At the SIPA Washington conference I heard some interesting comments about how quality free content is a gateway to paid content.

Miles Galliford said that in a session on “developing online communities” and one of the other speakers said similar things in a general session.

And it seems to make sense — as if there’s a funnel of engagement, from stranger, to some level of awareness, to website visitor, to “registrant” or other form of free content user, to paid customer.

But I also had some hallway conversations with marketers who said that their lists divide quite neatly down the paid / free divide. IOW, the people who download free stuff don’t pay and the people who pay don’t download free stuff.

So which is it? Or does it vary by market, or by industry, or by the type of content you’re discussing?

One possibility is that when people download free stuff they give you their garbage email address. We all have one — the “give away” address that we never really use. And then when we want to do something serious we use our real email address.

If this is true (and I’m only mentioning it as a possible explanation), the same person might be downloading the free stuff on his crapmail address and then purchasing on his realmail address.

Just a thought. Any ideas?