Bi-annual Shareholder's Report #003: 20-21 Financial Year (Patreon)

Every six months I try to share some insight and updates into how your support helps me run the YouTube channel and its overall financial position. I actually love writing these breakdowns and reflecting on the business, because I believe being introspective in always worthwhile. I made this YouTube channel in April 2018 to promote my DriveThruRPG products, then launched this Patreon in May 2020 – it's come a long way, but there's still a lot further to go.

Some changes compared to previous reports is how I'll be timing releases with the Australian financial year from now on so it tracks better with my record-keeping. This means we'll have one partial report covering the 1st of July to the 31st of January, then a complete financial year report that covers the 1st of July to the 30th of June. I've also converted all currency to AUD rather than keeping it half-half with USD.

Goal results from Shareholder's Report #002

First, let's look at the goals I had from last time.

I think a focus in this immediate period coming up is to overhaul the channel's branding and visual style. I want to commission some great background art for videos. I want a new logo. I want new graphics, stream overlays, banners. I want to subscribe to image libraries, license art properly and elevate this whole operation.

The general visual aesthetic of the videos went through a few little transformations before I went on break, and it's become something I'm pretty happy with. I tried using a commissioned background illustration, but when the set was divorced from a realistic location, it felt kind of soulless and made me reconsider the green screen altogether. So I've leant into my lighting and camera setup to use the green screen less. On the art side, I'm now 100% on the level for licensing art and having permission to use all the stock art in videos.

That transformation also applies to Patreon. I've put a little bit of thought into how these PDFs look, but I want to make this a complete overhaul. That's why I've got these calligraphers, that's why I want to hire a dedicated cartographer, that's why I want to hire multiple writers.

I haven't hired a cartographer. I found someone I want to work with, but production never really progressed to a point I could get to pumping out battlemaps. The only area where outsourcing Patreon content really took off was with the writing — our mate Randall Right absolutely slayed a bunch of content this year. Some of the PDFs released this year are the best things we've got on Patreon, but overall I'm not satisfied with how I've progressed towards the Patreon content and the release schedule I want, so I need to refresh and refocus. Though I'm so stoked with Randall's work on the project we've worked on together and looking forward to making more stuff together.

If I lean into streaming more, I also want to fix the whole setup. It just looks awful at the moment. Literally the worst Twitch channel in the world. This would mean picking up a desk mount for my mic, a dedicated mirrorless camera instead of a webcam, maybe wall-mounting a light, commissioning art and music.

This goal has been 100% met and was totally worthwhile. I have a DSLR as a webcam. The lighting is rad. I just got a top-down camera sorted. And sometimes my wife joins and we have good fun. Even though hardly anybody follows the Twitch channel, I'm so happy with the livestreams – I'm streaming three times a week at the moment at https://www.twitch.tv/matthewperkinsdm. I'm having so much fun!

And lastly, I wanted to talk about my team and why I pay our mods. On Discord we have three mods: Luke who will be running games for Patrons in the future, Gabby who is our dedicated welcoming committee and community event manager, and mistershifty who captains our Street Team, the people who promote video links out there on social media. The mods keep me from getting overwhelmed, and even though I'm only paying them a nominal fee, it's my way of buying them a few beers every month for the vital work they do.

Trying to build a team and personnel infrastructure around the community was a good idea that hasn't exactly paid off yet. But that's no foul or shade to any of the team, we had a good crack at it. I'm planning to step up personally and see what I can get accomplished by giving direct attention to a couple areas, shake the tree, see what comes out.

Revenue 1st of July 2020 to the 30th of June 2021

Patreon is still the top revenue source – I don't think that will ever change – but even then, it took a massive leap with the tier restructure. YouTube also took a massive leap because I've started running mid-roll ads and have been paid for SIX sponsored videos these last 12 months (though I still have three to make for dScryb). There's also my freelance work which I'm including here because they were contracts I landed through my YouTube reputation. And lastly: some people have started directly donating, so let's give those kind folks a mention too. (Reminder: this is the revenue over 12 months, not 6 months like last report.)

• Patreon AU$11231.23
• Youtube AU$2270.07
• DriveThruRPG AU$2485.50
• Freelance Work AU$1236.18
• Direct Donations AU$31.87
• TOTAL REVENUE: AU$17254.85

Expenses 1st of July 2020 to the 30th of June 2021

I definitely missed some things in this, but I reckon this is 90% OK. I've got a tax deductions app for tracking this throughout the 21-22 financial year which should help. One of the goals was to outsource more, so I'm happy there's over $1000 spent on hiring help. There's a bunch of recurring subscriptions and licenses, some gear upgrades and a few beers from when we hit 5k subscribers. (Reminder: this is the expenses over 12 months, not 6 months like last report.)

