Posted on 13-Jul-2018
GoAstrologer is an online platform for astrological advice. Users can ask any question for FREE. Our team of astrologers provide a reading which can then be unlocked by paying the fees (₹199 at the time of writing).
Some users have complained about this being an unreasonable deal. Here are some reasons why asking users to pay is necessary.
Out of every 5 users who ask questions, only 1 pays. We send 2-3 reminders via email and then stop. We do not bother users beyond that point.
However we ask our astrologers to prepare answers in advance for all users (paid and unpaid) - and consequently pay for all the readings. This raises the minimum viable fees we charge from the user.
Some astrologers have asked us to make it a prepay model. In this model users have to pay upfront instead of afterwards.
Unfortunately, "pay later" is one of the main USP of this platform. Users can ask a question without any investment, read a partial answer, check the astrologer's profile and pay only when they are fully convinced of getting value from the reading.
This allows us to attract users who would have otherwise not bothered to sign up.
Unlike other astrology sites, we do not sell solutions and remedies. Those sites might offer free readings, but scare the user into buying costly solutions and remedies. We prefer to only provide readings by astrologers.
We do not promise or guarantee anything. We believe astrology to not be scientifically robust. We cannot and will not guarantee any solutions.
So to reflect this belief, our refund policy is very flexible. We offer no-questions refund to all new users. Existing users get FREE alternate readings.
We need to pay astrologers to keep them interested in this platform. So it is imperative that we charge money and pass a percentage to them. We cannot ask them to contribute their time and training for free.
Lastly we need to pay for quality infrastructure and support. We need to pay for web-hosting, email-hosting, development, design, support, marketing and many other expenses. It takes money to maintain quality infrastructure.
We cannot do all the above without asking someone to pay. In this case it is the users who want to read the prediction.
The system may not be fair to everyone, but we definitely think it is reasonable.
Thanks for reading.
Tags: blog