updated informaton Feb 22, 2023
A Creator’s Guide to Making Money
4 minute read
Key Takeaways
- Content creators can rake in some serious cash by partnering with the right monetization platform.
- Platform fees, membership fees, and services vary dramatically from service to service.
They say that it’s never been easier for content creators to reap the rewards of their creations. While that may be true, sifting through all of the available monetization platforms can feel like a second job. Pick the right one and you’re off to the races. However, pick the wrong one and you might be leaving money on the table.
Patreon
It makes sense to begin with the platform that revolutionized the content creation game. Upon its inception in 2013, Patreon has done a lot for content creators looking to explore new revenue streams. In fact, it is used by millions of creative professionals to monetize exclusive content.
The service lets creators of all sizes and specializations accept donations. On top of this, creators can paywall their creations behind a monthly subscription fee and
The platform hosts over six-million patrons, and has over 200,000 creators that are supported by at least one patron.1 Though it’s free to create an account, fees are charged as soon as you start earning money. Creators can expect to pay anywhere between five- and 12-percent of their monthly take-home. And that’s in addition to any applicable processing fees.2
Ko-fi
Ko-fi is loaded with monetization features. Content creators can use it to:
- Launch a crowdfunding campaign;
- Receive donations;
- Sell physical and digital products;
- Offer monthly memberships, and;
- Accept commissions.
Better yet, Ko-fi is free to use and charges zero platform fees on donations. The platform does charge transaction fees. Plus, only a few premium features require a monthly subscription fee or a platform fee.3
Podia
Established content creators can save themselves a lot in processing and platform fees by switching to Podia. That’s thanks to the platform’s premium membership model. Instead of taking a percentage of what you make, Podia opts for a flat-rate monthly subscription fee.
Podia members can accept donations and sell monthly memberships, digital downloads, and/or online courses, just like their competitors.4 Creators can choose between a $39 or $79 membership package. Be aware that that either package will be subject to standard payment processing fees.5
Buy Me a Coffee
Buy Me a Coffee is a great entry point for content creators interested in exploring memberships, donations, and product sales. The service is an official partner of PayPal and Stripe, which allows creators to link their account directly to their bank account and receive their cash immediately.
Uniquely, there are no monthly fees here. Instead, Buy Me a Coffee charges a competitive five-percent transaction fee, in addition to the standard PayPal or Stripe processing fees.6
Memberful
Memberful offers a simplified solution to those who prefer to generate subscription revenue directly from their website. The company lets the creator control the user experience by allowing for custom branding, analytics, and conversion tracking.
In practice, Memberful is a membership plugin designed to be installed as an extension through WordPress. You can set your own membership terms and use them to paywall content on your site.7
Memberful’s starter plan doesn’t charge a monthly fee but takes 10 percent of your earnings instead. Though that percentage goes down as your subscription plan, while the monthly fee goes up.8
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updated information June 14, 2022
20 Hot New Small Business Ideas to Start
Guru
Guru runs on a bidding system. An employer needs a document translated into French? Bid on it. Someone needs a logo for their cooking blog? Bid on it. An entrepreneur needs a ghostwriter for her new thought leadership book? You get the idea… bid on it. Alternatively, companies can reach out to you directly if they search your listed area of expertise.
Profiles are free to create. They include a basic membership, which comes with 10 bids per month. There are varying levels of paid memberships that give you extra bids each month, or you can purchase more bids directly if you don’t want to pay a recurring membership fee. It’s $10 for every 20 bids, or you can get discounts for bulk — $50 for 125 bids and $100 for 250 bids.
Similar to other freelance marketplaces, Guru takes a percentage from the selling price of the service, and it varies based on what kind of membership you have.
| Basic membership | Basic+ membership | Professional membership | Business membership | Executive membership | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fee deducted from payment | 8.95% | 8.95% | 6.95% | 5.95% | 4.95% |
| Monthly membership fee (billed annually) | Free | $8.95 | $15.95 | $24.95 | $39.95 |
Interested? You can make a free profile here and select what membership works best for you.
Who Can Freelance: Almost anyone — customer service reps, legal experts, photographers and more.
Glassdoor Rating: 3.7 (out of 5) stars.
PeoplePerHour
Founded in 2007, PeoplePerHour is one of the oldest freelancing sites on the list. It’s based in the U.K. but available worldwide and to freelancers in most professional fields.
