I’ve been doing up my Patreon lately (still no video because every time I’ve got a minute to make one, I realise I don’t have a minute to make one) but I’ve tidied up my goals and rewards, and I was wondering if you guys could be a lil focus group?
Rewards
Let’s start with the fun bit. I’m offering things that you won’t just get from following me on Twitter – though you can hey hey – like actual handwritten letters and postcards and General Free Shit. You can see your name on the sidebar of this very website and in the thank you notes of every book I write (which will happen, I’m just too superstitious to say any more) too. But I’ve had my Patreon open with various rewards for over a year and have thus far attracted zero beans of investment. That could be because I don’t have a lot of work to show apart from here and a handful of publications – I told you, I’m working on it – or it could be because no one cares about receiving cute mail. So, were you to pledge me a dollar or five or ten a month, what would you want in return?
Goals
#1: Blog Upkeep
Aside from domain expenses, I would love dearly to have the money to rid my sites of AdWords completely – but at the moment there’s a chance they could earn me $100 so I’m leaving them up and will use the earnings to pay to get rid of all ads for as long as I can afford. I’ve had AdWords on Indifferent Ignorance since 2012, mind you, and have so far clocked up the grand sum of $15. WordPress won’t pay out until it reaches $100, so unless people get clicking with enthusiasm, having a goal on Patreon is the smarter option. Or is it a bit of a naff goal?
#2 & #3: Health Upkeep
My other two goals are set predominantly for my mental health. My biggest expenses over the year are train tickets, research costs like entrance fees into places I can’t talk about because I don’t want to give my projects away (patience darlings), accountancy fees and software updates. I also work from home and although it’s fun – dogs are on hand, coffee is there, I can blast CDs – it’s causing massive problems with my family. The way things stand, I have to either quit freelancing and get a ‘real’ job (not my word but don’t get me started) or ask you guys for help to research my work properly, rent office space and take some courses to ultimately progress onto what is deemed a real job.
I have my eye on a really nice shared space in Southend, but the cheapest rent is £100 pre-VAT at three months’ minimum use. I could manage it by myself if I replaced all my business cards with handwritten slips, traded my computer for a typewriter and took a pay cut… Well I could manage it if I took a pay cut, but I’m so far under any type of average earnings threshold that I’m surprised inland revenue haven’t come knocking to check I don’t have a spare bank account in Panama.
I don’t think the goals I’ve set are unreasonable – there are creators on the site looking for a thousand dollars plus towards recording equipment or studios – but they might not be all that interesting?
I’m not expecting to earn a grand a month from the general public, and every dollar I received would go toward work. You guys would be contributing to everything I make even more than you already do, with the added bonus that I could focus my actual wages toward moving out of my mum’s before our relationship deteriorates completely.
So what do you think? Do you see Patreon as an interactive tip jar, or would you consider pledging double figures to my work? Do you have an ideas for rewards? What would you like to see me make? Do you think I should just pack in everything for a real job?
Tell me all.
Francesca's Thoughts 