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Apple take 30%. You have to understand that you're not paying just for the service, but the reach. You can DIY your donation platform and the tech side isn't ro

by tootie 4y ago

Apple take 30%. You have to understand that you're not paying just for the service, but the reach. You can DIY your donation platform and the tech side isn't rocket science, the issue that platforms like Patreon and Apple have access to orders of magnitude more users than you can ever generate on your own.

maxshadurskiy 4y ago
Article states the opposite is true. Small creators, do not receive decent amount of discoverability on Patreon. I guess same true for Apple AppStore.
- sokoloff 4y ago
  It’s not just (or even primarily) discoverability. I will never type in my credit card to give some random app developer $1.99. I will frequently click buy on an app in the App Store. Same is likely true for Patreon. Even if I found your videos or podcast by some other means, the fact you can mention “Thank to to my patrons” means I can easily find you (not discover you) on Patreon and subscribe.
  - maxshadurskiy 4y ago
    Let’s assume random website use Stripe checkout or PayPal to process cards. Will you fell better and safe to type in your bank card?
    - sokoloff 4y ago
      It’s about convenience and removing friction more than safety/security. If those are every bit as low friction as the alternatives, I’m willing. (But that includes “I heard a podcast while I was driving mention patron; I should spend 30 seconds and give that creator money.” where I can find and login to Patreon faster than I can find the creator’s random website URL.) For recurring billing, no, I will not give a random website my CC near as easily as I will Apple or Patreon (or any other platform that stands more to lose by biting my hand than an individual site does).
      - abnercoimbre 4y ago
        I use DonorBox for supporters of my indie conference [0] and I have a healthy revenue stream (would be healthier if I had a Patreon.) Is that an OK choice given your preferences? It seems low friction, with the caveat that you have to remember my random website URL. [0] https://handmade-seattle.com/donate https://handmade-seattle.com/donate
        sokoloff 4y ago
        I poked at your site's donation functions. For me personally, if I was doing a one-time donation, that flow seems fine and something that wouldn't block me for a one-time. For a recurring donation, the hover over "A donor account is created automatically for recurring donations. Account setup info will be emailed to you." would remind me the hassle of using a random extra account that I need to keep track of, trust that it won't get breached, and be able to find and login to when I want to stop the recurring donations [and trust that the site will actually stop the donations without hassle]. That's going to be enough to block me for recurring (but you probably have data on the people it doesn't block, meaning people's preferences vary).
        abnercoimbre 4y ago
        Thanks for the feedback. Indeed I'm not capturing the supporters with your concerns. However, I get immediate cash access to a donation (recurring or otherwise), and almost everyone covers the transaction fee. This feels less centralized and gimicky than Patreon -- at the cost of losing sokoloff.
        sokoloff 4y ago
        You could A/B test showing Patreon to a subset of your users (or in different positions) and see if Patreon gives you enough incremental lift to cover their higher vig. It’s not about sokoloff. It’s about what gives your group the most net income after all fees and factors.
- bombcar 4y ago
  There's no discoverability anywhere, save if you get into a new platform super early. There's just too many things. Most creators who have "made it" (whatever that may be) should work on setting up their own website with their own payment processing and encourage fans to use it, less for the additional money and more for the security against single-income flows.
  - kareemsabri 4y ago
    I don't think that's true, there's discoverability on Spotify. I often get suggested artists or podcasts based on what I already listen to, and some of them are very good.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      But how many of them are very small? It's easy to find "big things" on any platform, the question is which are successful for those trying to grow?
Anx2k 4y ago
In the case of Apple you’re really paying for access to the platform, as you don’t have a choice. But in the case of Patreon, I don’t think they offer anything in terms of reach - by this I mean I’ve never made the decision to support a creator because they were on the platform. Typically if I decide to support someone, I just go to whatever they point me to - and I think this was the authors point (especially for very narrow/vertical creators). A better example of a more ‘reach’ offering would probably be YouTube’s similar offering (although I don’t know their fee structure), which goes beyond just reach and has very low friction for creators who make content on that platform. Honestly I feel like Patreon as a platform is pretty underwhelming from the donator side of things, nor do I see much in terms of what’s changed to improve the experience over the years as their fees have increased - but I have no idea what has changed on the creator side. I think the big takeaway (no surprise) is that the creator really owns the donator, not the platform - vs someplace like Apple where they have a much stronger relationship with the customer than your typical app developer does.
- orthoxerox 4y ago
