Patreon sucks, y’all!

Whoa, that’s a bold topic for an entire podcast episode! I know.

It’s no secret that I have strong opinions, but I don’t bash lightly. What started as a bone to pick with this particular platform has turned into a hill that I’m ready to die on. Why? Because small business owners are not succeeding there, but the popularity of this platform has everyone believing it will be their ticket to success.

Patreon has become super popular recently, so much that it seems like it has become part of the New Business Owner Starter Pack. The marketing is sexy: Start for free, make your work accessible to anyone in your audience for just a couple of bucks a month, don’t pay anything until you get paid, and join the hundreds of thousands of other creators using this same platform.

This company is an example of really successful marketing, but we need to be clear about who the customer here is. On Patreon, your customers are not their customer–YOU are! Patreon profits off you.

Which isn’t a bad thing, right? All of our software and platforms make money off of us. We have a problem, they have a solution, we all win! What makes Patreon different?

In this episode I am giving our podcast fully over to my rant. I am breaking down what exactly makes Patreon such a bad deal for business owners. I pull apart the service agreements, use real numbers to show you what you would be paying Patreon if you DID create a self-sustaining business on their platform, and offer you alternative platforms that give you a way better deal for similar services.

Tune in this week to get behind the marketing and crunch some numbers so that you have the information you need to reach the audience of your dreams.

SHOW NOTES

1:35– My first problem with Patreon: The math.

9:16– Payment processing

14:18– Patreon will not get you new customers!

23:21– The race to the bottom of the barrel

33:11– What to do instead? Other options besides Patreon.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sarahmchappell.substack.com