That means my audience can support me directly by subscribing monetarily to my channel for exclusive content, features or to just simply support me.

So if you’ve been wondering whether YouTube channel memberships are worth setting up, you’re not alone.

In this guide, I’m breaking down exactly what they are, how they work, what you’ll actually earn, and a few alternatives that might put more money in your pocket.

First Up, What Are YouTube Channel Memberships Exactly?

Channel memberships are a monthly subscription service built directly into your YouTube channel.

They give your most loyal viewers a way to financially support you on a recurring basis in exchange for exclusive benefits and special access.

When someone becomes a member, they choose from different payment tiers that you set up, each with its own unique rewards.

Think:

• Special emojis
• Member badges that show up next to their names in comments
• Access to members-only live chats
• Exclusive video content (including shorts) that non-members never see.
• Early video access
• Discord access

For example, Caleb Hammer has the most subscribed membership currently and offers:

• $9.99/month — Hammer Elite (basic perks)
• $12.99/month — Hammer Elite Support Tier (additional benefits)

When you click on “join” a light box appears with the tiers for your audience to subscribe to, you can also setup a sales video to help with conversions.

In exchange for this, YouTube takes a 30% cut.

How Do Channel Memberships Work?

To unlock channel memberships, you’ll need to meet a few criteria before you get access to this feature.

Eligibility Requirements

• 500 subscribers
• Either 3,000 watch-time hours in the last 12 months or 3 million Shorts views in the last 90 days
• Be in an eligible country
• No content marked as made for kids
• Channel in good standing
• Accepted YouTube’s partnership terms

Setting Up Your Tiers

Once you qualify, you can create up to six membership tiers, each with its own monthly price point ranging from $0.99 all the way up to $499.

You control the pricing and decide what exclusive perks each level unlocks.

In practice from my experience you’ll want to leverage 3 tiers as the optimal amount. This is actually rooted in classic pricing research called the “goldilocks effect.”

When people see three options, they anchor to the middle one as the best deal. Too few choices (just 1) and you miss audience segments. Too many (6) and decision fatigue kicks in, people freeze and don’t join at all.

Have 1 tier your budget, entry level for people who like you want to send a dollar or two your way. The middle tier is where they unlock content and the third tier should be for superfans only.

Everything Stays on YouTube (The Unique Selling Point)

One of the strongest selling points of YouTube memberships is that everything happens on-platform.

YouTube handles payment processing, member management, and all the technical infrastructure so viewers can become paying members with just a few clicks without ever leaving the site.

No external redirects, no separate payment systems, no new accounts to create.

That seamless experience typically leads to higher conversion rates compared to driving traffic to an outside platform.

How Much Will You Earn?

As I already mentioned, YouTube keeps 30% of everything you earn through memberships. So let’s run the numbers. If you price your membership at $5/month and get 100 members:

At $1,000/month in membership revenue, you’d keep around $700.

How to actually promote your memberships

Turning memberships on is the easy part. Here’s how to get people to sign-up:

1. Create a short “what members get” sales video.

Keep it 60–90 seconds, be specific about the perks on screen, tie it to why it matters for your content, and end with a direct CTA to hit Join.

YouTube lets you set this as your official membership intro video, so it plays whenever someone clicks the “Join” button, it’s essentially a free evergreen ad as you see with Caleb’s membership.

2. Mention it in your videos (duh!).

Talk about memberships in your public videos and live streams, and remind viewers they can become members by clicking Join. Not every video, but regularly.

3. Add a /join link to your video descriptions.

Add a join link to your default upload descriptions so it’s automatically there on every upload without extra effort. You can always delete it the link if you like, but it’s annoying to always manually add it in

4. Give non-members a preview

“Tomorrow, members get the full uncut Q&A, here’s a 15-second preview.”

5. Cross-promote on other platforms.

Share your memberships details casually on social media, email newsletters, and any other platform you use. Your audience exists outside of YouTube.

