I’m posting this up here on the forums to see if anyone else has this issue. Or maybe it’s just me.
Long story short, the fact that the front page of my Patreon “About Me” is hidden under membership and my patrons have to click “show more” is annoying. This is why.
I post the instructions for how to access my rewards and all information about how my Patreon works on the front page, it’s just as important for current patrons as it is for non-patrons browsing. The tier rewards do not have enough space to explain the rewards without it looking clustered. And, so I prefer to explain and give all the info about my Patreon on the “About Me”
Yes I know I can make a pinned post, but there is that one website that data mines recent Patreon posts and uploads it for free (I’m not going to say what the website is, but literally every Patreon page is on there). I can search up any creator on Patreon and access all their locked posts for free on this website. For this reason, I do not distribute my rewards via new blog posts. It’s not secure, and so I have to hide my rewards someplace else. So the new layout feels like it is forcing me to distribute my rewards via the blog posts which is not good. Putting information on the “About Us” page is more secure.
I figure ok whatever websites change their layout all the time, patrons will get used to it, I’ll get used to it. So I updated with new instructions and everything BUT every week someone is sending me a message asking where the rewards are and it’s getting annoying having to explain that not only is it in a specific tab, my “about me” page is completely hidden on default and needs to be opened up using “show more”. This has never been an issue for the last 4+ years I’ve been on Patreon.
Maybe I’m old school, but I don’t like when information is nested. Maybe it’s to be more friendly to mobile users maybe it makes a page free of ‘clutter’, but on a desktop it’s now taking both me and my patrons 2-3 more clicks to access information whereas before it was only 1 click and BAM all the information is right there tiers, info, recent blog post.
This isn’t an angry complaint btw, if this is permanent layout then I’ll get use to it and patrons should be smart enough to send me a message if they are confused. It’s no big deal. Just putting it out there.
Suggestion: Because creators have different needs, it would be nice if we can customize what we want on our front page for patrons and non-patrons, or set which tab we want on default, or whether or not our “About Me” page is fully opened to show all information, or shrunk down to include the “show more”.
If anyone has any suggestions or solutions, for a workaround let me know and consider what I mentioned for #2.
As an optional solution right now, a pinned post might be your best bet. If this is information that you’re already giving out for free, since it explains how to get the rewards, then it shouldn’t matter if it’s mined and posted on that website.
But otherwise, I do agree that it’s frustrating to have the “About Me” section basically tossed in the trash.
The number one reason that I have seen patrons leave (through exit surveys) is that everything is hard to find, rewards are difficult to find, difficult to navigate. The UI needs improvement and if it were improved, I would imagine a 10-15% increase in patrons and patrons that stay longer.
I think I know which site Momo is referring to, and trick is: they convince someone to pay to get in, then they scrape everything they can from what their tier permits them to have.
Your true supporters won’t do this because they really want to support you, and they understand they are paying for what you will produce in the future (even if the reward is what you’ve made so far).
If you find someone has been scraping from you, consider your options to slow the flow, and remember that the only method that works 100% of the time to prevent it, is to never post on the Internet (good luck with that if you want people on the 'net to find you and hand over money).
It’s not hopeless, and you’ll have to take an active role in your security no matter where you post.
They have also used bots in the past to make fake accounts and pledge so unless you have pay upfront enabled, at least up until recently, new patrons could still view your content the moment they pledge, even if they hadn’t paid yet. I don’t recall if that is still a thing but it was for a long time.
That might be harder now that some log in security on patreon has changed (though i have a feeling they just have people willing to make fake accounts by hand to bypass it), but yeah, some people leak the content they get to said sites.
Hi @Momo, thank you so much for sharing this feedback with us. I will definitely share this with the product team, it’s very useful having all this thoughtfully shared in one place. Improving content organization and making sure it’s easy for patrons to access is something we recognize as being crucial and really want to tackle this year. The changes we’ve been making to the landing page and the patron page is moving towards that direction, but we know it’s not perfect yet. We’re continuing to iterate and improve and will look to your feedback as guidance throughout the process.