# PATREON ► worth it?



## creativeforge (Apr 2, 2022)

Hi, I'm trying to help a musician friend get more opportunities and reach a wider audience, without touring (touring is not an option). 

I made a new website for him (nearly complete): https://richardsouthermusic.com/

I heard Patreon could be good for someone who is very creative. He has music he hasn't released yet and he's always doing something, which could be good for a Patreon site, I think, yes? 

For those who use it, can you share your experience? 

Thanks!

Andre


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## MartinH. (Apr 2, 2022)

creativeforge said:


> Hi, I'm trying to help a musician friend get more opportunities and reach a wider audience, without touring (touring is not an option).
> 
> I made a new website for him (nearly complete): https://richardsouthermusic.com/
> 
> ...



Imho Patreon is a waste of time for him. It's not a tool for discovery, it's a tool to monetize a "following". You need to be mad popular on social media first, then you can go to Patreon and convert less than 1% or so of your following into patreon supporters. Compare the patreon follower counts of various music youtubers with their patreon supporter counts and you'll see what I mean. It's just not financially viable to go that route before you have a huge following imho.


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## creativeforge (Apr 2, 2022)

MartinH. said:


> Imho Patreon is a waste of time for him. It's not a tool for discovery, it's a tool to monetize a "following". You need to be mad popular on social media first, then you can go to Patreon and convert less than 1% or so of your following into patreon supporters. Compare the patreon follower counts of various music youtubers with their patreon supporter counts and you'll see what I mean. It's just not financially viable to go that route before you have a huge following imho.


Thanks Martin, are you speaking from experience? The main goal I have in mind is to monetize his music. do you know of a better alternative?


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## FinGael (Apr 2, 2022)

creativeforge said:


> Hi, I'm trying to help a musician friend get more opportunities and reach a wider audience, without touring (touring is not an option).
> 
> I made a new website for him (nearly complete): https://richardsouthermusic.com/
> 
> ...



Vision (Music of Hildegard Von Bingen by R. Souther) is one of the albums of my life. I bought it on CD in -94 or -95, and it has been a very dear travel companion ever since.

Please send my best wishes, blessings and thousand thanks to Richard.

PS. Many thanks for helping him, Andre.


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## d.healey (Apr 2, 2022)

I agree with @MartinH. Generally Patreon users are following people they found elsewhere because they want to access to exclusive content. I don't think many people discover new people to follow through Patreon very often.


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## MartinH. (Apr 2, 2022)

creativeforge said:


> Thanks Martin, are you speaking from experience? The main goal I have in mind is to monetize his music. do you know of a better alternative?


Regarding Patreon, I'll DM you.

As for better alternatives, I don't know any.


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## vancomposer (Apr 8, 2022)

MartinH. said:


> Imho Patreon is a waste of time for him. It's not a tool for discovery, it's a tool to monetize a "following". You need to be mad popular on social media first, then you can go to Patreon and convert less than 1% or so of your following into patreon supporters. Compare the patreon follower counts of various music youtubers with their patreon supporter counts and you'll see what I mean. It's just not financially viable to go that route before you have a huge following imho.


Spot on answer. If you don't have a fanbase with your music, then you have to create content that has some sort of other value for people. And in the composer community those are usually tutorials and gear reviews. Unfortunately it takes A LOT of consistency, dedication and time to build up a channel and obviously no guarantees. All those channels on YT, most of the time when they throw an original music video in between the click rates are significantly lower then the tutorial content. A few viewers might signup to Patreon to support the creator to continue to put up content, but as Martin already said, that's a very small number. Many creators also often address the inconsistency with just trying to monetize with YT adsense because the amount varies a lot depending on multiple factors. Google has introduced YT channel memberships that somewhat offer the same as Patreon after they realized they are missing on an additional revenue stream. At some point with some following offering merchandise can be extra income.

Unfortunatly there is no fast track.


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