  > I mean I’ve never made the decision to support a creator because they were on the platform. I have. It's nice to have a centralized UI for your donations and I would never enter my payment information just to support a single creator with a dollar or two.
- tootie 4y ago
  I think whenever HN readers deride a product because it doesn't suit them, that's not an effective argument. Like do you have any idea how strong conversion rates are on email? Or even paper mail? Stuff we all hate can be very effective at growing an audience. I honestly don't use Patreon at all and we rejected it as a platform for content monetization at my company, but I can also tell you that our first-party approach wasn't exactly a slam dunk.
hendrikrassmann 4y ago
I would say it's the other way round. Since creators need an income, patreon recieves a huge amount of free advertising from small and big influencers/youtubers/etc
egypturnash 4y ago
I make my living off of Patreon and I can confirm that they do jack shit to promote your work unless you are already one of their top earners. “Paying for the reach” is a bullshit excuse for the amount of money they’re sucking off of creators to try and make an immense payout for their VC. My spreadsheet says the total cut of my take that goes to Patreon and payment processing is about 10-15%, but I am an Early Adopter who gets a much better deal from them. For someone like this dude who doesn’t have this deal and has their usurious international fees on top of it, it’s definitely a bad choice. Patreon did one big thing: they took the concept of “monthly donations to support the arts” and repackaged it in a way that took off. I never got support via the old PayPal donation button like I have via Patreon.
- zdragnar 4y ago
  > I never got support via the old PayPal donation button like I have via Patreon Sounds like Patreon helped you after all. I'm not saying that they promote or market you, but having the name (much like Apple) seems enough to encourage people to pay you. OTOH, I certainty don't think that their cut sounds like a good deal; rather, it sounds more like your options are a bad deal or no deal at all.
  - iseanstevens 4y ago
    Apple also gives a full suite of developer tools, documentation, example code. Built in debugging, testing, simulation. If you have a design/image creation software and XCode you could make almost any app. Patreon doesn’t give any tools to creators to directly create.
    - zdragnar 4y ago
      Aye, that just further reinforces my last paragraph.
    - senojsitruc 4y ago
      ...that I can use for free to build a Mac app that won't run without security warnings, or to test in a simulator -- otherwise I have to pay $100/yr. The 30% tax brings no value.
jfengel 4y ago
As a developer I'm terrified of anything that handles payments. There are so many ways to do it wrong, and each exposes me or my clients to massive losses. Even well funded companies with teams for security suffer breaches daily. I'm happy to outsource anything involving money.
- tootie 4y ago
  There's plenty of middle ground. You outsource just they payment/donate form and pay a small premium on top of merchant fee. You just to do everything on the content and marketing side yourself.
- cultofmetatron 4y ago
  just use stripe, the fees are small for all the headaches you avoid. refunds are easy and can be handled from a dashbaord
bell-cot 4y ago
+1, BUT 's/the reach/the big-name familiarity/' 's/more users/more legitimacy & perceived security for most potential donors/'
electroly 4y ago
As a heavy Patreon user (donator side) I don't think this is true for Patreon. It may be true for Apple but it isn't true for Patreon. They do almost nothing as far as helping the creator's reach. The typical funnel is people find creators on YouTube first and then look up their Patreon if they want to support the channel. The discovery happens on YouTube or another platform. It's difficult to find new creators on Patreon's website even if that's literally what you want to do; I use Google to find the Patreon pages! I doubt that having a Patreon has any impact at all on the number of viewers; it's just a convenient solution once your viewers have already decided to pay you. IMO this should be concerning to Patreon: there's no stickiness in their platform; a competitor could easily take over, and the creators can easily switch. On the other hand, switching away from YouTube would be instant channel suicide, because they are actually the ones providing the reach. I think YouTube must see the existence of Patreon as a critical failure. YouTube is doing all the hard work and Patreon is getting paid for it!
noirbot 4y ago
I don't think this is exactly right. As other commenters point out, Patreon does nothing to help people find new stuff - what Patreon really provides is a sort of escrow service for subscriptions and payments. The value they offer me as someone who subscribes to things through them is that I know that Patreon doesn't really care that much if I decide to stop supporting something. My $5/month isn't worth them making it hard for me to cancel. The couple apps and podcasts I've subscribed to that did roll their own payments and subscriptions have been hell to cancel or adjust my subscription, riddled with dark patterns, and one seemingly just... removed the unsubscribe button entirely. There was no way to cancel at all.
- onphonenow 4y ago
  I have a "subscription" to support a business. You can signup on a website but have to reach out to them via email to cancel which they only tell you later when you login to try and cancel. It's working I'm still subscribed but will get into it with them and the retention flow they have eventually. With patreon I can click, instead of doing the back and forth email thing.
- uptime 4y ago
  Yes! I tried to cancel some PRX monthlies and there was no way to do it.

