Community Monetization Via Ads or Paid Membership - What's a Better Choice?

Natasha Jain

Natasha Jain

@iNatasha
Updated: May 14, 2025
Views: 350

We are looking to monetize our community of founders and marketers. The community has shown a steady growth over the past several months and we have some really good content. That’s when I stumbled upon the community monetization guide by Kaustubh.

Considering our audience, I’m confused between monetization via advertising and through paid memberships.

I spoke to a few members and they were against paid memberships; which is okay - because our community has been free for everyone since its inception.

Please help me decide.

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  • Kaustubh Katdare

    Kaustubh Katdare

    @kaustubh-katdare • May 14, 2025

    Great question! The decision is actually simple. If your community gets lot of traffic ( > 50,000 UVs/mo) from the first-world countries, monetization via ads is a no-brainer. The CPMs are good and you should be able to make a few thousand dollars per month to cover your expenses. Your community operates in an interesting niche and caters to a premium audience. You should be able to command good CPC from advertisers.

    The drawback of ads-based revenue is that it fluctuates with traffic.

    Paid memberships is also a great option when you have exclusive content or network. Paid membership is good option because it improves your member engagement while generating revenue for your community.

    Recommendation: Start by showing advertisements only to the guests. That will help you estimate the revenue potential of the community. Secondly, start forming a core member group and discuss the challenges of your community with them. Seek their opinion on paid memberships. Not everyone will agree; but you'll get a sense of the mood of your community.

    Hope this helps.