If you are looking to make money by offering a membership or a way for your audience to support you, I’ve looked into the differences and similarities between Patreon and Buy Me A Coffee to help you choose the right platform.
Buy Me A Coffee focuses on offering a simple way for supporters to donate or make a purchase with less commitment making it better for more casual creators. Patreon focuses on recurring membership tiers making it better for more serious creators.
Although both platforms offer memberships and ways to communicate with your supporters, the things they allow you to offer to your audience and how they charge you are much different.
In addition to this, you may find that you may want to use Patreon for recurring membership tiers and complement that page by using Buy Me A Coffee for one-off donations and shop purchases.
To learn more about how you can choose between Patreon and Buy Me A Coffee, simply keep on reading, my friend. 🙂
P.S. If you want to see how Patreon compares to other alternatives, check out my article called Patreon Alternatives: How To Pick The Right Membership Platform.
The Main Differences Between Patreon vs Buy Me A Coffee
When choosing between Patreon and Buy Me A Coffee, you will want to at least look at what they allow you to offer your audience, what features they offer you, and how their pricing works.
Patreon has a much bigger focus on recurring memberships and being a platform for creators that have specific and ongoing projects like releasing videos or content on a regular basis.
While Buy Me A Coffee has a much bigger focus on offering a very simple way for your supporters to say thank you and show support by donating without having to commit to a monthly membership or even signing up for an account.
Although both Patreon and Buy Me A Coffee have the ability to create members-only or public posts, Patreon has many more post types to choose from including text, photo, audio, video, live stream, polls, and more.
When it comes to pricing, both platforms allow you to create an account for free and only charge you by taking a cut of your earnings only when you are actually earning money on their platform.
However, Buy Me A Coffee’s pricing is much more simple when compared to Patreon as there is only 1 plan with access to all features that takes a 5% cut when compared to Patreon’s 3 different plans that take between 5% and 12%.
Both Patreon and Buy Me A Coffee allow you to create a hosted page and have a Discord integration available.
However, you should know that both have no discovery features available meaning you will need to do all of the work bringing people to your page and convincing them to sign up.
...so how can you make the right choice between these 2 platforms?
In the following sections, I’ll show you what you can offer, how the pricing works, how you can get paid, and what features and support each of the 2 platforms offer you in more detail.
Why Choose Patreon Over Buy Me A Coffee
When compared to Buy Me A Coffee, Patreon has a much bigger focus on recurring memberships and being a platform for creators that have specific and ongoing projects like releasing videos or content on a regular basis.
Patreon also seems to push itself as a more serious option to create a sustainable career for creators by offering the ability to generate recurring revenue, full control of what is offered, and full control over your schedule.
If you want to seriously push a recurring membership to your audience, then Patreon is likely to be the better option for you.
Let’s take a closer look at exactly what you get when using Patreon before taking a closer look at Buy Me A Coffee.
What does Patreon allow you to offer to your audience?
Although it is possible to accept one-time donations with Patreon, the real focus is on getting patrons to choose between one of the membership tiers you’ve created that have different prices and benefits (or perks) on a monthly or annual basis.
In addition to this, Patreon allows you to fulfill merch to your membership tiers and either get paid monthly or per creation.
Although both Patreon and Buy Me A Coffee have the ability to create members-only or public posts, Patreon has many more post types to choose from including text, photo, audio, video, live stream, polls, and more.
Just like with Buy Me A Coffee, you are able to create a hosted page with Patreon and there is a Discord integration available.
Does Patreon have any discovery features for helping new supporters find you?
Patreon does not have any discovery features that will help potential supporters find your Patreon page.
Patreon is a membership platform and is in no way a discovery platform, which means you will need to do all of the work bringing people to your Patreon page and convincing them to sign up.
If you want to learn how to get Patreon supporters, the best way is to build an audience off of Patreon first.
How does Patreon’s pricing work?
Patreon has 3 different plans available to creators that all have no monthly upfront fees or sign-up costs. Instead, Patreon will take 5% to 12% of the monthly income you earn on Patreon in addition to any standard payment processing fees.
To learn everything you need to know about Patreon’s pricing, plans, and fees, check out my article called Patreon Pricing, Plans & Fees Explained, my friend. 🙂
How long does it take to get paid when using Patreon?
After choosing a Patreon plan, getting your first patrons to join, and having their payments processed, you will be able to receive your payout (minus the creator and payment processing fees) on a monthly basis.
Although, Patreon processes payments on the 1st of each month, they recommend that all creators wait until the 5th to allow Patreon some time to recover any declined payments first.
What kind of analytics does Patreon provide?
Patreon only provides analytics to creators that are on their “Pro” plan. The analytics that Patreon provides include data on your Patreon page, posts, income, number of patrons, income growth, and more. Patreon also offers a Google Analytics integration.
Is Patreon safe to use?
Patreon is safe to use for anyone that wants to sign up as a creator or wants to sign up to support creators. Patreon has been around since 2013 and has proven to be a safe and legit platform.
How good is Patreon’s support?
Patreon has mediocre support – particularly when compared to Buy Me A Coffee.
Patreon offers weekly demo sessions where you can ask questions and you can contact them through Twitter or a detailed contact form on their website (with several fields to fill out depending on what your request is).
Why Choose Buy Me A Coffee Over Patreon
When compared to Patreon, Buy Me A Coffee has a much bigger focus on offering a very simple way for your supporters to say thank you and show support by donating without having to commit to a monthly membership or even signing up for an account.
