I decided to start two experiments with two Patreon tiers.
The first one would allow patrons to read my blog posts 1 week before they are publicly available on my regular blogs (on catchen.me). I’m not sure how many people would actually buy this, because my blog posts are usually not time sensitive at all. It’s a way to allow patrons to encourage me to write blog posts more often. The 1 week gap is more like a symbolic reward.
The second one is more interesting. I’m opening 1:1 at $100/hr for anybody interested in talking to me. I know some people are willing to pay me to answer questions on Zhihu, but at a much lower price and probably needs much less time. The reason I hesitate to answer those questions is the lack of building trust and relationship. People can get an answer and then go, but that doesn’t creates any long term value. I want to see if I can building long lasting relationships through monthly 1:1 while getting paid at a reasonable rate.
Because monthly 1:1 isn’t really scalable, I limit 5 patrons at this tier. If this becomes popular, I’ll find a solution for the scalability problem. It’s a good-to-have problem, so I don’t think about it for now.
If you are interested in, here’s a link to my Patreon profile. You will be able to find the reward tiers there.