by tootie 4y ago

maxshadurskiy 4y ago

Article states the opposite is true. Small creators, do not receive decent amount of discoverability on Patreon. I guess same true for Apple AppStore.

sokoloff 4y ago
It’s not just (or even primarily) discoverability. I will never type in my credit card to give some random app developer $1.99. I will frequently click buy on an app in the App Store. Same is likely true for Patreon. Even if I found your videos or podcast by some other means, the fact you can mention “Thank to to my patrons” means I can easily find you (not discover you) on Patreon and subscribe.
- maxshadurskiy 4y ago
  Let’s assume random website use Stripe checkout or PayPal to process cards. Will you fell better and safe to type in your bank card?
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    It’s about convenience and removing friction more than safety/security. If those are every bit as low friction as the alternatives, I’m willing. (But that includes “I heard a podcast while I was driving mention patron; I should spend 30 seconds and give that creator money.” where I can find and login to Patreon faster than I can find the creator’s random website URL.) For recurring billing, no, I will not give a random website my CC near as easily as I will Apple or Patreon (or any other platform that stands more to lose by biting my hand than an individual site does).
    - abnercoimbre 4y ago
      I use DonorBox for supporters of my indie conference [0] and I have a healthy revenue stream (would be healthier if I had a Patreon.) Is that an OK choice given your preferences? It seems low friction, with the caveat that you have to remember my random website URL. [0] https://handmade-seattle.com/donate https://handmade-seattle.com/donate
      - sokoloff 4y ago
        I poked at your site's donation functions. For me personally, if I was doing a one-time donation, that flow seems fine and something that wouldn't block me for a one-time. For a recurring donation, the hover over "A donor account is created automatically for recurring donations. Account setup info will be emailed to you." would remind me the hassle of using a random extra account that I need to keep track of, trust that it won't get breached, and be able to find and login to when I want to stop the recurring donations [and trust that the site will actually stop the donations without hassle]. That's going to be enough to block me for recurring (but you probably have data on the people it doesn't block, meaning people's preferences vary).
        abnercoimbre 4y ago
        Thanks for the feedback. Indeed I'm not capturing the supporters with your concerns. However, I get immediate cash access to a donation (recurring or otherwise), and almost everyone covers the transaction fee. This feels less centralized and gimicky than Patreon -- at the cost of losing sokoloff.
        sokoloff 4y ago
        You could A/B test showing Patreon to a subset of your users (or in different positions) and see if Patreon gives you enough incremental lift to cover their higher vig. It’s not about sokoloff. It’s about what gives your group the most net income after all fees and factors.
bombcar 4y ago
There's no discoverability anywhere, save if you get into a new platform super early. There's just too many things. Most creators who have "made it" (whatever that may be) should work on setting up their own website with their own payment processing and encourage fans to use it, less for the additional money and more for the security against single-income flows.
- kareemsabri 4y ago
  I don't think that's true, there's discoverability on Spotify. I often get suggested artists or podcasts based on what I already listen to, and some of them are very good.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    But how many of them are very small? It's easy to find "big things" on any platform, the question is which are successful for those trying to grow?

Anx2k 4y ago

In the case of Apple you’re really paying for access to the platform, as you don’t have a choice. But in the case of Patreon, I don’t think they offer anything in terms of reach - by this I mean I’ve never made the decision to support a creator because they were on the platform. Typically if I decide to support someone, I just go to whatever they point me to - and I think this was the authors point (especially for very narrow/vertical creators). A better example of a more ‘reach’ offering would probably be YouTube’s similar offering (although I don’t know their fee structure), which goes beyond just reach and has very low friction for creators who make content on that platform. Honestly I feel like Patreon as a platform is pretty underwhelming from the donator side of things, nor do I see much in terms of what’s changed to improve the experience over the years as their fees have increased - but I have no idea what has changed on the creator side. I think the big takeaway (no surprise) is that the creator really owns the donator, not the platform - vs someplace like Apple where they have a much stronger relationship with the customer than your typical app developer does.

orthoxerox 4y ago
> I mean I’ve never made the decision to support a creator because they were on the platform. I have. It's nice to have a centralized UI for your donations and I would never enter my payment information just to support a single creator with a dollar or two.
tootie 4y ago
I think whenever HN readers deride a product because it doesn't suit them, that's not an effective argument. Like do you have any idea how strong conversion rates are on email? Or even paper mail? Stuff we all hate can be very effective at growing an audience. I honestly don't use Patreon at all and we rejected it as a platform for content monetization at my company, but I can also tell you that our first-party approach wasn't exactly a slam dunk.

