I created a free tool. How to get sponsors now?
Hey there, indie hackers!
That's my first time posting here, and I'm excited to share with you what I've been building.
But as the title says, I also need some advice from you guys.
So, I've collected a bunch of bookmarks over the last years: tools, assets, learning platforms, you name it. I'm utterly interested in self-improvement, so I'm always hyped when I find something useful.
At some point my bookmarks got messy, and I wanted other people to also know about all these things I found.
So I created Dev Resources (https://devresourc.es).
That's my first indie project, and I'm loving the feedback I'm getting from fellow devs. Knowing that they are finding useful sites from the lists I created is the "mission accomplished" feeling I was looking for.
But another part of this story is that I quit my full-time front-end job back in August, due to burnout + lack of interest in the project. Since then, I'm focusing on DR and learning all the things related to indie hacking.
And I couldn't be happier.
But time has come for me to think again about making some money.
Apart from adding some referral links, which have not generated any income yet, and Patreon supporters (currently 1), I'm thinking of trying the sponsorship type of income.
Here lie my questions: when to go for it? How much to ask for? What will they expect from me?
I have zero experience in doing that, so any feedback from you guys is much appreciated.
Thank you!
Side note: I'm working on making the resources list of DR open-source and available through a public API, and it should be ready in the next days, so if you're interested in contributing, you can find me on Twitter as @marcelcruz for updates on that.
First off, that's a beautiful site, you should be proud!
TL;DR: Focus on corporations and other avenues for revenue rather than individuals (upselling, affiliates, gating content). Increase your sponsorship amounts, show value via traffic stats and the type of audience that you've gathered and be proactive in reaching out.
If you are going for individuals, you'll get more engagement with a polite "would you consider sponsoring the site" after answering any personal questions/support emails.
Possibly an occasional content spot: "Your Product Here" with a CTA.
----
Being realistic: temper your expectations about making IndieHacker-level money from individuals for free/open source content. I'm a developer for AnkiDroid. We have got ~2MM users, app is 4.9 stars and we're making ~$20k annually (amounting to just under ~$400/m personally from a few revenue sources). It's awesome and extremely fulfilling that a project I took on as a hobby could eventually pay rent, but it will be unlikely to get me anywhere near the salary I would working at a FAANG/having an SaaS.
Compare your website to a lot of similar products: https://opencollective.com/discover?show=open source and you'll see that most are making money from corporate sponsorships, rather than individual donations. A few sponsorship slots on a website or GitHub readme can work into a company's marketing budget, rather than their altruism budget, and that appears to massively improves conversions.
Upselling, affiliates or gating content until a certain subscriber count appears to be a much more effective use of time than focusing on individuals. You might find this article to be useful: https://calebporzio.com/i-just-hit-dollar-100000yr-on-github-sponsors-heres-how-i-did-it
For money: GitHub Sponsors currently charges 0 fees, and appeals more to a tech-focused audience. OnlySponsors is fairly new on the market (haven't tried it personally, I believe it's 0 fees), but that feels like the style of content that would drive engagement and sponsors. Don't expect internal discoverability on GitHub sponsors unless your project is a widely used open source dependency.
Do add a
FUNDING.ymlto your GitHub if you do open source your work.Being on Patreon as a dev is a little different than as an artist - most of your work is visible externally, so there's a lot less pressure to produce posts - the main reason you'll want them is for free SEO, both from Google, and Patreon's search functionality. Feature/content voting works well as a monthly check-in with subscribers.
Your current tag line in Patreon won't get you any drive-by donations unless they already know what "Dev Resources" is. See if you can update it.
I found that gating content (open source, selling the builds) for a specific niche got me around ~$50/m on my Patreon. I could improve this further, but I'd rather be providing value for the community.
You might also want a tip-jar style website for one-off donations, rather than recurring revenue (I know - recurring is much better, but people are more happy to part with a one-time tip).
----
The above is a bit of an information dump rather than a cohesive narrative. Take what works for you, experiment and discard the rest.
What I'm using (feedback welcome):
GitHub
GitHub Sponsors
Open Collective
Patreon
First of all, thank you so much for this answer, David. I can see you really investigated my situation and gave me a thorough and honest answer. 🙏
I have to agree with everything you say, shooting for big corps might be a better choice, as they will have more power to sponsor and can benefit from me featuring their brand.
I'm working on making the resources list open-source and available through a public API, and hopefully this will attract people to collaborate on the project, resulting in more traffic and visibility.
I'll seriously consider moving to a one-time donation format for individuals, as it seems more reasonable to expect them to do it once for the appreciation of my work instead of committing to a monthly bill.
Amazing answer David, it gave me a lot of good ideas and motivation. Thank you once again, and best of luck with your projects. Give me a shout whenever you need something. 🤘