The key thing is to let your audience know you offer a membership and to remind them on a constant basis.

Alternatives to YouTube Channel Memberships

There are several creator-friendly platforms worth knowing about, each with a very different fee structure. This is worth knowing as a 30% fee is significant cut

Patreon (The Classic Choice)

Probably the most well-known alternative. Patreon charges new creators a 10% platform fee, significantly better than YouTube’s 30%.

You also get more control over your community, with advanced analytics and flexible content delivery.

The downside is that you have to drive your audience away from YouTube to sign up.

Ko-fi (Membership Light)

Ko-fi charges between 0–5% depending on your plan, and for just $6/month (Ko-fi Gold), you can eliminate transaction fees entirely. It lets you accept tips, sell products, offer memberships, and take custom commissions, all in one place.

Simple and creator-friendly.

Buy Me a Coffee (Donation Platform)

Built around making fan support as frictionless as possible. They charge a flat 5% on transactions with no monthly fees. It’s designed around the idea of fans sending you a small, casual tip, though this platform does support ongoing memberships.

How Much Do You Keep From Each Platform?

At $1,000/month in membership revenue, here’s what you’d actually take home after fees:

Now is this a fair comparison? A few thoughts…

First, you have to take into consideration your conversion percentages with each platform. YouTube channel memberships are built into YouTube and are easy to sign-up to when you’re logged in.

While you can technically keep more from Ko-FI and Buy Me a Coffee, your audience needs to navigate to those sites and create a separate account which is a barrier

Second, fees matter, but they’re not the only factor. Here’s a quick way to think about it:

• YouTube Memberships — Best if simplicity is your priority and your whole audience lives on YouTube
• Patreon — Best if you want deeper community tools and structured membership tiers
• Ko-fi — Best if you want flexible “support me” options (tips, products, commissions)
• Buy Me a Coffee — Best if you want casual one-off tips alongside memberships

You Don’t Need Elaborate Perks to Get Started

You can get started offering something as simple as a .99 cent subscription for access to private, members only short form content.

You also don’t even need to offer anything. You can just offer a channel membership where people who signup get emojis and priority response to comments.

Additional Things To know

1. Taxes — the $700/$870/$960 take-home figures don’t account for income tax, so just be aware.
2. Churn — Running a membership is not “set and forget.” People do cancel. You have to actively retain members (good perks, consistency) and set realistic expectations based on pricing.
3. YouTube’s 30% actually covers payment processing — Patreon’s 10% is on top of payment processing fees (~3%), so the real gap between YouTube and Patreon for example is a bit smaller than it looks.
4. You can run YouTube memberships AND Patreon/Ko-fi at the same time — There is no exclusivity rule. You can use both if you like. Just make sure to develop a unique selling point for each if you do so.

Executive Summary

Once you hit 500 subscribers and 3,000 watch-time hours, turn on YouTube channel memberships and give a go.

It’s one of the easiest ways to test whether your audience has an appetite to support you and whether there’s demand for exclusive content they’d actually pay for.

Once you know there’s real interest, you can stick with YouTube or migrate to one of the other platforms if better fees or more control matter to you.

The key is to start monetizing somewhere and start building that relationship with your most dedicated fans, rather than getting paralyzed trying to pick the perfect platform.

Till next time. Your man,

-David

From the desk of David Utke

Subj: Is Fiverr Seller Plus worth it? My honest breakdown (see my YouTube video)

I’m a top rated Fiverr seller with over 1000, 5 star reviews. But even as far as I’ve come on the platform, you always need to be learning and adapting.

So I noticed that if I wanted more detailed analytics and keywords related to my gig I needed to sign up to Fiverr Seller Plus to unlock everything.

With two tiers, standard and premium, I decided to go for the premium tier. Here is a high level overview of the difference:

Is Fiverr Seller Plus worth it?

Yes, the Seller Plus program is worth it if you’re already a seller on Fiverr making at least a few hundred dollars a month on the platform.

