#62: Should You Start A Subscription? - Storytellers Rule the World

Posted on December 7, 2023.

In today’s episode, Michael Evans and Emilia dive into a crucial question many aspiring authors grapple with: Should you start a subscription? 🤔 Despite the podcast’s focus on subscriptions, it’s surprising to learn that a significant number of listeners haven’t taken the plunge yet. Join Michael and Emilia as they provide valuable advice on the types of authors who thrive in the subscription model.

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#62 Episode Outline:

00:01:09 Introduction

00:02:50 Authors Best Suited for a Subscription

00:04:03 Should You Start Your Subscription Based on Your Genre?

00:07:48 Correlation Between Serials and Author Success in Subscriptions

00:13:42 When Should You Start a Subscription?

00:18:34 Conclusion

#62 Episode Transcript:

Michael Evans: [00:00:00] obviously, you know, the ecosystem built on retailers served a purpose, was able to help a lot of others make a living, and it still does. But it’s becoming slightly less effective because the whole industry is shifting towards the superfans.

It’s why we see the rise of crowdfunding. of all these different business models that are based around superfans. And I think it’s a really big shift, especially because we’re seeing with the rise of Generate AI technologies, these new ways of doing things that the casual readers there. We love them.

They exist. That’s great. We can be casual readers of many people, but what’s actually going to drive your business and make what you’re doing sustainable is a super fans and you need to build a business model for them. And one of the only real things that makes sense to do for your super fans. That is that business model is subscriptions.

[00:01:00]

Michael Evans: HEllo, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the Subscriptions for Authors podcast. And today we have a very important question, which is, should you start a subscription? I know it’s weird that we’re asking this question because we’re on the Subscriptions for Authors podcast. One might assume everyone has a subscription here, and maybe you’re the only one listening that doesn’t.

But that is likely not true. Why we said is because we’ve been doing surveys of new members who come into the Facebook group for like well over a year now, and regularly, 70 percent of people say that they haven’t started subscription yet, but they want to start one. So, in fact, if you are, should you start a subscription question haven’t yet wondering if and when you should take the lead.

You’re probably like most of us listening here and we want to help you today. So me and Amelia are going to share basically our advice [00:02:00] on the types of authors that are successful in subscription.

Michael Evans: Obviously the specific question should you, capital Y, you specifically started a subscription is a great one for the Facebook group because we can help you more individually there.

Other authors can chime in. Obviously, Amelia, you have been doing your subscription for quite a while and actually have started now multiple subscriptions in different formats, comics, et cetera. What comes to you at a conference or emails you or all the different ways that we have people ask us questions when someone says, should they start a subscription?

What is your advice? What kinds of authors do you think are best suited for it?

Emilia Rose: Yeah. I would just say everybody, mainly because I feel like anybody, whether you’re just [00:03:00] starting as an author, because I started my subscription before I even published, so whether you’re just starting as an author and have zero published books, or if you’re a very established author and have a really wild fanbase, I definitely think that you should start a subscription.

You might not be ready at the moment. Because you need some, some background on on ways to run one. But I think everyone should at least consider running a subscription and a place and, and having a place for your super fans to not only connect with each other and have a community, but pay you if they want to pay you.

Michael Evans: Okay. I’m I’m with you. I think everyone should consider it. I definitely. I definitely agree, but I also know people’s first questions, which are, I write genre X, we can insert whatever your genre is. Am I going to be successful? Which I, we can’t go over every single genre right now, but how do you feel about the question of genre subscriptions?

Like if I’m maybe genre [00:04:00] Y. Should I not start a subscription because of my

Emilia Rose: genre? I Personally think you can start a subscription in any genre. Some genres definitely have more prevalence in the subscription. I guess author community right now, like romance, like RPG. I know, I think you mentioned Cozy Mysteries at some point are doing really well.

But I think that you can start a subscription regardless of your genre. Mainly because you’re servicing your superfans. So if you have superfans, like if a genre has superfans, which all genres do I think you can have a, you can start a subscription. You can have a successful subscription. So even though it might not be, your genre might not be represented in the subscription market at the moment.

