After reading all the articles on the statistics of this experiement I'm glad that radiohead seem up on what they could of possibly earn from this business model.
Though I noticed when I purchased the album from their site that it wasn't the most smooth purchase (which could affect the statistics). Here are a few points I suggest for next time (if there is a next time)
1. Allow samples before payment
People tend to want to try something before they buy it, you see it in music stores with headphones hooked up to allow people to try the new CD they are considering. Radiohead didn't provide this, and so people downloaded the album without payment to sample it.
2. Don't expect people to come back
If you allow someone to download your 50mb+ album and then pay later, chances are they have already navigated away from your site while they are waiting for their download to be finished, reducing the chance that they'll come back to pay.
3. Download and pay later
If you do this option, you have to remember the user's that have already downloaded the album. Radiohead only allowed 1 download per email, not giving the person the option to come back and pay later. A simple option once they have submitted their email would be to say, welcome back, did you enjoy the album? and an option to pay (with/without download).
If I where to set up a band site to allow this model, I'd first allow the user to sample the album, be it 30 second track samples or whole tracks (considering it could be given away free I'd go whole tracks). This page would also specify what features are on the downloadable version (ie audio quality, cover arts, etc). The next screen, payment details, then a download link.
Remember this is a business model, so it comes down to trying to get the most payments per download.
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After reading all the articles on the statistics of this experiement I'm glad that radiohead seem up on what they could of possibly earn from this business model. Though I noticed when I purchased the album from their site that it wasn't the most smooth purchase (which could affect the statistics). Here are a few points I suggest for next time (if there is a next time) 1. Allow samples before payment People tend to want to try something before they buy it, you see it in music stores with headphones hooked up to allow people to try the new CD they are considering. Radiohead didn't provide this, and so people downloaded the album without payment to sample it. 2. Don't expect people to come back If you allow someone to download your 50mb+ album and then pay later, chances are they have already navigated away from your site while they are waiting for their download to be finished, reducing the chance that they'll come back to pay. 3. Download and pay later If you do this option, you have to remember the user's that have already downloaded the album. Radiohead only allowed 1 download per email, not giving the person the option to come back and pay later. A simple option once they have submitted their email would be to say, welcome back, did you enjoy the album? and an option to pay (with/without download). If I where to set up a band site to allow this model, I'd first allow the user to sample the album, be it 30 second track samples or whole tracks (considering it could be given away free I'd go whole tracks). This page would also specify what features are on the downloadable version (ie audio quality, cover arts, etc). The next screen, payment details, then a download link. Remember this is a business model, so it comes down to trying to get the most payments per download.