Free Fantasy Football: Subscriptions Fading?

I’ve been in the fantasy football online industry for 3 years now and one trend I am seeing as a lot more prevalent is less and less people are willing to pay for fantasy football content (well it’s really Internet wide but back to the topic). Footballguys.com will always have a good member base fueled by loyalty. I’m not saying they have a subpar product, but product alone usually doesn’t do the trick anymore.

I think most people want to make their own picks and control their own destiny. More and more people are finding out how the game is played and believe they have what it takes - whether or not they really do. Veterans, in general, had an off year last year with the RB drought and now newcomers who may have been the recipients of a little beginner’s luck may have even more of a sense of “I don’t need anyone’s advice.”

I predict the sharks have a feeding frenzy in 2008 with fresh fish ready to make their buy-in without the experience and knowledge that marks consistency and a high winning percentage in fantasy football. The switch to free based content will still be there, with sites playing for their share of the traffic. While an industry favorite like Footballguys does have personality and pretty good data to go around, sites like fftoolbox.com and fantasyfootballcafe.com make it hard to attract any new members at $26.95 a clip.

I’m not sure how fantasyfootball.com does. They seem like they would attract a fair amount of new members based off domain alone, but I imagine they would still like to shell out a few more Platinum memberships off the shelf by seasons end.

The industry side of fantasy football should be as compelling as the stats as consumers decide whether to go free or pay.