The inner circle... you


#1

We’re starting a new experiment… using Patreon.com to test one way of covering our fixed overhead: hosting.

I’m reaching out to you… the inner circle around our campfire… to ask you to become, at least temporarily, one of our first patrons.

The social proof to new-comers of having a few patrons will make a big difference as we share our experiment with the world.

Click here to become a Patron today!


#2

Now go burn all your gannt charts. — nice touch!


#3

@chrismurman gets the credit for that!!!


#4

It’s cool. I laughed.

Now to include it on future podcasts and give people a chance to put their money where their hearts are.
:smile:


#5

For the sake of transparency… would it be possible in the future to expose the income from Patreon compared to the expenses it covers? I think people like myself will ignore this call (we’re new, and it was touted as free) unless we know that not paying a few bucks here and there are going to lead to a loss of community value/existence.


#6

Andy,
I appreciate the invitation but I’m not able to help out financially at the moment. Hopefully that will change soon and I’ll be able to jump on.
James


#7

Absolutely! We’ll share what we have documented vis a vis expenses to show this isn’t a cash grab.

To everyone reading…our goal is and always will be to be a FREE community. There will be NO DIFFERENCE IN EXPERIENCE between those who contribute with those who don’t, this is merely an experiment we’re trying to see if there’s interest for others to contribute. Please do not feel obligated to chip in, but if you’d like to we will gladly accept.


#8

Thank you @kschlabach and @pascal8888 for your direct and honest feedback. And @bradstokes for your $5.

This community is and always will be free. Full stop.

Patreon is an experiment, and yes, we will plan to make all things visible… exposing the income vs expenses.

To date, our income is $10.

Re our expenses: I’ll work on getting things tallied up. The Board has been covering the cost of hosting services out of our businesses and our pockets. Which was fine for year one to see if this crazy idea of ours might have legs.

As we head into year two, we want to explore various options for sustainability. And we don’t have a map…

We’re making things up as we go… and Patreon is one of our experiments. It is very flexible, and supporters can contribute one time, on going, any amount, from $1 on up.

We’ll be adding a “become a patron” link to our podcast show notes and see what happens via our listening audience. Kind of like National Public Radio…


#9

Thanks for the quick responses… for me personally, I have TRUST in this group, but to ENTICE me to support with my wallet, the transparency would help (as I try to put that money into charity, etc first).


#10

@andycleff Gracias a ti. I was appreciative I could contribute. I definitely get way more value than the very little bit I’m giving.

@kschlabach I literally asked for this. I wanted a way to give back to the organization that supports me. I don’t expect anything more than I already get. I love the voice that you have on the boards and hope to keep talking with you here.

The coalition runs at around 2.5 - 3k downloads per episode. Ryan Ripley of Agile for Humans recently did a podcast looking at founding a podcasts. One of the things that came up was at 2000 to 3000 listeners, most podcasts have a hard time to attract sponsorship as most sponsors are looking for 5k listeners or greater.

The upshot of this is the costs are slowly growing, but the funds to support the podcasts can’t come in. I like the fact that I don’t have to listen to another ad about Made Fresh, Casper Mattresses or Square Space. At the same time, I don’t want this place to go away because it becomes a burden to members of the board.

@pascal8888 I wouldn’t sweat it. We do what we can. I just appreciate having you here in order to talk to and the insight you provide.

All in all thank you all for making this place as special as it is.


#11

Hey, friends and family focus group time…

The minimum donation via Patreon is $1/month
We set another tier at $5/month, for which we offer “Swag” - (what that swag is will tbd… stickers, t-shirts, caps… etc)
(And we have a third for companies that might want to sponsor a full podcast and get pre-roll shout outs)

How do you respond to the following CTA’s? Any resonate more than another?

  1. Help by becoming a patron and supporting the Agile Uprising for as little as $0.03 / day!
  2. Help by becoming a patron and supporting the Agile Uprising for less than a cuppa coffee a month (and get some great swag to boot)
  3. Help by becoming a patron and supporting the Agile Uprising for less than $0.17 a month (and get some great swag to boot)

#12

I’d suggest you go down the Radiotopia path and do more levels. Their fall campaign can be seen at https://commitchange.com/nonprofits/4341/campaigns/1908. But basically people could step up to the levels they want.

$3 = some stickers
$6 = A set of experiment cards or something similar
$15 = A shirt. Although I strongly suggest reworking the design. The current yellow on black isn’t great for wearing out.
$30 = half an hour with one of the board members discussing a current issue
$45 = all of the above + a follow up call x months later

And none of the 3 above resonate with me. I’m more interested in the why. Some of the info I put above would be useful.

I’d also suggest that whatever “swag” you come up with is thrown into an online store. You don’t need to reference it all the time, but it might be a convenient way of people giving you money without needing to subscribe.

The other thing to note is support levels very from podcast to podcast, but Roman Mars stated that 99 Percent invisible gets 8 subscriptions per 10,000 listeners. Hopefully we have better returns.


#13

Swagging it up!


Christmas is here


#14

You have better swag than most of us…lol


#15

What @bradstokes has is, i assume, “AU Company Issue Swag”…

A little thank you for his Patreon support… that arrived via USPS to down under in record time…


#16

Lol. It isn’t just me. My daughter, son and partner’s pc now also bear the stickers. It was appreciated.

Thanks guys