The primary benefits I got from the program are as follows:

1-1 coaching call with your dedicated success manager who works at Fiverr

For the low price of $49, you can get a 1-1 coaching call with someone who works at Fiverr and go over your gig.

This is a big help because they will explain to you how the algorithm works, how to analyze your keywords and take actionable steps to better improve the visibility of your gig.

It’s also useful because you now have a point of contact at Fiverr. So if there is a specific question you want help with, your dedicated success manager can be your go-to with support.

That means you don’t have to deal with generic support responses and can get clear answers in a timely fashion.

Finally, you get one 30 minute long meeting a month and you can always email your success manager with any questions, concerns or follow ups to your previous call.

I personally would suggest getting the premium tier for 1-3 months at a minimum. If you get a lot of value out of it, keep paying. But if you feel you’re ready to move on, then you can always downgrade your account and still get access to all the advanced analytics.

Advanced analytics are very helpful

This was the main reason that enticed me to sign up in the first place. When you join Fiverr Seller Plus you get access to your gig performance, top keywords and keyword research.

Keyword research is helpful for finding relevant phrases to include in your gig title as well as tags. If you’re also looking to launch new gigs, it’s useful to know what has search volume on the platform and what is converting.

Your “top keywords“ are a literal list of keywords that are driving organic traffic to your gig page. You can easily find out what keyword convert, which ones don’t and how much traffic you’re getting from each keyword.

Negative keywords allow you to stop getting traffic from phrases that are irrelevant to your gig. Depending on the gig this could be quite helpful.

One of the most annoying things about offering UX testing is buyers hitting me up and asking me if I’ll leave a paid testimonial on Amazon, Trust Pilot or Google My Business.

“Testimonials” are now one of my negative keywords.

Gig performance is a need to know

The gig performance gives you an idea as to how your gig performance stacks up to others in your overall topic. You get to see your impressions, order breakdown, coupon use breakdown, and the overall conversion rate of your gig compare to the competition.

I’m outperforming 92% of my competition so there is not much else for me to do as I’m already crushing it.

But if you saw your score was 60% or less then you know you have work to do with your sales copy and VSL.

Marketing tools help convert more sales

On both tiers you get access to marketing tools, specifically the ability to send out coupon codes which help convert gig page visitors into buyers.

• New buyer promotions: This turns on a high converting pop-up that offers a special discount to new buyers of your gig.
• Coupons for past buyers: You can also send out coupon codes to past buyers to help drive sales.
• Follow-up messages: Automatically send out a follow up message to everyone who has purchased from you.

Overall these coupon codes work at converting sales. I do find the follow up message to be a bit spammy for my liking. But if it makes sense for your gigs then go for it.

Buyer activity insights

This unlocks detailed info on prospective buyers. If you have a gig that’s open ended like web design, then knowing buyer behavior and if their a problem or not is helpful.

But overall from my experience, when I increased my prices, it reduced the amount of problem buyers. Also, this buyer metric is a “nice to have” but for my use case it does not help in any meaningful way.

Request to order

This allows you to set it so buyers must message you first before placing an order. For my gig, this is not useful at all, but if you’re offering a service like article writing, video editing or something a bit more creative where you want to send out custom quotes then this is quite helpful.

Personal automated assistant

Fiverr GO is a collection of AI assets. It’s targeted at buyers obviously, but one new addition you get access to with the Fiverr Seller Plus program, Premium tier is your personal AI assistant.

Currently what the personal assistant is, is simply a chat bot. You can train it to respond to commonly asked questions, when to pass off conversations directly to you and showcase your gig.

The assistant is aware of your availability, when your online, when it should be online, and how to act when you set your availability off (vacation or perhaps you have too many orders – always a good problem to have).

This could be a big help if you’re an individual maintaining multiple gigs for different services. But if you only have 1-3 gigs then I don’t find the AI assistant helpful yet as it’s not too hard reply to the occasional message within a 12 hour period.