The company focuses on the quality of its freelancers. To get started at PeoplePerHour, you must apply initially to create your account. After you’re screened and approved for relevant topics or industries, you’ll have free rein to bid (or “quote”) on projects in your wheelhouse.
Basic accounts come with 15 free quotes per month. Once you burn through those, you can wait for them to renew or purchase more.
| Number of Quotes | 5 | 10 | 25 | 50 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | $8.95 | $13.95 | $21.95 | $29.95 |
Based on the payout from the project, fees vary at marginal rates:
- For the first $500 dollars with a new client, the fee is 20%.
- Income between $501 and $4,999 is charged 7.5%.
- Fees for payments of $5,000 or more are 3.5%.
The scale starts over with each new client, so it incentivizes recurring business.
Who Can Freelance: Experts in almost any field, from tax pros to tutors.
Glassdoor Rating: 3.4 (out of 5) stars.
TopTal
Toptal is for expert software developers and designers, financial experts, project managers and product managers.
This platform is unique in that its screening process is intense and can take upwards of three weeks. It includes a communication assessment (that requires in-depth English comprehension), a skill review, a live screening and test projects.
It boasts that when all is said and done, only 3% of applicants pass. If you make it through, you’ll have access to Toptal’s clients, some of which are top tier — Airbnb, Artsy, Pfizer and Zendesk to name a few.
According to Toptal’s website and terms of service, the company doesn’t take fees from its freelancers. Rather, it charges its clients for access to its freelance talent pool. Hourly pay starts at $60 and varies based on experience. Freelancers can be hired by clients per project, part time or full time.
To create a freelancer account and begin the vetting process, start here.
Who Can Freelance: Experienced developers, designers, finance experts, project managers and product managers.
Glassdoor Rating: 4.3 (out of 5) stars.
Upwork
Upwork, aka the baby of Elance and oDesk, claims to have more than 14 million users from 180 different countries, which would make it the largest freelancing platform in the world.
It’s a marketplace format, meaning gigs in just about every professional field are up for grabs. Businesses can reach out directly to you, or you can bid on a business’ job listing. With so many users, the competition is hot. Making a good profile and crafting the perfect pitch are crucial to landing a gig.
Under new Upwork fees that go into effect in Summer 2019, freelancers must pay between 15 cents and 90 cents to bid on a gig.
Once a project is completed, Upwork charges marginal fees depending on how much you’ve earned with that client.
- A 20% fee for the first $500 with a client.
- For $500.01 to $10,000, the fee drops to 10%.
- Anything over $10,000 is charged 5%.
Again, the idea is to encourage recurring work with the client. The more they pay you, the lower the fees.
Think Upwork is the site for you? Click here to make a profile.
Who Can Freelance: Almost anyone, whether you’re a creative or a coder.
Glassdoor Rating: 3.9 (out of 5) stars.
9. Freelance Social Media Manager
Small and medium-sized businesses, now more than ever, need to have an online presence. But many business owners simply don’t have the time to keep up with their business pages on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. And it shows.
You can use that to your advantage. It can be quite obvious which businesses have left their social accounts to languish. Frustrating for customers. But for you? It’s an opportunity to reach out to the business, offer your services and make money using your social media skills.
You can offer businesses a mix of help with branding and customer service — with prices way more appealing than an agency.
TPH’s Earning Potential Estimate: About $20 an hour. Potential to scale into a business.
How I Became a Successful Social Media Influencer
While in school, I took on internships in fashion blogging to get as much experience as possible, and I signed up for writing classes to hone my craft.
I discovered new social media platforms that made it possible to share my love for writing and connect with people. That’s how I came to create mini blog posts, or “captions,” on Instagram. I really love photography, and Instagram became my experimentation ground.
Around the same time, in August 2014, my sister and I decided to launch a fashion and lifestyle YouTube channel. We also created an Instagram account to document our personal styles and adventures in New York City.
By the summer of 2016, we were taking our project more seriously and treating it as a part-time job on top of our main focuses as an international business student (my sister) and a full-time freelance social media consultant and writer (me).
We now dedicate our entire weekends and five hours during the week to editing our videos, capturing content at live events, modeling, scheduling our posts on social media, pitching brands and bloggers for potential collaborations, along with other related activities.
Our brand now aims to empower women to live up to their potential and do it all in style. We invest in the production of high-quality images and videos — purchasing editing software, working with photographers, booking studio space, directing shoots — to tell stories that delight our audience.