• 5000 subscribers celebration (thanks!) -AU$83
• Artist Commissions -AU$598.00
• Bank fees -AU$24
• Calligraphy  -AU$30.00
• Computer Monitor + Gear -AU$574.82
• Contest Prizes -AU$281.20
• D&D Beyond -AU$381.44
• D&D props (potions) -AU$156
• Desk Storage -AU$34
• Discord Boost -AU$133.64
• Discord Bot -AU$143.26
• DriveThruRPG Purchases -AU$48.77
• Foundry License -AU$64.75
• Green Screen -AU$239.00
• Hiring Proofreader -AU$210.00
• Ikea boxes for storage -AU$34
• Imac repair -AU$179
• Imac upgrade -AU$600
• License Creative Market Assets -AU$87.12
• Minecraft server test -AU$24
• Moderator Fees -AU$168.72
• Mug Prop -AU$130.00
• NPNP Shirts -AU$61.82
• NPNP hosting and licensing -US$200
• Office Supplies -AU$35.83
• SEO Consultant -AU$94.13
• Shutterstock License -AU$239.00
• Soundproofing blankets -AU$63.6
• Spotify premium -AU$36
• Stardew Valley on iPad (a moment of weakness) -AU$7.99
• Steam games for streams -AU$47.49
• The War of Art (a self-help book) -AU$24.14
• TubeBuddy -AU$36.15
• Video Editing -AU$100.00
• Website Domain -AU$29.70
• Website Squarespace Host -AU$211.20
• Writer Commissions -AU$617.00
• Yeti X Pro Microphone -AU$298
• Zoom Subscription -AU$221.73
• TOTAL EXPENSES: -AU$6549

Future goals

Spend more money. I still need to spend more money! Patreon was already earning more than my overall operation was spending, but it's grown even more since last report and is sitting well beyond my expenses. Spending money doesn't fix every problem, but there's still some headroom where smarter spending could make things easier.

Though I will say: I've learned a strange lesson about outsourcing. I thought by paying someone else to do a task, that would mean it would be significantly less effort than if I had done it myself. But that hasn't proved the case across the board. In a few instances, continual revisions or writing briefs or reworking content means sometimes I'm still putting in 50% effort into a task. I need to put attention into the way I approach admin, organisation and communication to be a better leader.

So far I haven't taken any money from this little side-business for my personal life over the last three years, but given that I'm struggling to spend all the channel's earnings, I should consider paying myself for my work. If I end up doing this, it would take the shape of keeping a year's worth of channel expenses in a business kitty, then taking any overflow home. But I'm not really sure yet and would have to look into it.

Do more for Patreon. Patreon's my base, so I'll always push for more quality and never be satisfied, but even with that conceit: I should do more. The only aspect of Patreon releases which is 100% locked in is The Pea Pod once a month (which I LOVE doing). But for the other three weeks, I'd like to have set content. As I'm imagining it currently, this could be one big PDF (5+ pages), one small PDF or playable content (2 pages) and one early video. But this is something I need feedback on, so I'll be running a Patreon survey in October to determine which content people actually use, which stuff they don't care about.

Do more for YouTube. I've said it before, but: I need to make weekly videos. This will require an attitude adjustment. After I blitz the SKT guides, maybe this could take the shape of a rotation of a DM Guide (which is high-effort), a Table Talk (which is low-effort), an &Design (which is high-effort), and then a Patreon-suggested video (which is medium-effort).

Hit ten thousand subscribers. The Victorian government has arts grants specifically allocated for YouTubers with over 10,000 subscribers. I want one! I'd need to hit that goal and then write a proposal for a big project, though I have no ideas yet. To hit that goal this year, my channel would need to perform 50% better than it currently is, but I reckon that's actually kind of possible.

Meet people. PAX Australia was meant to be a massive networking event, but it got cancelled due to you-know-what. I've made some really special online connections with other content creators this year, and I'd like to chase that rabbit and see where meaningful professional relationships can lead.

Future expenses

In order of priority, here are some things I could see myself spending money on over the next 12 months:

• [DONE] Captions for every new video, gradually working through the back-catalogue of older videos.
• Like a hundred commissioned Twitch & Discord icons and emotes.
• High-definition animations for Ror, Twitch alerts and YouTube lower-thirds.
• [DONE] DSLR upgrade (which would let me use my old Canon EOS M50 to replace my smartphone top-down camera).
• Mic upgrade from USB mic to proper XLR and mixer setup (though I know absolutely nothing about the world of microphones).
• Commissioned & licensed battlemaps for Patreon.
• Website development with a storefront for purchasing individual PDFs.
• Merch? A Ror plushie? I don't know.
• [DONE] A gaming PC for streams? Probably not. That's a bad idea. Yeah that's a very bad idea. I shouldn't do this.

Questions? Comments?

I'm an open book about this kind of thing, so please feel free to hit me with any questions, comments, suggestions below. I hope this kind of financial stuff is at all interesting to you – I figure you're a huge part of this operation, so you should have as much information as possible.

Cheers everybody!