Pushing the free line too far: how far is enough, Warriors?

Hi -

I'm a big fan of offering a lot of free content to customers/potential customers upfront. But a colleague raised a good point, about that I may be giving away too much "good stuff", which means lower sales for premium content.

So the question is, "how much is too much" free content? Limited things like free articles, pdf special reports, occasional videos, that's all normal I suppose.

I also however do things like:
+ free once-a-month webinars with unlimited Q&A (I often get 1200-2700 register for my events, 600-900 show up live, gotowebinar, I stick around for an hour+ answering detailed questions)
+ publish articles in industry magazines with top strategies revealed (usually I'll publish 6 to 15 articles a year)
+ free intensive 20+ minute "how to" videos at least once a month online
+ make free appearances at industry events as a featured speaker.

main reason for all the 'free' stuff I do is to Demonstrate value, which my customers appreciate (I've got thousands of customers, less than 1% lifetime refund/cb rate, well known in my niche).

But. Maybe I give away too much, why buy cow when free milk. One split I know the seminar presenters have used, is "GIVE them the WHAT they need to know, but SELL them the specific HOW" to do it. I understand that, but don't fully agree since you should be giving away some of your best stuff at no cost, to build trust and actually help people.

Any insights on that? I've produced over 47 dvds, created 65+ websites, sold a lot, very productive, did 91 webinars last year (most were paid), fulltime online since the late 90s, have made my living online for over a decade w/my sites. Hard work is fine, just trying to figure out how far to move, or pull back, the free line.

Or for example with youtube videos, I think I like the idea of keeping them short and frequent, like 4-5 a month that are 4-5 minutes each, rather than long 15+ minute ones.

thanks,

ken