I never imagined this project would allow me to follow my dreams. I went from creating images and writing quirky captions to having real influence on people’s decisions about what to wear, where to shop, what to do and where to go.
How to Make Money From Instagram
If you thought you couldn’t make money from your social media accounts, think again! Since July 2016, I’ve earned an average of $1,600 per month — just from our Instagram account. And yes, that’s after my sister gets her share.
How do I do it? The answer is in having different income streams.
Here are a few streams I suggest tapping into if you want to be a successful influencer.
1. Create Sponsored Posts
It’s not always about your follower count, but the number of people who engage with your content and look forward to each one of your posts. A lot of brands are moving away from working with major digital influencers to leveraging smaller bloggers’ audiences.
When you start, reaching out to brands is a great way to secure a few collaborations. As you gain traction, brands will discover you and email you about different opportunities.
Every company has its specific rules for sponsorship, so do not use a one-size-fits-all approach when reaching out. Do your research and interact with them on social before initiating contact.
The key is to associate only with brands that fit your aesthetic. That way, your readers perceive every collaboration as authentic and buy into what you’re trying to sell to them.
Within six months of launching our platform on YouTube and Instagram, we received our first sponsorship opportunity. A jewelry box subscription company found us through a hashtag and reached out. Its reps offered to send us complimentary pieces every month in exchange for a few Instagram features.
We have since received products from Coach, TOMS Shoes, Pura Vida Bracelets and other clothing and accessories brands.
FTC guidelines require you to identify your sponsored posts. We usually include a branded hashtag in our captions (for example, when we collaborated with Coach, it was #CoachHoliday) in addition to the required ones like #ad or #sponsored.
We typically charge at least $75 per sponsored post, but we don’t get paid for all collaborations. Sponsored posts add up to about $600 of our income every month, which we split evenly.
Some brands send their products as gifts; to date, we’ve received $3,000 in merchandise. Because we receive most of our accessories for free from brands, we’ve been able to cut our shopping budgets in half, saving us a combined $500 a month.
2. Sign Up for YouTube Advertising
Monetizing your videos on YouTube can earn you a passive income stream. There’s even a bonus if these ads convert! You are allowed to monetize your videos once Youtube accepts you into its Partner Program.
We’ve only made about $50 from YouTube ads so far, but the more your numbers grow, the higher your income goes.
3. Offer Private Social Media Consultations
Don’t underestimate the skills you can acquire from a side project. Creating content and growing my social media following helped me learn how to edit with Final Cut Pro and Photoshop, how to create marketing materials like brochures using graphic design tools, and how to advertise on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
I then monetized these skills by offering my services to local business owners and startups. I posted ads on Craigslist, gave out business cards at networking events, leveraged LinkedIn to generate leads and marketed myself in niche Facebook groups.
I eventually landed a consistent gig last summer with a small business owner. I support her handbag company’s social media efforts with content production (creating images and videos) and marketing (running ads on each platform). This gig pays about $1,200 a month.
I also occasionally help other entrepreneurs manage their social media accounts and become more visible online. My rate starts at $40 per hour, and I’ve made about $500 in the three months since I started offering the service.
What’s Next?
I never set out to be an influencer. I just always loved connecting with people and bonding over common interests, like fashion, traveling and eating.
I married my love for writing with my passion for capturing moments to create this lifestyle brand. In the future, I can see it growing into a digital media magazine that will also offer a line of products and services.
How’s that for getting paid to do what I love?
Shelcy Joseph is a freelance writer and the founder of A Millennial’s Guide to Life, a career blog where she helps multi-passionate creatives (aka multipotentialites) make a living by doing all the things they love.
Closet refresh
Although the internet’s hunger for secondhand fashion has flattened the distance between the definitions (see below), not all thrifted goods are the same.
Vintage: Typically a little more higher end, both in price and selection. Like in wine (from where the term is believed to have stemmed), it’s often deployed to suggest an investment, and a worthwhile one at that.
Secondhand: Goods—usually furniture, clothes, appliances, etc.—that have been resold to and by a store. Think chains like Crossroads, Buffalo Exchange, Half Price Books, and other consignment stores that pay you for old clothes or books, as well as online sites like Depop or Poshmark.
Thrifting: Traditionally applied to charitable organizations, where items were donated rather than sold. Think Goodwill or Salvation Army.