hendrikrassmann 4y ago

I would say it's the other way round. Since creators need an income, patreon recieves a huge amount of free advertising from small and big influencers/youtubers/etc

egypturnash 4y ago

I make my living off of Patreon and I can confirm that they do jack shit to promote your work unless you are already one of their top earners. “Paying for the reach” is a bullshit excuse for the amount of money they’re sucking off of creators to try and make an immense payout for their VC. My spreadsheet says the total cut of my take that goes to Patreon and payment processing is about 10-15%, but I am an Early Adopter who gets a much better deal from them. For someone like this dude who doesn’t have this deal and has their usurious international fees on top of it, it’s definitely a bad choice. Patreon did one big thing: they took the concept of “monthly donations to support the arts” and repackaged it in a way that took off. I never got support via the old PayPal donation button like I have via Patreon.

zdragnar 4y ago
> I never got support via the old PayPal donation button like I have via Patreon Sounds like Patreon helped you after all. I'm not saying that they promote or market you, but having the name (much like Apple) seems enough to encourage people to pay you. OTOH, I certainty don't think that their cut sounds like a good deal; rather, it sounds more like your options are a bad deal or no deal at all.
- iseanstevens 4y ago
  Apple also gives a full suite of developer tools, documentation, example code. Built in debugging, testing, simulation. If you have a design/image creation software and XCode you could make almost any app. Patreon doesn’t give any tools to creators to directly create.
  - zdragnar 4y ago
    Aye, that just further reinforces my last paragraph.
  - senojsitruc 4y ago
    ...that I can use for free to build a Mac app that won't run without security warnings, or to test in a simulator -- otherwise I have to pay $100/yr. The 30% tax brings no value.

jfengel 4y ago

As a developer I'm terrified of anything that handles payments. There are so many ways to do it wrong, and each exposes me or my clients to massive losses. Even well funded companies with teams for security suffer breaches daily. I'm happy to outsource anything involving money.

tootie 4y ago
There's plenty of middle ground. You outsource just they payment/donate form and pay a small premium on top of merchant fee. You just to do everything on the content and marketing side yourself.
cultofmetatron 4y ago
just use stripe, the fees are small for all the headaches you avoid. refunds are easy and can be handled from a dashbaord

bell-cot 4y ago

+1, BUT 's/the reach/the big-name familiarity/' 's/more users/more legitimacy & perceived security for most potential donors/'

electroly 4y ago

As a heavy Patreon user (donator side) I don't think this is true for Patreon. It may be true for Apple but it isn't true for Patreon. They do almost nothing as far as helping the creator's reach. The typical funnel is people find creators on YouTube first and then look up their Patreon if they want to support the channel. The discovery happens on YouTube or another platform. It's difficult to find new creators on Patreon's website even if that's literally what you want to do; I use Google to find the Patreon pages! I doubt that having a Patreon has any impact at all on the number of viewers; it's just a convenient solution once your viewers have already decided to pay you. IMO this should be concerning to Patreon: there's no stickiness in their platform; a competitor could easily take over, and the creators can easily switch. On the other hand, switching away from YouTube would be instant channel suicide, because they are actually the ones providing the reach. I think YouTube must see the existence of Patreon as a critical failure. YouTube is doing all the hard work and Patreon is getting paid for it!

noirbot 4y ago

I don't think this is exactly right. As other commenters point out, Patreon does nothing to help people find new stuff - what Patreon really provides is a sort of escrow service for subscriptions and payments. The value they offer me as someone who subscribes to things through them is that I know that Patreon doesn't really care that much if I decide to stop supporting something. My $5/month isn't worth them making it hard for me to cancel. The couple apps and podcasts I've subscribed to that did roll their own payments and subscriptions have been hell to cancel or adjust my subscription, riddled with dark patterns, and one seemingly just... removed the unsubscribe button entirely. There was no way to cancel at all.

onphonenow 4y ago
I have a "subscription" to support a business. You can signup on a website but have to reach out to them via email to cancel which they only tell you later when you login to try and cancel. It's working I'm still subscribed but will get into it with them and the retention flow they have eventually. With patreon I can click, instead of doing the back and forth email thing.
uptime 4y ago
Yes! I tried to cancel some PRX monthlies and there was no way to do it.