How creators are actually converting free members
A few weeks ago, we asked some of our Creator Ambassadors: How are you engaging and converting your free members?
One thing came through pretty clearly: Free members don’t convert because of one big push. They convert because they keep seeing your value over time.
Here are a few of the ways creators in this community are actually doing that right now.
1. Turn your public posts into something people come back for
Erika Lancaster shared one of the most thoughtful examples:
She runs free weekly art challenges built around a monthly theme. Each post includes a guided exercise, tips and fundamentals, and a mix of free and paid tutorial resources.
And about once a month, she unlocks a full premium tutorial for everyone.
What’s nice about this approach is it doesn’t feel like “free vs paid.” It feels like a system people can participate in. Free members get real value every week, older paid work gets resurfaced naturally, and people get a feel for her teaching before upgrading.
2. Show people exactly what they’ll get (and when)
Kia’s Creative Club keeps it really simple. They post a preview of the next month’s physical rewards, pair it with a clear note like, “3 days left to join if you want this,” and then reinforce the message throughout the week.
It works because there’s no guesswork. People can see the value immediately, and there’s a clear moment to act.
Sometimes conversion is just about making things obvious and timely.
3. Make your free → paid structure really clear
PrintyJay approaches this more structurally.
Free members get access to standalone or less frequent pieces, while paid members unlock full sets and more complete experiences. On top of that, they layer in things like milestone events, limited drops, and occasional discounts.
The key here is clarity and consistency. The free experience stands on its own, but it clearly points to something bigger. You’re not holding back value, you’re showing the difference in depth and frequency.
4. Let people experience paid (without the risk)
A few creators mentioned this, but Degrassi Kid is a great example:
They regularly gift memberships to free members, sometimes dozens at a time. A good number of those people stick around and subscribe after.
Why it works: people get to actually experience what they’re paying for, it creates excitement, and it lowers the barrier to trying something new.
You could try a monthly, engagement-based giveaway of gifted memberships to encourage participation.
5. Make your value easy to understand upfront
Natural Six does two things really well:
They’ve created a Free Trial Collection, a curated set of posts that shows exactly what paid members get, and they pair that with a monthly public digest post sharing what they’re working on, what’s coming next, and what’s paid vs public.
This helps new and existing fans quickly understand the value, know when to come back, and see how much more members get.
You can also see this in action with creators like I Know Dino, who created a “Member Perks Sampler” shelf on their page. It’s a curated set of posts that gives new visitors an immediate feel for what they’d unlock as a member.
It’s a simple idea, but really effective:
New fans don’t have to dig to understand the value
They can quickly explore a few strong examples
It builds confidence in what they’ll get if they join
6. Just stay present
Manuge et Toi Design takes a lighter approach:
They post regularly, share work, tutorials, and community creations, and don’t constantly push upgrades.
They’re just… there. Regularly.
And that matters more than it sounds. Most people don’t upgrade the first time they see something. It usually takes a few touchpoints.
The throughline
All of these look different, but they’re doing the same thing:
Engagement first. Conversion second.
The creators seeing the most success are:
Showing up consistently
Giving real value to free members
Making paid value visible
Creating natural moments to upgrade
What to try
You don’t need to do everything at once.
Start small:
Share one meaningful public post (discussion, newsletter, poll, etc.)
Post a couple lightweight updates (Quips, previews, quick thoughts)
Surface something great from your backlog (or add it to a free shelf)
Then check Insights → Path to Paid and see what actually resonates.
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Comments (38)
It told me to put a few of my post on the Quips to get more visibility, I did and not one person saw it. How is it helping me, I'm also new to Patreon.
Hey Nicole, that kind of low reach isn't the intended outcome for a discovery-focused feature, and we've heard similar feedback from smaller creators consistently over the past couple months. Jack recently shared more on this, including changes underway to help with discovery for creators of any size. You can read more about this in our most recent post: https://www.patreon.com/jackconte/posts/new-patreon-167204499
Some great suggestions here. Thank you!
I am starting to see some beginning results and attention. Looking forward to being one of the top stock communities on Patreon.
I would do this for sure thanks for the info and ideas.
How about patreon should not have DESTROYED the creators with this " free member " garbage . I have lost over ONE HUNDRED PAYING MEMBERS!!!!!!!! BECAUSE of PAYING MEMBERS joining free RIGHT AWAY after this stupid " free member crap " was announced. TAKE OFF FREE MEMBERSHIP nonsense . Patreon creators join patreon TO GET PAID , if people want FREE they can watch YOUTUBE FOR FREE .
Nice one I will start allowing free access from now so they can see my work
Looks good for elite fashion weeks backstage.
Just discovered this page I felt like I was fighting in the dark and my fighting is shite! So thanks guys 🫂 🙌
So glad to have you here! Happy you found us 🙌
This is why I am creating only free products and videos, paid membership should be totally voluntary, when someone really wants to support creators. Unfortunately, here discovery of channel is more difficult and on youtube it is difficult to contact even to your own subscribers and keep in touch with the community.
🔥❤️🔥
Good
Awesome stuff! 👏🌈
मैं अपना कंटेंट नहीं डाल पा रहा हूं इसके लिए क्या करें
Huge thanks to the Patreon team for these changes. Providing more ways to engage with our audience directly is exactly what we need to grow sustainably. Very excited for what's coming next!
I would love to have free members on my newly established page.
I’m trying to get my podcast to grow further
As a small creator and faith based I’m struggling to gain free members and traffic. I think I agree that if a post doesn’t get traction within the first hour it ends up dead in the water and not get pushed which is where fb does a good job giving posts a better shot before marking something not viable. I’m still here building a community of like minded people and definitely not ready to throw in the towel and willing to learn from others in the meantime.
This is great advice and very helpful. Thanks for posting it! :)
More like a great post.
