13 Reasons To Support Me At Patreon

​First of all, let's get one thing straight: there are countless ways to support me without spending money. These include borrowing my books from your local library (yes, we authors do get paid for that - no need to feel guilty!), sharing my social media posts or watching my YouTube videos.

If you're willing and able to go further, though, there's always Patreon, which allows you to support me with a monthly pledge! Here are some reasons why you might well enjoy doing that...

1) I'll give you the most time-sensitive reason first! I'm running a special offer, which sees eligible new patrons receive a specially-designed, glossy, full-colour Christmas card dedicated and signed by me - or by Jack Sparks, or indeed by any of my other fictional characters. All you have to do is pledge to support me at Patreon, at the Oh Dear God, What's That At The Window? tier or above, before 6pm GMT on Friday 9 December. Naturally, my existing eligible patrons are each getting a card too - here's how I broke the news to them the other day, in this rare example of a post that I've made public. 

2) Patreon has allowed me to foster a fun, fenced-off community, where you can get involved as little or as much as you like. I love that I can write and chat directly to my patrons, soliciting their opinions on things like YouTube video thumbnails, or posting exclusive diary entries or vlogs for them to read among lots of other exclusive content. I even tell them the odd thing that I wouldn't post on a public forum.

3) My Patreon backers who pledge at the Terrifying tier or above get an onscreen credit at the end of all my videos on the aforementioned Jason Arnopp's Terrifying House Of Obsession channel on YouTube!

4) Last summer, I got together with writer James Moran (Doctor Who, Torchwood, Spooks, Severance, lots more) to shoot a Zoom video about writing, specifically for our respective patrons. The theme we decided to cover was the difference between writing prose and scripts. The result was really interesting and often quite funny into the bargain. The video ran for 50 minutes, and remains for patrons' eyes only! You can see the video thumbnail at the top of this article, although you'd probably figured that out already. 

5) When you back me at Patreon, you achieve two truly astonishing things. You help me to support my family and to feel more secure in a bizarre and unpredictable career like writing, which if I'm honest, can often feel like feast or famine. And that means the world to me. I do my best to treat my backers like royalty!

6) Also! When you back me at Patreon, the system pings an email into my inbox AND makes a notification pop up from the Patreon app on my phone. Whichever of these I happen to see first, it gives me a real buzz of happiness and indeed surprise! It's an amazing feeling that someone wants to back you, regardless of whether they pledge £2 or £10 or £25 or even more per month.

7) When backers support me at the Terrifying tier or above (this one is £5, in case you were wondering - you can see all the tiers here), I record a personalised welcome video for them, usually while sitting at my desk, just as I do in my YouTube videos. I then upload this video to YouTube, keeping it unlisted (private), and personally send my brand new patron the link via Patreon DM. The end result looks like a YouTube video that talks to them, which tends to be a pretty fun effect!

8) My backers get to see my YouTube videos early, before the rest of the world. Sometimes, for one scheduling reason or another, this may not be possible, but I do my damndest to make sure that happens. I also often tell backers about YouTube videos I'm thinking about making. 

9) Doctor Who fans: I created a combined PDF of both parts of my Doctor Who Magazine interview with Tom Baker, which I conducted at his home in 2009. I then wrote a new foreword for the epic piece and made this available to patrons only.

10) I make a monthly vlog exclusively for my supporters, titled Walking With Patrons. At the time of writing, this series has been running for one year. 

11) I know, from my own experience of supporting people at Patreon (YouTubers like Steve Benway and Atari Archive, for instance) that it really makes me happy to back people who bring value to my life. Perhaps if I've somehow managed to bring value to yours, you might feel similarly good cheer if you support me via the Patreon route.

12) I'll often make exclusive videos for patrons only, generally off the cuff. Last summer, for instance, I attended a car boot sale for the first time since the pandemic began, and immortalised this visit with a video for patrons only. On another Sunday, I shot a video while walking from my home to Brighton train station, as an intro for the diary entries I then wrote for them on the train.

13) Every year, I send patrons at the Terrifying level or above a seaside Brighton postcard, to wherever they are in the world, to say thanks! At the next tier up, I can get my friend Jack Sparks to write the postcard for me...

You can find my Patreon page, and check out the various tiers, right here at this link. Thanks for reading!