This season, Patreon is checking some big things off your wish list

In recent years, creators have seen the largest bump in paid membership sign-ups between November and January. Whether it’s the giving spirit or the new-year-new-me mentality, many creators end up growing their communities and earnings thanks to this “holiday boost.”

This year, creators can accelerate this bump and celebrate the holiday season with new festive features like membership gifting and discounts.

Three ways creators and fans can give this holiday season:

1. Fans can give a gift to anyone

Members often tell us they want to gift someone in their lives a membership to a creator they already know, love, and subscribe to themselves. For them, a membership isn’t just a thoughtful gift, it’s also a way to share their favorite creators with their favorite people. With gifting, they can now introduce friends, family, and fellow fans to new work or upgrade an existing free member’s experience to paid. It’s a powerful way for the people who love a creator most to support their work and help them grow their communities.

2. Creators can give a gift to their fans

Fans aren’t the only ones who have been asking for gifting. This feature has been on creators’ wish lists for years, too. Earlier this year, we announced we were testing creators' ability to gift memberships to their fans. We’re excited to share that all eligible creators now have access. This means creators can grow their communities by giving fans complimentary memberships to their own Patreon. It’s the perfect “thank you” to fans for being a dedicated part of their community on social media, and it gives fans a way to try out Patreon for a month before committing. Once they get a taste of creators’ exclusive work and communities, it may even increase the chances of them staying on after the gifted period is over.

3. Creators can treat new fans to a discount

For even more ways to grow, creators can also now incentivize fans and free members to become paying members with membership discounts. Whether creators set up limited-time holiday sales for all visitors or surprise specific groups with private discount codes, fans can now join a creator’s Patreon community at a more accessible price.

Re:animated, a video reaction channel, used a combination of gifting and discounts to drive conversions ahead of the holiday season. First, Re:animated gifted five lucky fans a free month of membership, and then they also set a limited-time 40% off discount which they promoted across their social media channels and on Patreon. After a week of running the promotion, they saw a boost in new paid members who redeemed the offer to join.

All of these new features are available starting today for eligible creators and can be found in the Promotions tab.

Give the gift of community

Deepening connections with real fans is the key to building sustainable creative businesses. But first, creators need to have a direct line to those fans. With a holiday sale or gifted membership, they now have more ways to strengthen their relationships with their communities. Fans can discover creators’ work and get that extra nudge they need to finally become a member of their favorite creator’s Patreon.