It is useful though for those instances when you want to turn your availability off and not respond to messages.

Fiverr Seller Plus – yes you should sign up

Sign up to the premium tier for at least one month, sit down with someone from Fiverr and talk about your gig. Then if you want to continue with premium you can, or if you want to downgrade to standard you can also do that.

Overall I found the Seller Plus program to be very helpful for me to optimize my gig even more than it was already and to launch new gigs in different verticals.

We’re talking about sellers who were making $50K, $60K, even $100K+ per month just walking away from everything they’ve built. Like Levi Newman who made over 1.4 million from writing, just calling it a day.

As someone who’s been on Fiverr since 2017 doing my UX testing and currently does around 20-40 orders per month generating about $500-1,000k monthly, I’ve seen the platform evolve completely.

Some changes have been brutal, others necessary, but the exodus of top talent is real and there are specific reasons why it’s happening.

Let me break down exactly what’s driving these sellers away, why some of their concerns are valid, and why I’m choosing to stay despite the challenges.

How Fiverr’s Accountability System Became Overwhelming

When I started on Fiverr in 2017, things were different. Back then, you had SEO services dominating, logo designers crushing it with high volume, copywriting services thriving, and voice-over work booming.

The platform has always had some pressure built into it, you have to deliver on time, reply fast, maintain quality.

Miss a delivery date? Your gig drops in ranking.

Not reply to some spammy messages from a guys in India? Get demoted to level 1 if your reply rate drops below 90%.

It’s stressful at times, but honestly, this system also keeps us accountable and disciplined.

But here’s where things got complicated.

The top rated seller status shakeup

Originally, once you reached Top-Rated Seller status, you were basically set. It was nearly impossible to lose it unless you did something crazy.

You got massive benefits:

• Priority in search results
• Fastest reply badges
• Up to 30 gigs
• Fast payment clearance
• The prestigious “top of the platform” status

This was the holy grail every seller worked toward.

Then Fiverr changed the game. They implemented an evaluation system based on your last 60 days of performance. Suddenly, that “lifetime achievement” status became something you had to maintain.

I get why they did it, they saw too many sellers coasting on past success without current performance to back it up.

It’s also unfair to new sellers who are figuring their gig out that maybe got a few bad reviews that would always stick around.

But this change created two very different types of stress for high volume sellers:

High-Volume Sellers (not me): If you’re someone doing the agency game and delivering 250+ orders monthly, you can recover from bad reviews because the volume helps balance things out. One negative review gets diluted by dozens of positive ones.

High-Value, Low-Volume Sellers: These sellers might only do 10 orders per month, but they’re $1,000-$2,000 orders bringing in $10K-$20K monthly. For them, just two negative reviews can devastate their rating because they don’t have the volume to buffer the impact.

This created intense stress for successful sellers.

The Success Score System

Fiverr then introduced the “Success Score” system, presumably because sellers kept asking support: “Why was I demoted? How do I rank higher? What determines my placement?”

While I understand the logic, give sellers visibility into their performance metrics.

I’m not convinced this system is helping anyone’s mental health.

My success score has sat at a perma 10, with me qualifying for “top rated” status yet it never happens. I’m forever level 2 it seems no matter how effective my performance (but it’s fine because Fiverr is and has always been, a side income).

But I’ve watched other sellers obsess over their score going from 9 to 8, then panicking about losing their level status.

It’s created another layer of stress and constant monitoring that’s frankly exhausting.

When AI threatens your livelihood

Then came the biggest disruption: Generative AI in the form of ChatGPT and the like.

This absolutely decimated the copywriting and content writing niches. One of the most prominent examples was Alexandra Fasulo, a massive Fiverr seller with a huge YouTube following and Facebook community.

She quit Fiverr in 2024, citing both AI disruption and platform changes.

