What tier benefits command the highest price and profit for readers?
This graphic was created by Matt Estes. He’s the COO of Uscreen, a company you have probably never heard of that pays out $200 million (yeah about half the size of KU) to video creators annually.
Uscreen is like Ream except a subscription platform for video creators (whereas Ream is a subscription platform specific for fiction authors). It’s a sleeping giant in a space where niche membership companies are helping creators of all types drastically increase their membership revenue.
But how do you get readers to pay you every month over and over again?
The simple answer: offer something they value.
The more complex answer: different people value different things and different stories from different creators.
BUT…
In general… there are a set of benefits you can provide that have higher retention AND a higher customer lifetime value.
First, let’s start with content.
Content/Stories — Typically tiers featuring early access/bonus content and other levels of access to your stories command a price of anywhere from $5 USD to $25 USD.
The most common price we see is $5 USD for eBook early access.
When the backlist is included this can go up to $10 USD and when audio and other media formats are included I’ve seen this go as high as $25 USD, but certainly the $5 USD to $15 USD range is where the majority of these subscription tiers sit.
This sounds great! Making $5 or $10 or even $15 per reader every month.
Except there are two issues here.
- With content/stories there is churn on average of 5% to 8% each month. Churn is when readers unsubscribe. This is natural. I’ve seen churn for authors with 1,000+ members as low as under 1% because readers LOVE their content so much. But I’ve also seen churn spike similarly when series end and books they are loving end. This spike in churn is stressful and ultimately leads to a lower Reader Lifetime Value (the metric that drives value in your publishing business).
- You are leaving money on the table by not having tiers at an even higher price per month. Higher price per month? Ya! Some readers already get enough value, belonging, and transformation (reference hierarchy below) from your work that paying $25, $50, or even $100 USD per month is worth it to them. This is why it’s NEVER a bad idea to have a high-priced tier with NO extra benefits and see if people will sign up. Time and time again an author with 7 members has someone paying them $100 a month… and that’s huge for someone getting started. But of course… unless you are actively nurturing those tiers by truly creating a space for belonging and transformation then your retention and conversion to higher-priced tiers will be muted.
This is where the power of community comes in.
What is a community? A space where your fans can find belonging in their shared passions, interests, and experiences.
This feels fuzzy. Not actually real.
I’m going to make it concrete and show you how you can do this.
But first, the WHY behind this all.
For you as an author:
Retention is MUCH higher and readers pay MORE per month when members garner belonging in your community.
For readers:
Your membership isn’t just a place to get early access, it’s a home away from home (a third place in the words of Hugo Amsellan).
In a time when loneliness is an epidemic and creators play a bigger role in our lives than ever, the community spaces we create as authors are akin to the next generation of YMCAs and coffee shops.
EJ Frost does this expertly in her membership with a monthly call with her readers at her $25 tier where they each have special roles in her community. It’s incredible and she has 90% year-over-year retention. For perspective, this is a better annual retention than Netflix and Amazon Prime, two of the best subscription programs in the world.
This retention is so nuts… but she’s not alone.
Christopher Hopper employs a very similar strategy with his readers in the Hopperverse. And has built an incredibly unique membership model.
If you want to learn more about both, I highly recommend watching our interview with EJ Frost AND Christopher Hopper’s keynote at the 2023 SFA Summit.
David Viergutz and Emma St. Clair are just two more authors doing incredibly well with this strategy and they are FAR from alone.
In the end, it’s intimidating to build your “community” as an author. What the heck does any of this mean and how do we do it?
Here’s where your AUTHOR PERSONA comes in. For those that don’t know, Author Personas is a short personality quiz designed to help you discover what your persona as an author is.
You can make your persona the center of your community, and connect with your readers in a way that is comfortable and sustainable for you (and 4/5 of the personas… it’s not even “you” doing the connecting with your readers).
In addition, belonging comes from 3 main components:
- Status. We are status-loving creatures and “Status-as-a-Service” is picking up steam in all industries. How can you recognize your top fans for their contributions and make them feel special? (again watch the resources linked below for more info and real-life examples from fellow authors)
- Identity. Give your readers a role, responsibility, or something to contribute to in your community. Whether it’s a VIP meeting about happenings in your world… or whether it’s giving readers a role in your community such as the “Mistress of Kink” (shout to EJ for that one), when people know they have a regular commitment and role in a community it gives them a sense of identity and purpose.
- Rituals. We wrote an ENTIRE blog about this that I’ll link here… but rituals bring your community together, and give people something regular to come back to. The ritual can be as simple as reading your early access chapters together (one reason why releasing serially or dropping stories regularly is powerful).
For most of you reading this, you shouldn’t go and stress about building your perfect community and hierarchy of tiers for your readers on Day 1.
In fact, please do NOT do that.
But many of you have been in this group for a while are making good money (and some of you great money) in memberships, and looking to get to the next level.
This is one KEY way how to do it. And for those that aren’t ready to build out their hierarchy of tiers yet and are still focused on getting their first tier up and going… now you know why some readers pay hundreds of dollars per YEAR to subscribe to authors.
And hopefully, I planted a seed that can help you do the same thing in the future when you are ready.
The world has changed a ton and it will continue to change more and more. Nearly half of my generation (Gen Z) has met a plurality of our friends online. The next generation of readers is going to change this industry forever. They are coming of age NOW, and they are going to be the readers of all of us soon.
Hopefully, this gives you a bit of a window into this future. And a future happening today. EJ Frost’s readers are almost entirely women in their 40s and 50s. Christopher Hopper’s readers are almost entirely 30+ and many 50+.
If this community strategy is working *really* well for those generations of readers who did not grow up “digitally native” or meeting most of their friends online… just imagine how well it will work with the generation that did.
That’s my rant for today.
I hope you all enjoyed. Let me know any way I can help or questions you have and check out down below for some awesome links.
I will see you all soon!
But in the meantime, don’t forget…
Storytellers Rule the World
P.S. Notice how I didn’t even talk about merchandise, signed books, etc. All of that ties into this and feeds off this, but I’d have to do a whole separate post on that. One day. One day. For now, enjoy this one.