Ask HN: How would you monetize a reasonably popular free service?

[benhowdle]

I built and run Reqres - A hosted REST-API ready to respond to your AJAX requests (https://reqres.in/) - a free tool for developers. It receives millions of requests a month (this is the devs using the tool), and the homepage itself gets 20-30k unique visitors a month.

I run ads on the homepage which generates $200-300/month.

I'm looking to add a Pro tier to the service to start generating monthly income (through subscriptions) from it. I have a mailing list of ~200 people who clicked "I'm interested in the Pro tier" button, and sent them a survey to try and dig into exactly what devs would want from a Pro tier. I got 4 responses back.

What would you do to find out what people want from a Pro tier? Would you even add a Pro tier? How would you monetize this free service?

Would love to hear your thoughts: [e-mail]

(I have this PDF linked to on the homepage: https://www.dropbox.com/s/2w7gaeydx02qs40/Reqres_Advertising_Proposal.pdf?dl=0, which I had a company trial it for one month, but decided the fee wasn't worth the CPA they got from clickthroughs)

[Nextgrid]

Developer-focused, non-tracking advertising, directly negotiated with software companies. You could even have the "fake" data returned be ads for companies, as long as it complies with the response format (so name could be the brand's name, URL can be the link to the advertised product, etc).

[sharemywin]

I would offer custom endpoint.

I would have a free tier with registration.

basically it maps matches X to Y.

if I post/get etc. X you return Y.

They can add 10 examples for free with registration.

with XYZ request per month

Then add a paid tier which offer more and then an enterpise tier.

Maybe also add a feature request button

[sharemywin]

paid tier could have multiple projects/more request.

And the ability to add wild cards.

{ "name": *, "job": "leader" }