The writing industry, which had been one of Fiverr’s biggest categories, suddenly saw demand plummet as businesses and individuals started using AI tools for content creation.

But it wasn’t just external AI pressure. Fiverr started implementing their own AI features:

• AI Assistant for sellers
• AI creation tools for buyers
• Various AI-powered platform features

For many sellers, this felt like the platform was actively working to replace them. The message seemed to be: “We’ll help you optimize your business while simultaneously building tools that make your services obsolete.”

The reality of freelancing volatility

Let me be honest about something, freelancing is not for people who need consistency.

Since 2019 to 2014 I’ve been making a consistent $500-800 a month off Fiverr. It’s been a good, reliable side income source for me. Not something I would want to base my entire business off of however.

Just like Udemy is a marketplace for courses, Fiverr is a marketplace for services. That means organic sales without you needing to do any marketing.

But like I covered in my Fiverr Seller plus video and blog post, you need to now pay for exposure a bit on the platform. Running ads an promoting your gig, offering discounts to first time buyers, optimizing your gig every 90 days based on keywords.

This is the reality of entrepreneurship and freelancing, it’s incredibly stressful and unpredictable at one moment but also very exciting and potentially very rewarding financially.

Why Sellers Are Actually Leaving

Based on my observations and conversations with other sellers, here are the main factors driving the exodus:

1. Constant Platform Changes

Every few months, there’s a new policy, algorithm change, or feature that disrupts established business models. Sellers get tired of constantly adapting to survive.

2. Increased competition and saturation

The barrier to entry on Fiverr is incredibly low. Anyone can register and start competing. This has led to massive influxes of new sellers, often from countries with lower living costs, making it harder for established sellers to maintain their prices and market share.

3. Forced subscription costs

Many sellers feel pressured to pay for Seller Plus to stay competitive. While it offers valuable features, the increasing cost combined with the fear that canceling might hurt their business creates resentment.

4. AI disruption combined with platform AI integration

It’s a double hit, external AI tools reducing demand for human services like copywriting and graphic design, while Fiverr develops internal AI tools that could eventually replace sellers entirely.

5. Mental health and burnout

The constant pressure to maintain metrics, respond instantly, and deliver perfect work while dealing with difficult clients takes its toll. Many successful sellers simply burn out from the stress.

Why I’m choosing to stay

I’ve always used Fiverr as a side income and that’s not going to change. I’m an established seller with 1000+ 5 star reviews that provide excellent social proof, making it a “no-brainer” to hire me.

As my gig is functionally a consultation offer, I am a bit protected from AI (for now, at this rate who knows with AI)

Building a personal brand

Here’s the key insight that’s keeping me going strong: building a personal brand is more important than any platform.

When you have authority and credibility online, when people like you for you, they want to work with YOU. It doesn’t matter if it’s Instagram, YouTube, Upwork, whatever.

I send them to Fiverr because that’s where my operational infrastructure lives. Fiverr makes providing freelance and consulting services a total headache free joy. From handling communications, to order management and the deliverable.

It’s just easier for me to keep everything centralized with Fiverr instead of using various platforms.

The Opportunity in Others’ Exit

While it’s sad to see talented sellers leave, their departure creates opportunities for those who remain. Less competition means more potential orders for sellers who stay and adapt.

Diversify

Right now my gig is still going strong, but I know that it’s a mistake now to only offer a single service with a single gig. I will expand my offerings as a way to increase my reach on Fiverr and continue making $500 to $1000 USD a month (which is my personal goal with Fiverr).

The evolution you must embrace

The sellers who are struggling often haven’t adapted to how Fiverr has evolved. The platform has shifted from static images and basic descriptions to requiring:

Personal Branding

• Actual photos of yourself, not just logos
• Video introductions showing your personality
• Personal connection with buyers
• Professional presentation that builds trust

Video Content

Before, a simple image could get you orders. Now, gig videos are almost mandatory. Buyers want to see who they’re working with and hear your voice.