That doesn’t mean that it can’t be, and you can’t be the one to start it.

Michael Evans: No, that’s a really good point. When you mentioned superfans too. I know people start to think, and I do as well, like, what’s a, what’s a [00:05:00] good, like, Okay, not all of my fans are super fans, right? So what is kind of like a conversion, for lack of better words, to your subscription?

And there was actually this really funny moment recently. So when I was recently on Joanna Penn’s podcast. It’s going to go live the first week of December. So this podcast will go live before that podcast. If you haven’t listened to Random Pants podcast, you should tune into that one, you should tune into that one.

You should tune into other ones too. She’s great. But you know, she kind of asked me a similar question and I was like, you know, we typically see the conversion rate between like. 5 percent is like super awesome of like your fans who are like book buying regular on retailers or reading your work regular reading through your books and show fiction platforms to have like 5 percent is like stellar.

anD we see like 1, 1, 1 to 5 percent is kind of the range, which is a big range, but that’s because there’s a lot of different ranges in terms of how we market things, etc. And she went on because she has a subscription for her podcast and literally like while I said that looked and looked at like the [00:06:00] number of listeners that she has regularly who are listening to most of her podcast and the number of people that she had in terms of paid subscribers.

And it was 4%. So like she hit like right at the top end of that, like, like I said, 5 percent is like amazing, but yeah, it was like kind of live proof that like, Hey, like these are the expectations that we’re sharing with you in this, like they can be met. There’s people doing it. So that was really cool.

And I agree, like. No matter what stage you’re at, there is definitely something to be said about your books. I mean, this is a little bit of a tangent, but I’m curious, like, why you think subscriptions have picked up faster in serial fiction? Because I have so many people who say, like, Hey, I want to join Ream.

She had an author DM me yesterday, I want to join Ream, but I don’t have time to write serials. Yeah. They’re only writing on retailers. And I’m like, Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you could do serials on Ream. Like, of course, we’re not going to stop you. But you don’t have to do serials. There’s a lot of, like, kind of people kind of view subscriptions and serials as [00:07:00] one, when it doesn’t have to be.

Like, Kay Webster is a huge author on Ream, and does not write serials too often. Kat T. Mason, I don’t think, typically writes serials from all the research I’ve done on her, and she’s crushing it, and just launched a subscription a little while ago. Alina Johnson, same thing. I mean, I can name a bunch of people, all right, so I can name a bunch of people.

With that said though, why do you think there’s that sort of correlation between, Oh, if I have to have a subscription, that means I’m doing serial fiction. Why do you think that is? And I guess, why do you think it’s more popular for serial fiction authors? Because up to this point, people draw that conclusion and they’re not wrong, right?

Like there’s a lot more serial fiction authors that are succeeding in subscriptions. As of right now, proportionally to the authors who are in KU or on Y Retailers. Yeah,

Emilia Rose: that’s a really good question. I think one of the reasons why people think that you have to do serial stories for subscriptions is because like what you just said, [00:08:00] majority right now of authors who are doing subscriptions and doing well are those serialized storytellers.

Like you look at the RPG, they’re pretty much. I, I don’t want to group them all together, but I feel like the majority of them are doing serialized stories and they’re funneling people over from Royal Road. And that’s what we see a lot of serialized authors doing just because. There’s very little way to monetize serial stories right now and on the other platforms.

So I think that’s a big reason why a lot of serial storytellers are turning to subscriptions because they host all subscriptions. You have all the data on your customers. When you’re on these other platforms, you have no data about them. You just have maybe their. username and that’s it. And there’s very, there’s not many ways to monetize and on those other platforms [00:09:00] anyway.

Michael Evans: I think that last point, yeah, that last point is a key point. The, everything else I agree with. But, all of that has been true for retailer authors, too. Like, retailer authors who benefit from making more money, they benefit from having a direct connection to superfans they don’t have elsewhere.

So all that’s true, but then it’s like, Oh, wait, on these, these serial fiction platforms are completely under monetized. Tons of them rip off their writers. Kind of, there’s many that treat themselves like writer’s sweatshops. And we rarely ever use their names because we don’t want anyone going there.

