Easy subscriber perks that don't waste your time

We all probably got a little too excited about offering merch.

Merch is fun. Live events are exciting. Subscriber-only posts are cool too. But who has the time to do all this extra work?

Not you!

That’s why this issue is all about the easiest subscriber rewards you can offer so you can get back to your reporting.

Easy subscriber perks that don't waste your time

📰 No perks

Can’t get much easier than no perks! There’s lots of publications who just offer a “pay us” tier. It can absolutely work because turns out your reporting is valuable on its own and your readers want it to exist.

Examples

• Range 

• Ed Zitron

• What the fuck just happened today?

🤩 All content access

Paywalls get a bad rap but Google can get behind them now (if you want them to) and it just might make sense to gate more of your articles. You can do a metered paywall (read 3 free) or paywall every article.

Examples

• Flaming Hydra (all articles paywalled)

• Hell Gate (most articles paywalled)

❓️ Ask a question access

This is one of my favorite perks because it doesn’t promise much at all and it brings your readers in closer to what you’re doing. They feel included in the creation of your work, whether or not you answer their question. You can let them ask you questions or you can use their questions in your reporting (as The Lever does with politicians).

Examples

• The Lever’s “Opportunities to enter your own questions for Lever interviews with major political figures”

• Simon Owens’ submit a question for Q&A

📣 Get a shout out

A classic from the days of telethons—give the reader a shout out! Simple and beloved. My name is etched on the wall at KCRW and I will forever think that’s cool. Don’t underestimate the power of you tweeting a thank you to a subscriber or adding their name to a page on your website.

Examples

• The Lost Ogle’s Patrons and Benefactors page

• Millennials are Killing Capitalism’s personal shout outs

✏️ Contribute community content

If you have a reason to take in community contributions, that can be a subscriber perk. Ideas include classified ads, event submissions, missed connections, or comments that get republished in your newsletter. I couldn’t find many great examples (though I love Rascal’s below!)

Examples

• Rascal’s community announcements

📺️ Remove ads

If you run ads, you can offer an ad free version. One of the podcasts I listen to exclusively airs ads read by Malcolm Gladwell and I might finally pay to turn that off.

Examples

• 404 Media’s ad free tier

• The Colorado Sun’s no membership ads

👀 Behind the scenes content

Slightly more labor intensive than some of the other perks, but one of the coolest things about indie media is the behind the scenes of how it comes together. You can keep this low effort by using photos or notes you’ve already created as part of your reporting or by doing something infrequent once or twice a year.

Examples

• Tangle’s updates from the founder and insider info

• This is Hell’s “access to Chuck’s show notes”

• Barbed Wire’s virtual meetup with the staff ←these guys are brand new!

💳️ Discounts

If you have events or merch, you can offer discounts to your subscribers as a perk (you can also offer free merch but that becomes a bit of a project—story for another issue!). An underutilized perk for local news is negotiating a couple discounts with local businesses which is what LA TACO did to get their members free tacos.

Examples

• Garbage Day’s discounts on merch and events

• LA TACO’s free tacos around the city

💡 Guides, Directories and Downloads

This is a different type of paywall that can make sense if you’re creating guides or reference material readers want to access over and over. Tech reviews (like Jeremy does in Wonder Tools) and recipes (like Alison has) are good examples but this would work for any type of review content, city guides or recommendations.

Examples

• Wonder Tools’ Treasure Chest

• Alison Roman’s Access to all recipes

Our takeaway

Aim for pull not push. Make the perk something subscribers have to do (submit a question, send content) or make it an automatic setting like no ads, no paywall.

If the perk is something you have to do, make it one time (negotiating discounts) or a couple times a year (behind the scenes).

Your readers expect less than you think! Survey them to find out what’s motivating those upgrades and get creative with how you frame those benefits.