that they market as (or at least live in the gray about) being a 1:8000 chance.
Some do genuinely limit the odds, more fool them I guess. I tried to deliver a physical product for normal price (and just worked on controlling my margins) And saw it as delivering general sales which worked and I felt less exploitative for - but I could have made much more simply delivering nothing. Opening up to people to spend thousands felt unfair to the people buying a small token and the small sales meant less money. I've thought about doing it again but niching down in lower but still significant value, but it's a hard balance.
Interested to see what different takes are in somewhere like this.
To me, Whilst I see the thought line of 'no one is forcing them to enter' and 'it's a business first', it feels like it crosses a thinly veiled line of gambling, desperation and addiction for the people engaging and I'm not sure if it sits right with me as a model (at least as far as the current trend of giveaways is concerned).
I've met more than a few gambling billionaires and they've been a mix of completely morally shut off and conflicted.
So what is your take?
No harm no foul, or morally questionable?
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