Authentic Communication

People are tired of getting scammed by faceless entities. They want to work with real people they can trust. This is why personal branding has become so crucial.

What’s hot right now (and what’s dying)

Understanding market trends is crucial for Fiverr success:

Still Popular:

• Social media management and marketing
• Instagram-related services
• AI-assisted services (working WITH AI, not being replaced by it)
• Video editing and content creation
• Business automation and systems

What’s Declining:

• Basic copywriting and blog writing (AI-replaceable content)
• Graphic design (Canva and AI tools handling this)
• Basic data entry and administrative tasks

My advice

Stay on Fiverr if:

You’re willing to adapt to platform changes and can handle the stress that eventually happens. My gig was once totally de-indexed for no reason back in 2020 but was quickly resolved with the help of Fiverr. I noticed this because my analytics went to zero organic visits for a week.

Then, my gig performance in terms of sales fell by 30% during the summer of 2024 due to an algorithm change. My point is that you need to be able to handle changes and deal with a lack of stability that sometimes happens.

With Fiverr everything will run smoothly for a year then something will change. You need to be willing to adapt and not be lazy.

Consider leaving if

Your services are obsolete due to AI. You’re lazy and looking for a way to make money easily by using some short cut (like AI slop in the form of writing). You’re having trouble adapting to the evolving platform requirements.

Don’t just abandon everything

If you’re a top seller considering leaving, don’t just quit and walk away. You’ve built something valuable. Consider the following:

• Automating your processes with a team
• Reducing your involvement while maintaining income
• Building systems that let the account generate passive income
• Using your Fiverr success as a launching pad for other ventures

Even if your account only generates a few thousand per month with minimal involvement, it’s still a viable income stream.

The Future of Fiverr and Freelancing

Platforms will continue evolving. AI will keep disrupting industries. Competition will remain. But there will always be demand for high-quality, personalized service from real people who can deliver results.

So deliver exceptional work, stay current with market demands, communicate professionally and authentically and position yourself as an expert, not just a service provider.

We’ll you’re in luck as I’m a top rated seller (with over 700 5 star reviews) and am going to explain why this platform is so useful for making a side income or perhaps even a full time income if you’re ambitious enough.

While I personally don’t suggest trying to make it a full time income as I’ve had numerous unfair issues with the site like my gig being accidentally deindexed for a week or dealing with the rare unreasonable buyer. Fiverr is simply not safe enough to have it be the main thing.

But if you’re looking to build a lucrative side income I can’t think of anything better than this platform. It’s a marketplace where they take care of all the annoying aspects of freelance. All you have to do is fulfill the deliverable.

What is Fiverr?

First, what is Fiverr? It’s a very popular website in the United States, but outside of the US it’s less well known. Fiverr is a freelance platform that takes care of all the technical details of getting setup like the payment processing, reviews, organic traffic, built in sales page, pricing tiers and so forth.

For the convenience and organic traffic that Fiverr provides they in turn take a 20% cut on your earnings. You should view this service fee more as a commission as Fiverr is a large marketplace and once you’re able to establish yourself on the platform, making organic sales from the platform will become the overwhelming bulk of your orders.

In fact, when I first started on Fiverr all my first 100+ first orders were strictly organic. I did no promotion what so ever. Even to this day I still get the bulk of my orders from organic traffic though my blog and YouTube channel exist as traffic sources if I wish to tap into (which I don’t, I get enough orders organically as it is).

Selling on Fiverr – My 6 Bits of Wisdom

So what are some important Fiverr selling tips to know when getting started on this platform? Here is a high level overview of what I suggest new freelancers know and understand:

1. Focus on value and your skills. Don’t be a money chaser. Do something in an area where you have some talent.
2. Make a good introduction video and write a compelling paragraph.
3. Sell your gig for cheap at first to get sales and good reviews. When starting out, you can only compete on price.
4. Build out the three tiers for your gig on Fiverr. You will make more money per sale.
5. Provide good customer service. Deliver on time, respond to messages and keep your clients happy. Download the Fiverr app to help you accomplish this.
6. Cancel gigs orders from difficult buyers or orders that are not within the scope of what you’re offering.