I’ve been posting early Comics for my patrons for a while, but only recently just switched it so that the post will go public showing free members that they could’ve seen them earlier.
I sometimes "accidently" make some of my Paid content free. That can help too.
Good tips! 😃👍👍👍 I appreciate this page so much! 😊 /DARK FANTASY Author Birger 💙📚
I think my account is transparent and no one can see it, but I'm just starting out on Patreon. 😂Greetings!
🙏🙏🙏👍
How do we gift membership!? 😃🎁 Help! Would Love to try this!
Go to the promotions section and you will find it :-)
Would like to know what is best for discovery ... and growing free account between sharing patreon account on other socials or to use quips. Would i grow fastest by creating weekly posts with a patreon link on meta or will i grow quicker using weekly quips ... ? (Assuming content type does not have an influence) .. which platforms tools are best?
I cant agree more with some of the tips here exposed 💜 Consistency + free/paid content , everyday, even if is a little bit, is what works for me, to help decide if a Free member wants to support my content or not.
👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
One thing that might help creators actually reach the stage where these tips apply (converting Free Members to Paid) is looking at how crowdfunding platforms handle discovery. Right now, smaller pages are struggling to even get Free Members because discovery is limited. The algorithm decides what gets pushed to Home and Explore based on engagement. But it’s deciding way TOO fast! (Usually within just a few minutes I think.) If a post or quip doesn’t get early traction, it`s basically considered "dead on arrival" or "not interesting enough to push to the main feeds" - before most human eyes ever have a chance to see it or interact with it. That seems to be why a lot of newer creators just aren’t showing up on the Home feed or Explore section after posting, and their analytics are showing that their content hasn`t really reached anyone beyond their own small membership circle (or many times, no one at all). That’s where platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo do things differently. Campaigns have limited funding windows (usually 30 ~ 45 days), so these platforms have to give ALL projects an almost equal time to be seen and considered by everyone on the platform (and off the platform) before judging them because they never know who might be interested in supporting and funding the project. Individuals, communities, friends, potential entertainment companies, and large investors... They are all at play (and there`s money involved). So these platforms can’t really just "assume" something is “dead” based on a few hours of community engagement - because a lot of projects actually pick up massive momentum later, sometimes right before the deadline. And honestly, these platforms never really know what’s going to blow up or become a global trend.🤣 Some of the most silly, crazy, and off-the-wall unexpected ideas end up getting heavily funded and smashing their original goals: https://www.entrepreneur.com/starting-a-business/4-kickstarter-campaigns-you-wont-believe-actually-succeeded/235499 But if visibility on these platforms was hidden by default or cut off early, most crowdfunding projects would never get discovered at all. Because, unlike an algorithm that just goes by data and trends, humans need time to discover, view, and consider the value before engaging and committing to something that they are interested in. I think Patreon needs something similar. Give posts and Quips a real window (24–72 hours) to be seen first, then let actual community engagement decide what organically grows - just like in the old days of Facebook, YouTube, and the old Twitter. Unlike other SNS platforms, Patreon isn’t about keeping up wth and chasing daily news or global trends. It’s about helping creators build worlds, communities, and long-term value, which can also be profitable for them. We’re not building trends - we’re building universes that will outlast them. That’s where the hidden gems are. And honestly… that’s where the real value is too! Just more of my opinions on a GW holiday in Japan. But what do you think?
I’d say even more beyond the 72 hour mark - why not push it to a week, 2 weeks, 1 month, 2 months even… because if we as the creators know that our work will continue to surface to new audiences that much longer after sharing, won’t it affect what we choose to put out and share, and won’t it encourage long-term value over immediate results - which social media has trained us all to optimize for? I think one of the key factors that it should come down to is one’s own interest in a topic - because for you it probably wouldn’t matter if something was shared an hour, a day, a week, a month ago (or even longer), you would still be interested in it and it would still be valuable because your own interest is the real currency. It also shouldn’t matter how many likes or the level of interaction a post has had - that’s not the ultimate qualifier of value. At least, I don’t think that it should be
Fantastic tips!
I’ve started using Quips, Re-share, and survey polls more, and it’s really helped with consistency. I’m still early with a small audience, but I’m confident these tools will help showcase the value of my content over time.
I will definitely build the house on the left in The Sims 4. 😍
This is good info and a great post, but it fundamentally only addresses the second and third parts of the puzzle - which only activate after a person already has Free Members on their page to convert. The issue that most people here need to address is organic Discovery on the platform and how to actually bring people on Patreon to their pages so that they might view their content and actually choose to become free members. I’ve discussed the current “early stage” choke points for that in this post. https://www.patreon.com/posts/157144297?utm_campaign=postshare_creator Organic Discovery, and growth within the actual Patreon community can usually lead to attractive more Free Members joining off platform (because when linking a Patreon post externally, interested parties will usually check the membership numbers of that page to see how much engagement that it has before deciding to Join or become Free Members themselves). So I think this post sequentially should come after solving the first issue that most small pages and new Patreon members are facing at this time. But curious as to what everyone thinks!
You make a great point. I have found that people join as free members if you interact with others in the discovery section of Patreon. Whether you like, comment or share your own quips. It helps with getting discovered. You can also join other pages for free that you enjoy. It is all so new, the best thing you can do right now is explore it, play around with it and see what works. I think Patreon itself is always testing things out to see how and what works. Essentially I think that’s what we ought to do, just experiment with it to figure out what gives you personally the best results while taking tips & advice from others at the same time. Cause we also shouldn’t be doing the exact same thing everyone else is doing. Kind of defeats the purpose of this whole thing. Either way, I think you brought up a great point. As a smaller account I know how hard it can be to reach a larger audience. Quips has started making a big difference for me and I’m very grateful for it.