Buy Me A Coffee, a platform that allows creators to receive monetary support, share exclusive content with their fans, and sell digital downloads, is waiving its 5% fee for the month of April, for its community of 100,000 creators on the platform.
In a statement to Reclaim The Net, Buy Me A Coffee said:
“We’re making this change in April to support our creators, many of whom are gig workers, freelancers, creatives severely affected by COVID-19. Jobs and livelihoods have been impacted and we want to do what we can to help them during this time.”
Plenty of time on my hands as I’ve recently become unemployed so donate me a coffee and tell me when your birthday is and I'll send you a personalised GrumpySkeletor poem on the day! 💀👍
(Please leave email address details!) https://t.co/WVq7pabbJ8
— GrumpySkeletor (@GrumpySkeletor) March 31, 2020
Hello! While I can’t do live gigs for the foreseeable, I’ll be endeavouring to create online content and write a new show. If you’d like to support that then here’s a link but no pressure, and hope to see you on tour in the future! https://t.co/ZtkYr8ofbw
— Catherine Bohart (@CatherineBohart) March 23, 2020
I know there’s higher priorities atm, but consider supporting freelancers in your life who now cannot work, (I bought a print form my talented mate @KrisAskey).
If you listen to a podcast that has a patreon/@buymeacoffee or a local business that is open, keep them in mind! https://t.co/5sPPYzlnS3
— Ben Burrell has lost track of the days (@benburrell) March 17, 2020
Buy Me A Coffee added that it has seen a rise in coronavirus initiatives on the platform which has given it a stronger impetus to support its creators.
Not only do the changes mean that creators will earn more revenue from every donation and payment that is made through Buy Me A Coffee but the platform itself has recently been seeing higher than average growth which creates more opportunities for creators to boost their income.
Buy Me A Coffee’s founder and CEO Jijo Sunny tweeted “tipping and membership volume exploded last week.”
Awesome to see this growth across all creator platforms@buymeacoffee's tipping and membership volume exploded last week
We're planning to waive all our fees for the month of April — it's the least we could do! https://t.co/jUSFL1gOeA pic.twitter.com/08nLBoim1c
— Jijo Sunny ☕️ (@jijosunny) March 30, 2020
And Buy Me A Coffee told Reclaim The Net that its average daily sign-ups have grown by 75%, with an average of 700+ new creators signing up every day recently compared with its previous average of around 400 daily creator sign-ups.
Buy Me A Coffee’s waiving of fees and huge surge in user numbers comes as several other reports are suggesting that the fan funding market has seen significant growth over the last few weeks.
While YouTube ad revenue is down by as much as 50% for some creators and sponsored post rates are predicted to fall by as much as 25% because of the virus, fan funding through platforms such as Buy Me A Coffee appears to be an income stream where there is plenty of opportunity for growth.