Focus on providing value and your skill set

Providing value means you’re a small part of a solution for someone else. You provide value by having an actual valuable skill. Perhaps that’s video editing, proof reading, you’re great on camera of have an excellent voice for narration.

Regardless, a key focus for beginners is to connect the dots between what people are needing and willing to pay for and what you can offer as a freelancer. Don’t buy into the hype of running some lazy service on Fiverr where you outsource orders to someone else or use some automated tool to do the work.

That’s not value, that’s being lazy and looking for a shortcut. Also, don’t copy. Too many beginners simply copy other successful Fiverr sellers without having the actual skill set and expertise to compete. No one wants to hire an echo of someone better so figure out what you do really well first.

My explainer video mistake

When I first started selling services on Fiverr I started off by creating explainer videos using Powtoon. I read about people reselling services on Fiverr and thought this was a way I could make money easily.

I hated it. I got a handful of orders, the buyers asked for numerous revisions, I did not have any video skill and found it unfun to constantly be editing explainer videos for clients. I made back my initial investment into Powtoon and learned a valuable lesson.

Provide value and don’t be an echo of a more popular creator. We all have different experiences and skills, so focus on what you know how to do that other people don’t and would be willing to pay you. This sometimes takes a few months of trial and error, but it’s the process everyone goes through.

Pick a good account name

If you have some idea what you want to sell on Fiverr go ahead and create an account. Please note that you can not change your Fiverr user name. So whatever username you create that’s the one you’re stuck with.

Again, the username is not a big deal for buyers as long as it’s not silly or borderline inappropriate. If you already created an account to buy services and you went with a goofy user name like kittycatsocks67, then yes you’ll want to make a new account with a better name.

Make a good introduction video and paragraph

Part of your gig page within your profile on Fiverr allows you to set a quick service introduction video. You absolutely need to create a video as it will directly increase sales by 20% or more. For your video you’ll want to record with a proper mirrorless camera and a quality microphone.

You can get by with an iPhone as well, but do your best to improve the audio quality to make it professional sounding. There are plenty of cheap microphones for iPhones that can help with this. We know that not everyone want’s to make video, but with any sales page it’s simply required today.

Your gig’s organic reach is influenced by many aspects, one aspect is your conversion rate (which you can actually see). By having a good description free of errors and a compelling video your gig should be converting visitors into buyers.

Create a Sales Video

Your sales video is extremely important at helping drive sales. My first video was very mediocre, it was recorded with a point and shoot and shoot camera with below average sound and I was quite awkward on camera.

A few years latter I redid the video (because I then started making YouTube videos and built up the skill) and noticed a big spike in orders with a more professional looking and sounding video. For recording your video, step back and write out a simple 1 minute script:

• Introduce yourself.
• Explain why you have the authority to offer this gig.
• Use language that connects with your audience to show that you understand the problem they have.
• Explain how you can help solve it.

Please note that Fiverr does have specific video requirements, one being that the video has to be a small file size. So don’t record anything in 4k or even 1080P. 720P is just fine for Fiverr.

Sales paragraph

This paragraph should quickly outline the value of your gig, what clear benefits people get from purchasing from you, what to expect if they do decide to make a purchase decision and to leverage bullet points, bolded text and to highlight important sentences.

You don’t want to overdo it with the text but in general you’ll want to have an introduction paragraph that’s followed by bullet points and a conclusion paragraph. If it’s important for buyers to contact you first then bold that at the top or bottom of your paragraph.

Create an FAQ

Last, create an FAQ overtime with your gig where you genuinely answer frequently asked questions. Not only does this help reduce the amount of messages you get, it provides another spot for you to emphasis important aspects of your gig as well as your experience.

