Buyers guide: When buying porn online

Before signing up

Do some research

When you find a site that looks appealing to you, there are always a number of things that you can do yourself to find out more about a site.

• »search for reviews
• »study the tour
• »check for recent updates or update schedules
• »look for samples of the content
• »consider value for money

If you cannot find a trustworthy review of the site, first try to figure out what a membership actually offers. A site typically has a tour that presents the site and its content. It often includes actual members area sample pictures or videos. Sometimes in reduced size.

Some sites offer a list of members area updates. This allows you to see how regularly the site is updated and how much content an update includes.

Then decide if you are satisfied with what it offers. If you like to download and keep your videos, make sure that the site in fact lets you download videos and not only offers streaming video. If you prefer your videos to be high-definition and crystal clear, make sure that the site offers such high quality video. If high quality photos are important, make sure it doesn’t only offer screen captures from the videos.

When signing up

Membership options

Most porn sites will offer several different membership options. They can vary in both duration and the amount of content included. Both recurring and non-recurring memberships are also commonly seen.

Study the available options and decide how long you expect to be a member of the site – extended period memberships are often cheaper than monthly recurring memberships.

Cross sales

Upselling has always been a known sales method in traditional businesses – like when you go to a fastfood restaurant (supersize me!). Lately it has emerged in the adult industry as well. It is known here as cross sales.

What it means is that on some sites’ join-page, where you approve the purchase of a membership to a particular site, there is a check box typically with a “special offer” to join an additional site for a low price. If you wish to join the site, you check the box, if not - make sure that it is unchecked before you approve your purchase.

In some cases the check box will already be checked as default. This is known as pre-checked cross sales. The same rule applies here that you want to make sure it is unchecked before you approve your purchase unless you want to join that additional site.

In general we do not recommend that you join other sites than the one you originally intended since it makes it harder to keep track of your membership. Typically the additional membership will be a trial membership of some sort, meaning that you have to cancel it in time to avoid additional charges.

Trials

Many sites will offer a short trial membership at a very low price. Trial memberships often deserve extra attention before signing up though.

Limited trials

To prevent abuse from people buying a trial and downloading an entire site in a couple of days, many trial memberships have special restrictions. Trial memberships can be limited to only parts of the content such as only the first 2 out of 5 episode clips, only streaming video, a limited amount of models, a download limit or other restrictions.

Additionally trial memberships often recur at a higher monthly rate than regular memberships unless cancelled well in advance.

And since it is often difficult to get an exact idea of what a trial membership offers, we do not recommend trial memberships.

Read the terms

It is always recommended to quickly go over the site’s terms of use. Everything about a membership is written in the terms. You don’t necessarily have to read the whole thing, but just give it a quick look and look for anything out of the ordinary.

Secure credit card transaction

When using your credit card to pay for the membership, be sure that the transaction page is secure when you type in your credit card details. You can do this by checking that your address bar has a URL that starts with “https” instead of the usual “http”. There should also be a small padlock either next to the address bar or on the status bar at the bottom of your browser depending on your software version.

After signing up

Cancelling your membership

Some parts of the terms are more important than others – always be sure to find the section describing when and how you can cancel your membership. Typically sites will require you to cancel your membership at least 24 hours before it is set to rebill.

Please see our FAQ section for more information about how to cancel your membership.

Complaints about a site

In case you are dissatisfied with your membership, we recommend that you contact the site via email or other contact forms (how to contact the site may vary from site to site). Explain to them why you are not satisfied and what you think they could do better. Please remember to keep the tone civilized – this will get you much further.

Suggestions to improve the site

Even though you may be fully satisfied with the site you are a member of, you might have a suggestion how to improve it or a scenario that you would like to see brought to life by professional porn stars. Send your suggestions to the site (look for contact info on the site) and tell them what you think. Remember there’s always another person behind the site who is most likely eager to hear what the members think and to improve his/her site.