I am just starting out on both Patreon and makerworld commercial licensing. Although my dream would be one day to earn enough money to start slowing down on my day job, that’s a tall order and a long way to go. Afterall without a big hairy audacious goal.. what do we have !
Until then I’m trying to figure out if it’s worth the investment to maintain and be active on Patreon in addition to makerworld.
Is makerworld licensing popular enough that 3D print sellers would search makerworld?
I noticed many of the popular vendors on makerworld also have Patreon, is that simply because Patreon pre dates makerworld licensing? Or it has more to offer (audience, higher conversion rates, etc.).
Second part of my question is the makerworld tiers. I’m not truly understanding the best use of the 3 tier slots on makerworld since you can’t limit models or include special access repositories or restrict posts. So what is the most practical use of the tiers? Recognizing each tier can have a monthly, quarterly and annual rate.
I would love to hear your thoughts and advice to help me along.
It’s common to have a bottom tier for selling prints in person, a middle tier that adds selling online, and a top tier that adds permission to use the designer’s photos/videos.
Common is not the word I would use, maybe “not unheard of” or “something to consider”. Of all of the patreons I’ve patreon-ed, I’ve seen that language in 1 or at most 2, so maybe 5%?
I’m not a creator, I’m a consumer. All I can tell you is that I’m constantly looking through my list of non-patreon creators wondering if I can dump them each month (or persuade them to switch to patreon). All of my information flow is geared around patreon, the few stragglers have to be really special for me to keep.
It’s unfortunate because MMF has the best library system, so what I really want is to pay people on patreon and have them archive to MMF (which all of the good ones do).
Yeah. I learned that the hard way. Any advice on a strategy of how one would increase a price once their library gets to a point that warrants a hire subscription fee?
You can give them permission to use the photos you use when you upload your models. Google drive is another option, especially if you want to include a substantial number of extra photos. You would have to take very good photos, both technically and from a marketing perspective.
How well are you doing on here? The idea of giving away everything for free and still make enough money to make it worth it seems like having your cake and eating it too. I’m on thangs and patreon and I’ve done well with it but I keep looking at maker world like the cake I want to eat but don’t because it’s not worth the calories.
Fine I guess. I don’t really care about the financial aspect that much, I donate all of my proceeds anyway. I only use set up the commercial because a bunch of people were asking and I don’t feel right giving away a free commercial license.
That said, I put in significantly more effort than what is being rewarded. Most of the effort comes through special requests.
To me it is more important to keep it simple, for my own sanity.
I only have 22 commercial subscribers, that is really all I want to deal with. But I guess it depends on the product, most of my subscribers are running their own farms/stores, and are active in communication. Not someone selling trash on etsy.
Love the analogy. So far I am doing better with paying members on maker world. It seems like Patreon is the place people go to look for licensed material.
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