Patreon: Everything you need to know

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Patreon: Everything you need to know

Using their own words, Patreon is a membership platform that makes it easy for artists and creators to get paid. This platform allows fans (or patrons) to pay creators for their work.

This model encourages people to see themselves more as members of a private club and less as consumers. And because this platform has seen incredible growth in the last few years, it has more than 6 million active patrons, supporting more than 200 thousand creators.

Explaining a bit of Patreon

Patreon is an American membership platform that provides business tools for content creators to run a subscription service. Simply put, Patreon is a crowdfunding platform that allows fans to pay and support artists for their work.

This platform allows artists to receive funds directly from their fans. Nowadays, many artists and creators are using the internet to share their art and, with Patreon, writers, podcasters, musicians, YouTubers, and many other types of creators can find their fan base and those same fans can pay a few dollars per month or even per post, become a patron and have early access to their content and work.

How Patreon was born

Patreon was founded in May of 2013 by the musician Jack Conte and entrepreneur Sam Yam. Early in 2013, Jack Conte figured that people could agree to support his future music videos -and support any other artist if they wanted- and pitched his idea to his former college roommate who loved it and began coding the Patreon platform.

Conte uploaded his music video on his YouTube channel and in the end inserted a segment where he encourages fans to support him by going to this new website he and his friend -Sam Yam- had created. On their website, fans could be able to download his new music for free and also help fund any other videos he created going forward – this website was of course called patreon.com.

Even though people could still watch the videos for free on YouTube, patrons had access to small perks like first dibs on tickets for live concerts, exclusive updates, and even early access to new content.

How to become a patron?

Although it is possible to view the public content of the creators on Patreon, it is also possible to become a patron as a way to pay these creators and artists for the content they create – but of course, with some benefits.

Patreon allows creators to establish multiple membership tiers if they want. Tiers are optional and very flexible. Creators have the freedom of deciding the number of these tiers and the subscription rate for each of them.

In exchange for supporting creators, patrons receive some perks, like ad-free content or exclusive new work. The different tiers can encourage the more casual fans to pay a low rate -it could even be $1 per month- and allow more dedicated followers to pay higher rates -maybe $10 per month-. Of course, higher tiers offer fans access to premium content that would not otherwise be available for lower tiers.

Signing up for Patreon is free!

To sign up to Patreon, all that is needed is a valid email account -or a Facebook account- and a password. Plus, signing up is completely free, it only costs if the user decides to contribute to their favorite content creator or creators.

You can access Patreon on its website Patreon.com or download the app in the App Store for iOS or in the Google Play Store for Android devices.

Want to be a creator on Patreon?

With Patreon, it is easier to generate revenue for some of your creations, those being videos, webcomics, podcasts or songs, just to name a few. So, after creating an account, you can click Create on Patreon from the drop-down menu in the upper right corner.

Patreon will ask more about what you make and your creations. It does not matter if you are a video creator, a musician, a writer and journalist, a gaming creator, or even a podcaster because this website gives all types of creators a platform to share their work and a way to crowdfund revenue.

When creating a new tier, you can set not only the tier price but also a title, an image and a description that will give your new subscribers or patrons a sense of what they can expect.

Secure your online accounts

It is very important to protect your personal information and credentials and two-factor authentication -also referred to as two-step verification- is the perfect way to protect it, because it provides a higher level of security to the authentication process on your online accounts. The first step is to enter your password and the second step is to enter a code sent via SMS.

So, in order to have access to your Patreon account -or any online account for that matter- when you are traveling and cannot receive text messages, you can acquire a Non-VoIP number.

Non-VoIP numbers are virtual mobile numbers that are not attached to any geographical location. VerifyWithSMS offers USA phone numbers for account verification. This service is offered through the Epsilon Technology LTD company, allowing users not only to access their accounts from anywhere in the world but also protect their privacy.

These disposable numbers are not only really easy to access but also affordable. Buy virtual number receive SMS to verify your account, and make your data more secure online.