Sell your gig for cheap at first

As a brand new Fiverr seller with no reviews and no history the only thing you can compete on is price. Yes, no one want’s to work for $4 per gig order (after Fiverr takes their cut) but it’s required in order to build up momentum.

What’s excellent about Fiverr however is that they want talented people on the platform, they want to promote new up and coming sellers. So help your gig and your profile by providing outstanding service for cheap and focus on getting reviews and honing your gig to fit perfectly with what people want.

You may even get labeled as a “rising star” on Fiverr which will help your new gig standout so you can make that transition from a beginner to a solid, established level 2 seller. Once you start getting organic sales on a regular basis , have a solid 30+ reviews and hit level 2 status, then consider increasing your price point.

Have 3 pricing points for your gig

While years ago Fiverr only allows sellers to sell gigs at a $5 price point, Fiverr now allows sellers to price their services at multiples of $5 as well as the ability to set tiers for your gig.

Take advantage of this and come up with three pricing points to offer your potential buyers. On Fiverr there are numerous companies and professionals who can, and are willing to pay for quality work. By providing multiple tiers, you’re able to make much more money and provide more value and flexibility to your buyers.

Each tier should have a clear description of what the service that is being provide is exactly and how it is different from your other price points.

Provide good customer service (really)

As part of your Fiverr profile you’ll have different metrics which influence how much exposure your gig receives such as sales, reviews, repeat buyers, replying to messages and so forth. As such, providing good customer service and replying to messages promptly is a required aspect of being on Fiverr.

I suggest you download the Fiverr App to your phone as when you receive a new message you can reply right away or mark it as spam. If you fail to reply to less than 90% of your messages in a month what happens is that your profile will be demoted a level.

Levels are not actually that important, what’s more important is to make sure your metrics are good. That way you’re happy, Fiverr is happy and your customers are happy. Fiverr will be less inclined to put a low performing gig in front of an audience so reply to your messages.

Cancel gig orders from difficult buyers

Simply put, some buyers are ridiculous and expect the world for cheap. Instead of dealing with difficult people simply cancel the order. Even if you provided excellent service and the buyer is proving difficult, cut your losses and cancel.

Difficult people won’t leave good reviews and are not worth working with. Also cancel orders that are not inline with what your gig is about. For example, you have a proof reading gig from a non-native speaker where they more need you to do a total rewrite of their paper.

Do Fiverr levels matter?

From my experience Fiverr levels don’t matter in terms of organic exposure on the platform. They become more important if you transition from being a solo creator on the platform to building out a small team of people where you’re managing multiple gigs.

Higher levels can have more gigs available so if your business is based on Fiverr, being demoted a level for a month (the typical punishment) can often result in you needing to turn of one of your gigs. But if you’re selling 3 or 4 gigs then it does not matter.

Fiverr cares about making money and will promote gigs that have good metrics and a good conversion rate. Instead of worrying about your level, focus instead on your metrics like your gig conversion rate, your feedback and various ways to incrementally improve your gig.

Contact support and join the forum

Fiverr provides a ticket support system. In any dispute they will side with the buyer over the seller, even if the buyer is being unreasonable. Fiverr support otherwise is helpful and replies to messages within 24 hours.

If you have any issue with your gig, perhaps another seller copied you and you want to report them or a buyer order from you and wants you to do a service that is outside of what you provide then reach out to support.

Last, Fiverr has a helpful forum which you can join to interact with other buyers and sellers.

Selling on Fiverr Conclusion

Fiverr has proven to be a reliable, lucrative side income for me. I don’t have to do any sort of marketing or promotion, I don’t need to follow up with clients on payment, I don’t need to worry about social proof because my 700+ 5 star reviews speak for themselves.

If you’ve been thinking about getting started selling on Fiverr then do it. Think about your skill set and what people want. Create a gig, sales video and quality paragraph selling your gig. It takes time to build up your profile but long term it is worth it.