Patreon?

[RowanWrites]

I have noticed a few people mention they do Patreon sites to invite tips. I'm curious -- how is that working out for you, if you do it?

I think I am too new an author without sufficient body of work for that to be worth the effort of setting it up, but if it's really working for people I might plan around it in the future.

 

[Blind_Justice]

It all depends on the size of your following. Consider this: The average rate of views vs. votes is already pretty poor. The rate of views vs. comments is even worse. I don't have the exact numbers, but 1 in 100 for votes and one in 1000 for comments seems to be the ballpark. That's simple actions on your free stories.

Now try to imagine the conversion rate of people who want to read your stuff for free vs. those willing to pay for it. Not only once, but over several months.

My numbers are absolutely nothing to write home about AND I completely suck at self-promotion. I only started the Patreon thing because I received several inquiries from long-time readers on how they could tip me. So, I launched a Patreon in February 2019. I have around 800 followers here on Lit and around 500 over on StoriesOnline. From those 1300 people, around 20 were/are willing to pay for my writing.

I don't aim to get rich off my Patrons (also, my current living arrangements prohibit excessive extra income) so I'm asking only for one dollar to have access to Patron-only posts (which usually include some raunchy artwork) and three dollars for the ability to read previews and early drafts for shits and giggles. I do have one super-fan who voluntarily upped his donation to a whopping 15 bucks a month when my depression hit (I told everyone to frequent other artists who actually produce content, but my faithful stuck around - which I still find incredibly flattering). All in all, I make roughly 50 bucks a month off my Patreon. Most of that money goes into the piggy bank for cover artwork commissions and editor fees for eventual e-book releases of my stories.

You have to be aware that Patreon only grudingly accepts NSFW content. You will be required to tick a NSFW flag when setting up your profile and you intend to publish ANY kind of raunchy material, be it sexy pics to spice up your blog posts or smutty writing. Problem is - Patreon then hides your page from its internal search engine. The only ways to be found are direct links to your creator page and specific Google searches. Even then, you will be greeted with a big fat "Icky stuff ahead" warning label, because age verification implementation is soooooo difficult for a Big Tech company. Another downside is that any public post you make on your creator page has to be squeaky clean, no "implied nudity", nothing suggestive at all. Any and all dirty things have to be "Patrons Only", as if that would keep minors from seeing naked boobs. Sheesh. The end result is that audience growth boils down to excessive self-promotion. Plaster your Patreon link (or embedded button) everywhere you publish.

To grow your following in the first place, write, write and write some more. Have a decent body of work. Then, spread your work around. Publish on other sites besides Literotica. Most of my paying customers seem to come from StoriesOnline, where author profiles seem to have higher visibility than here on Lit. Be aware where you are allowed to stick links. Here on Lit, for example, you are only allowed to link off-site from your author profile, not from within your stories, which drastically limits the visibility of your Patreon link. You CAN slap it into your forum sig (VVV like I've done VVV). Over on SoL, your author page has a few spots for self-promotion and conversion rates seem a bit better over there.

That's pretty much everything I have off the top of my hat. If you still have questions, feel free to ask.

Edit: Some time ago, Patreon did change their business model from a "we take a cut off your income" to a tiered "pay for services" model. I came in well before the switch, so I have zero idea how the new tiers work. You'll need to dig through the documentation yourself and pick the tier which works best for you.

 

[RowanWrites]

This is great information! Thank you for taking the time to share!

 

[Blind_Justice]

My pleasure. There are absolutely people who can make some cash on Patreon like Tefler and Etaski, but their audience massively eclipses mine and they put in the hours.

 

[EarlyMorningLight]

…and they put in the hours.

I can’t stress this point enough. I’ve done the Amazon/Smashwords thing in the past and gave it up because it’s an absolute grind. On top of keeping up a steady output, you have to put so much effort into promotion. And if you want any chance at making enough money to justify the hours, you really need to work to specific niches and formulas. Some people can hack churning out a couple of paint-by-numbers BBW Hotwife stories every week and then hustling social media for hours. For me, it took all of the joy out of writing.

 

[Blind_Justice]

@EarlyMorningLight : That's the case for me as well. I'm not much of a Social Media person. I don't have Facebook, my Twitter account has lain dormant for at least ten years and in general, puttering about with those services is time I could put to use actually writing more stuff. Besides, chasing likes and followers feels a lot like begging and I do have my pride. Either people come for my stories or they don't. That's their choice. Making my stories visible to interested folk should be the job of the platforms I publish on, not mine. And everyone hates adverts, including me. In this age of overcrowded everythings, only the loudest and most obnoxious people get heard and I don't want to engage in a mega-jerk pissing contest. Then I'd rather die in obscurity.