Paying the price
By the 1950s, secondhand stores had shed their humble beginnings and “vintage” clothes were a treasure trove for a wealthier set—a thrill that hasn’t waned in the years since. Nowadays, thrifting can be done anytime, anywhere, thanks to sites like Depop, Poshmark, The RealReal, and ThredUp. Sellers’ closets can quickly become a rotating door of looks (often shown off on YouTube and TikTok), allowing the user to make way for new styles while also turning a profit.
But that attention has ignited a debate about the soul of secondhand marketplaces, and whether resale sites have contributed to a gentrification of thrifting. Critics argue that flipping thrift store finds into “vintage” fashion causes secondhand prices to rise and harms the more marginalized shoppers who need, rather than want, to shop thriftily. Proponents counter by saying that secondhand clothing is a net good and, particularly in the era of fast fashion, a more sustainable way to shop goods that can’t be recycled very easily.
At their core, each side’s argument could be boiled down to how much responsibility they think the consumer (rather than the retailer or the manufacturer) should take for the dire economic and environmental repercussions of the market. But while the debate may have new retailers and representatives, it’s a division that’s held since the beginning of thrifting. Even in the 1970s retailers claimed the vintage clothes boom had caused prices to quadruple. And certainly as long as the fashion industry continues to churn out styles at a faster and faster rate, it doesn’t seem like the thrift shop market will slow down.
The billion-dollar question
Is this the end of brick-and-mortar stores?
We understand why you’re asking that question. Because of Covid-19, the e-commerce surge of the past year was astounding, and experts believe a lot of the digital shopping habits consumers picked up during the pandemic are here to stay. Online shopping siphons sales from many brick-and-mortar shops, making many stores less productive.
The reality is, stores aren’t going away. As virtual as our lives have become, we’re still physical bodies operating in physical spaces. Stores remain an indispensable way for us to interact with products and brands, and the commercial areas where they cluster can still be vital social spaces. Stores are convenient, too—in some cases a more convenient way to shop than buying an item online and waiting for delivery.
But the way companies use stores is evolving as technology alters the way we buy things.
By the digits
80,000: US stores that could close by 2026, according to UBS
16%: US retail sales done online at its 2020 peak
36%: UK retail sales done at its 2020 peak
>50%: Estimated 2021 retail sales done online in China
17,000: Square feet of the outdoor turf field at Dick’s Sporting Goods’ “House of Sport” concept store
30-second case study
Target has done well during the pandemic—in the year ending Jan. 30, the company’s sales grew by more than $15 billion, greater than its previous 11 years of growth combined. E-commerce may have fueled that growth, but its stores are still very involved.
It’s embracing its brick-and-mortar stores as logistics hubs for its online orders. Its stores fulfilled 95% of its sales—online and offline—in the quarter through the end of Jan. 2021.
Stores were also essential in keeping its e-commerce sales profitable. John Mulligan, Target’s chief operating officer, said it’s about 90% cheaper when a customer picks up an online order in store rather than Target shipping it to them from a warehouse. (It can also have a smaller carbon footprint since the drive tends to be shorter and may happen in a more efficient vehicle.)
Watch this!
CBRE, a large commercial real estate and investment firm, predicts handling the growing tide of online returns will be one of the big jobs for its imagined “hybrid store of the future,” both shopping destination and miniature fulfillment hub
Fun fact!
Sales per square foot is the metric retailers use to determine the value of a store. But that may soon be obsolete. E-commerce is siphoning sales from brick-and-mortar retail; stores are taking on additional roles in the new shopping ecosystem that’s emerged, and their value beyond being a point of sale is moving to the forefront. Retailers are borrowing metrics from media, valuing stores based on “impressions” and email addresses collected.
Keep reading
How Covid-19 is transforming the retail industry. This June 2020 presentation tracks the dramatic transformation the pandemic brought to retail in charts.
What an estimated 80,000 store closings say about the future of US retail. Stores need a clear purpose if they’re going to continue to exist.
Retail’s future is in Asia. While the US spent much of the 20th century on retail’s cutting edge, that superlative now goes to Asia, which has become the world’s most innovative region for retail.
Retailers will spend billions processing record e-commerce returns this holiday season. The logistics of e-commerce involves the overwhelming business of returns.
Harley Finkelstein thinks Covid has changed retail forever. The COO of Shopify tells Quartz about how these retail shifts will ultimately benefit independent businesses.
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