Sales from gifts has increased 250% at Patreon since November 2024. Marketing SVP Mike McGarry discusses Patreon’s marketing point-of-view and holiday campaign.
Last-minute holiday shoppers often buy gift cards for convenience and as a safe gifting bet. But these gifts lack personalization and contribute to the consumerism craze, said Mike McGarry, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Patreon.
This is the message behind Patreon’s first-ever holiday gifting campaign, “Santa Hates Patreon,” which positions the content subscription platform as a thoughtful, personalized gift, McGarry said. The edgy video ad portrays Santa as a mob boss, venting about people giving Patreon subscriptions instead of physical gifts.
“A lot of those (gifts) just say, ‘Oh, you might like something in this retailer on their website,’” McGarry said. “But when you’re giving the gift of Patreon, it’s saying, ‘I know that you have a deep fandom for this creator and I’m going to give you the gift of the opportunity to get to know them deeper by becoming a part of their Patreon community.’”
Patreon allows consumers to buy a subscription to content from creators, such as YouTubers, comedians, artists, podcaster and writers. The content creators then give the subscribers benefits, such as exclusive content or early access to content or products. The concept is similar to its competitor Substack.
Patreon has more than 10 million members who pay for a membership each month, and 100 million consumers who have a free membership, according to its website. Plus, about 300,000 creators are on the platform.
Patreon Launches Gifting
The platform soft launched a gifting tool in June 2024 before fully rolling it out for the 2024 holiday season. Patreon gave its creators resources about the tool and encouraged them to promote the idea of gifting a subscription to their communities.
“It was a big hit,” McGarry said about the gifting tool. “Creators have wanted it for a while. Fans have wanted it for a while. It was very successful last year, hence why we’re doubling down with a more robust 360 campaign this year.”
In fact, since November 2024, revenue from gifts has increased 250%, Patreon said. And as the 2025 holiday season approached, gifting sales increased 50% in November 2025 compared to October 2025, the brand said.
Patreon’s Gifting Goals
The holiday video ad campaign launched Dec. 1. It took about six weeks to develop from a “kernel of an idea” to on air, McGarry said. Patreon tapped creators on its own platform, comedians Stavros “Stavvy” Halkias and Daniel Thrasher to create and produce the ad. These comedians have their own large followings and are promoting the ad as well.
“We’re looking to 2X what we did last year,” McGarry said.
So far the campaign has been well received based on chatter it’s heard from creators and on social media, he said. Patreon will measure the successes of the campaign based on the number of gifts given as the ultimate goal, as well as engagement with the video, non-skip video views, video completion and social media sentiment.
“You probably had to be familiar with Patreon to give it as a gift. So that’s a little bit like mid-funnel,” McGarry said. “We are also seeing some strong signals that this is doing a good job of perking people up to say, ‘Oh, what is this Patreon thing? I want to go check out what Patreon’s all about.'”
It will measure that through signals such as an increase in free membership, subscriptions and increases in search traffic and web traffic.
Gift Recipients Stick Around
Creators on Patreon’s platform can see in their backend who received a subscription as a gift and can market to them in a different way, if they so chose. Many of the creators who generated a lot of gift subscribers last year are running mini-marketing campaigns promoting the gifting feature this year, McGarry said. That’s because the tool is working to acquire new customers who end up sticking around.
“It is proven to be a driver of subscriptions well beyond the gifting,” he said. “A lot of those fans that come on end up sticking around. … The reason for that is people are giving it when they know that someone is a super fan of a certain creator; it’s not just arbitrary. It’s like a one-to-one gift where I’m going on and I’m deciding what creator is right for this person.”
Patreon’s Marketing Point of View
Like it did with the holiday ad, Patreon likes to tap into creators on its own platform when the brand creates a marketing campaign.
“We’re coming with kernels of insights and truly co-creating with creators from the ground up, which leads to work that is disruptive and resonates with our audiences,” McGarry said.
Not only do creators understand the target market and are creative, they also bring the human element that a number of marketing initiatives are losing, he said.
“There’s a lot of conversation that is going in completely in one direction, and a lot of marketers are leaving behind the power of human connection,” he said.
The platform also aims to move quickly, or “at the speed of culture” as marketers say. This means that the brand shuns months-long production cycles and aims to execute ideas quickly after inception and is open to adapting on the fly.
“If you are truly creator first, you can go do ideas that things like AI could never think about,” he said. “By partnering with creators to execute them, you can get speed as well.”
Hopping on Joe Budden’s Blunder
One recent example of a speedy launch was when former rapper and now podcaster Joe Budden accidently revealed how much he generated in revenue per month on the Patreon platform. It was roughly $1 million each month for eight months. Patreon jumped on the social buzz its brand was already getting in the market and launched the campaign “Own Your Ship.”
Patreon purchased billboards and had Budden talk to the media, including a feature in “The New York Times,” owning up to his earnings.
“His earnings were out there; it was a mistake,” McGarry said. “But then turn that into a campaign where he was talking about, ‘No, no, no. This is the type of money that you can create if you are building your own media empire versus renting through traditional means.’”