Because you will be exploited and a lot of them are functioning like that. It got me thinking what you said initially, right? The core of subscriptions, what it’s about is your super fans. And that made me think about how this industry is changing because there is no secret. There’s a lot more authors outside of serial fiction succeeding in subscriptions.

Now, compared to when we started, we started talking about subscriptions. [00:10:00] We started this community a year and a half ago. I want to say it was almost all serial fiction authors, literally like everyone, but me and you saw it and we’re like, wait, like you’re actually on retailers now and we’re bringing people in from retailers too.

So it’s not just a serial fiction thing. It’s, it’s a super fan thing. And then I was thinking about more what’s happened in the last year and a half. There’s been a kind of awakening of, Oh, inflation happened. We saw that 1. 22. The readers are locked inside and spending more money on ebooks and audiobooks than normal.

That went down. And we saw that these retailers, especially the big two letter program, KU, aren’t actually paying their authors all that well, you know, it’s not a sweatshop. Okay, what I’ve seen in the serial fiction space, I get why they went to subscriptions way faster. It was a need. Like, if you wanted to keep producing content for your readers and to create great stories, even though it makes so many writers uncomfortable to charge, [00:11:00] at some point you’re like, I’m running against my own psychological limits here.

I need to. I need to have something to sustain me, right? And obviously, you know, the ecosystem built on retailers served a purpose, was able to help a lot of others make a living, and it still does. But it’s becoming slightly less effective because the whole industry is shifting towards the superfans.

So I do think it’s something that [00:12:00] everyone should and can consider, but that doesn’t mean that everyone should then. Go to Serial Fiction Platforms and think that’s the way to do subscriptions. I’ve got subscriptions your

Emilia Rose: way. Yeah, I think just like looking at book box companies too, like a lot of them, they utilize authors.

Very authors popular books and those books drive in their super fans to that book box and then the book box grows and so it’s like the super fan kind of like mentality around subscriptions is shown not only with serial fiction, but these book box companies as well. not saying that everyone should go and start a book box, but.

You can have a subscription without doing serial fiction. You can have it without doing book boxes.

Michael Evans: 100 percent someone like Emma St. Claire on Ream is really focused on really just community events. That’s what [00:13:00] she does. A lot of really community building. Jackson, this horror short story. So there’s a lot of truly an unbelievable amount of different ways to approach it.

So that’s, it’s exciting. It’s exciting times. And, you know, in terms of should you start a subscription? Maybe the question is, sure, a lot of authors should consider it. Obviously, not everyone should go and do it tomorrow, but that’s actually a good point. When should you start a subscription? That verb in front of should you start a subscription is also really important.

I’m curious what you think about that because Obviously, we’re all at different stages of our career at different times, but how does career stage influence if and when you should start a subscription?

Emilia Rose: Yeah. I think it depends on your model. If you want to do a book box, if you want to do like physical goods.

Or merch, I would say those models tend to do well when you have an established audience already. You can still do it when you don’t have much of an audience, but [00:14:00] when you have a established audience of super fans who want that content, your subscription, that may do better than if you have no super fans and you’re, you wanna launch merch.

But if you’re just starting Serializing or just like writing and releasing early like early access is probably the model that you should go for. But I definitely think that you should have a little bit of background and understand how to launch early access, how to do Exclusive access or book boxes before you you start.

Michael Evans: No, I think I think that’s really good advice in terms of what model you’re doing and the right timing. And I will completely second that. It doesn’t oftentimes make financial sense to do merchandise that I mean, print on demand is a little different, but even then, like all the time that you’re spending.

Dreaming up of different merch and [00:15:00] making the designs. It’s probably better, I mean, unless you love it. Which, if you love it, like, don’t ignore me, right? You want to do what you love at the end of the day and have fun with it. But if that’s something you’re dreading, like, Oh, I think I gotta set up a merch store.

No, you definitely don’t need to right now. Unless you have, like, fans asking for it, you have a larger fan base. There’s not, like, a specific number that I would say. But I would shoot for, like, I wouldn’t want to start a sort of merch tier or a book box if I wasn’t going to at least get like five people in it.