Buy Me A Coffee can be seen as more of a simple online tip jar that can lead to recurring memberships and is great for any individual who wants to accept donations without a particular project being worked on.
Although you can still create a sustainable income here, the big difference is that Buy Me A Coffee is much more laidback both in terms of what you offer and how your audience can support you.
What does Buy Me A Coffee allow you to offer to your audience?
You can use Buy Me a Coffee to offer your audience the ability to support you with simple one-off donations as well as recurring memberships.
Although you can’t offer different membership tiers with different perks available like you can with Patreon, you can create a shop where supporters can buy individual items like zoom calls, commission work, digital products, and more.
The website currency is “coffees” and you get to set the price for what 1 coffee is worth and then supporters can choose how many coffees they want to donate – you can even provide discount codes (which is something you can’t do with Patreon).
You can create members-only and public posts with Buy Me A Coffee, however, it is much more stripped down in terms of what post types you can create (just text, photo, or audio type) and who you can share to (just members or public) when compared to what you can do with Patreon.
Just like with Patreon, you are able to create a hosted page with Buy Me A Coffee and there is a Discord integration available.
Does Buy Me A Coffee have any discovery features for helping new supporters find you?
Buy Me A Coffee does not have any discovery features for helping new supporters find you – they don’t even email the supporters you gain to promote their own stuff.
Just as the case with Patreon, will need to do all of the work bringing people to your Buy Me A Coffee page and convincing them to support you.
How does Buy Me A Coffee’s pricing work?
Buy Me A Coffee’s pricing is much more simple when compared to Patreon: there is only 1 plan available which takes 5% and payment processing fees off of any income you generate on Buy Me A Coffee.
Just like with Patreon, it is free to create a Buy Me A Coffee account and you only give a cut to them when you are actually making money.
How long does it take to get paid when using Buy Me A Coffee?
Buy Me A Coffee also has a much more simplified way for receiving your payments – you instantly get paid instead of having to build up a monthly balance or hit a minimum withdrawal threshold as you do with Patreon.
What kind of analytics does Buy Me A Coffee provide?
Buy Me A Coffee provides analytics for free to all users. The analytics that they provide include data on earnings, page views, supporter count, sources for visits and purchases, the country of supporters, and more. There is also a Google Analytics integration available.
Is Buy Me A Coffee safe?
Buy Me A Coffee is safe to use for anyone that wants to sign up as a creator or wants to sign up to support creators. Although it hasn’t been around as long as Patreon, Buy Me A Coffee has been around since 2018 and has proven to be a safe and legit platform.
How good is Buy Me A Coffee’s support?
Buy Me A Coffee provides much better support when compared to Patreon. You can easily contact them with a 24/7 live chat, an openly public email address, or through a feature request form on their website.
How To Get Supporters & An Audience That Supports Your Art
Whether you use Buy Me A Coffee or Patreon, you will need to have an audience that actually wants to support you if you want to make money on either platform.
The best way to get Patreon supporters is to first build an audience and community around your art or creative endeavor off of your membership site and to freely provide that audience and community with overwhelming value.
Remember that most memberships don’t have any discovery features so they won’t bring in new fans. Instead, they simply allow your current fans the opportunity to choose to support you financially.
When you have an audience with an engaged community, only then will you be able to successfully grow your membership by offering them membership tiers that they actually want to join.
To learn how you can get Patreon supporters by growing an audience and community and exactly how you can make effective offers, check out my article called How To Get Patreon Supporters. 🙂
How To Create Effective Membership Tiers
At the end of the day, the main reason that anyone in the world is going to sign up for your Patreon is if they completely understand how being a patron benefits them and they feel like they are getting overwhelming value for the cost.
The best way to create highly effective tiers for your Patreon or membership is by leveraging a concept used in marketing called ‘Marketing Funnels’ or Funnel Mapping.
By leveraging a marketing funnel, you can simplify what you offer and organize it in a way that is very easy for both you and your potential patrons to follow.
For a closer look at each of these funnel steps in more detail below and what you can consider offering for each specific level, check out my full guide to tiers, perks, and rewards called Patreon Ideas For Artists & Musicians. 🙂
How To Build A Content Plan For Your Membership That Keeps Supporters Coming Back
If supporters don’t feel like they are getting any use out of your membership because you aren’t posting enough or aren’t posting things that they enjoy, it is no secret that they will eventually stop paying for it.
The best way to build a successful membership program is to consistently release new content by combining a recurring content strategy with a content calendar.
Recurring content allows you to build your audience, optimize your membership tiers, and make sure your supporters keep coming back for more.
To learn how you can start publishing regular content that builds your audience and keeps your supporters happy without completely stressing you out, check out my article called Patreon Content: Ultimate Guide To Ideas & What To Post. 🙂
What Patreon Plan Is Right For Your Project?
When reviewing Patreon’s plans, it can quickly become clear that you need to join the Pro or Premium plan to make the most out of the Patreon platform.
Although the creator fees are lowest for their “Lite” plan, when comparing Patreon Lite Vs Pro the huge difference that you will find is that you can’t actually create individual membership tiers with the Lite plan.
So, for a full breakdown of the 3 different Patreon plans available to you, what features you get, and which is the right plan for your unique project, check out my full article on Patreon Pricing, Plans & Fees Explained. 🙂