Facebook To Begin Taking Share Of Fan Subscription Revenue

As part of a wider range of announcements related to monetization at VidCon, Facebook said it plans to take a share of up to 30 percent on fan subscriptions. The change will take effect Jan. 1, 2020. The social media company began to launch fan subscriptions last year and enabled creators to charge fans $4.99 each month, according to reports.

Facebook didn’t retain subscription revenue at the time of the initial pilot period less the fee Google and Apple collected on mobile subscriptions. The company is reportedly committed to letting creators retain 70 percent of subscription revenue less “applicable taxes and fees.” As a result, Facebook won’t take a cut at the time that mobile platforms take a 30 percent fee on first-year subscriptions. But, when platforms reduce their cut to 15 percent in year two, Facebook will retain 15 percent.

The social media platform, however, will have the ability to retain 30 percent as of the beginning on desktop. By comparison, Twitch reportedly takes a 50 percent fee, while Patreon charges a 5 percent subscription fee. And YouTube is said to collect a 30 percent fee. At the same time, it was noted per reports that Facebook won’t take a share of revenue on subscribers who join prior to January.

In other news, the company noted that it is enabling creators to form exclusive subscriber groups. The report comes after it was reported in February that Facebook was launching a Fan Subscriptions feature that allows users to pay a monthly fee for access to a creator’s exclusive content. The Fan Subscriptions service began testing last year, as Facebook looks to compete with Patreon. (Earlier this year, it was reported that the latter platform has 3 million patrons that are set to pay 100,000 creators more than $500 million this year.)

Facebook expanded the test earlier in February to the U.K., Spain, Germany and Portugal, where users pay $4.99 per month to a creator for exclusive content, live videos and a profile badge to show they are a subscriber.