I think five is a good number if you think you can get that. And one thing too, when you’re ever starting something with your subscription, and this is the ultimate hack, is you don’t have to do it before you get the money. So let’s say you want to start a book box, but you’re like, I have no idea if people are going to join.

And let’s face it. You might want to do a book box. You might want to do early access. But it’s a lot more exciting [00:16:00] if you know that there’s people paying for it. Then you’re like, okay, now I want to do it, right? You want to do the thing that your fans are paying you for, right? That’s a big factor. Well, you can launch your tier, launch your description.

It doesn’t take long to do it, especially if you’re not overthinking this. And then you see if people join when you share it with them. And if they don’t join when you mark your description, which by the way, you have other podcasts that mark your description. But like, if they don’t join, maybe that’s an indication that, okay, maybe now’s not the time.

You don’t have to put pressure on yourself to create something that no one’s in. You could do that if it’s an accountability thing. You don’t have to. But if you launch it and someone joins, you’ve got your answer. Yeah. And it can’t hurt to try because it’s free to start a subscription and you also don’t have to start a paid tier.

If you’re not ready yet, if you’re using a platform like rain, you could have followers, read your stories, follow, get your stories so that they readers have to sign up and give you their [00:17:00] email to read your chapters, which is super, super cool. They get them delivered securely notifications. So the chapters aren’t in email and they can comment inside.

It’s like a ton of fun. It’s a really cool business model. So like, if you’re like, Just interested in like kind of starting at CUNY and want to engage your fans, but like, I don’t know if I’m ready for this whole subscription thing yet. You could still use a membership platform to start connecting with your fans and just not charge yet.

That is completely valid.

Emilia Rose: I agree. And when, once you get like that first subscriber in there, it’s kind of validates like, hey especially if we’re doing like physical tiers, like. If one person wants it, there’s probably a chance that other readers may want it as well. I mean, that’s priced correctly. I just have to improve marketing, or I need to let those other readers know.

And then with serial fiction once you have that first subscriber, and you’ve committed to like, posting once a week, or once a [00:18:00] month, or however your cadence is, You kind of, like, hold yourself up to that, like, I have to post once, once a week, once a month, I’m going to sit down, make time, write. I know a lot of authors who started serial fiction through their subscription, and it’s become very easy for them to kind of stay on schedule.

Which I found too, so you’re not, like, waiting until… Like, the day before Amazon wants you to submit your manuscript to finish it all. It’s your writing as you go.. And

Michael Evans: yeah. I totally agree. I’m with you. I, I hope, I hope all this is helpful for people like who are thinking about starting who aren’t sure.

AnD also, one last thing if you haven’t yet signed up for our mailing list, you should. If you’re on this podcast and you’re not in our mailing list, go to the link description to sign up for it because there’s so much stuff that we do that’s like not on this [00:19:00] RSS feed that we update you on, that we share resources on and advice.

So being on the mailing list is important in my opinion. That’s enough from us. Hope everyone has an amazing rest of the day. And don’t forget, storytellers rule the world.

ABOUT SUBSCRIPTIONS FOR AUTHORS

We are the premier community to learn about making money from subscriptions as an author. We have this weekly podcast, our Facebook Group with hundreds of fellow authors, and a newsletter where we are committed to having the best free educational resources and networking for authors looking to break into this exciting new publishing model. We are led by Emilia Rose (six figures a year on subscriptions and steamy romance author) and Michael Evans (sci-fi thriller author and newbie to subscriptions, but excited to learn). Subscriptions are hard for authors, we hope this community makes it easier for you. But we also know how tough it can be using technology platforms that always feel like they are working against you. That’s why we are building Ream… oh… and about that…

ABOUT REAM Ream is a platform that helps authors make money with subscriptions. Think of us like Patreon built for fiction authors by fiction authors. And our mission is simple: to help more authors pursue their storytelling dreams full-time (and for those full-time to make even more money and have more control while doing so). The platform allows writers to build communities around their stories and charge a monthly fee that rewards their super fans with connection and access. You can join Ream and start making money from subscriptions on the only platform built by authors for authors: https://reamstories.com