What to do when a fan is chatty, but doesn’t buy anything.
It’s so important to focus on the right customers: customers who actually buy things
We are all way too busy with work and life to spend time chatting with the wrong kinds of fans. But trust me, I have been there.
Today’s blog post is going to cover:
What my old mentality was on chatting, and how different it is ~1.5 years later
How I make sure I only focus on fans who are worth it (aka fans who actually spend money)
Where my big spender fans came from
I’m sure you’ve experienced this:
While chatting with a fan, you realize that they are particularly chatty and demanding. Their need for attention is borderline astonishing, due to the fact that they have purchased very little or absolutely nothing at all.
I’ve had thoughts like:
Do they not realize this is a business?
Do they not respect my time?
Do they think I’m enjoying this conversation sooo much, I’m happy to devote time to them for free?
Chance are, they know this is a business. However, they’re happy to push boundaries (whether it’s gently or aggressively) and get your attention for free.
At first, I gave fans the benefit of the doubt. I was new to the space! Maybe if I’m super nice to them, they’ll realize all the work I’m putting in and tip me or buy something later! Haha, I know, I know.
Fast forward one year, my attitude towards chatting has changed drastically, and coincidentally so has the amount of revenue that comes in.
My hot take on fans who don’t spend money
I chat with fans who spend $12k/month and fans who spend just a few dollars per month. After getting to about 15k free fans, I’ve had my fair share of pointless chats and whales. Here’s what I’ve learned:
Anybody who was actually willing to spend money always did so within a few days of subscribing.
They did not take weeks or months of kindness and chatting. They showed their support and desire to spend almost immediately. Think about it like this: fans who have the financial means to spoil you, impress you with money, or get off on spending money, are incentivized to do this early on. What’s the benefit of holding out? They know that the sooner they tip, the sooner they get excellent treatment.
I think we all hope that if we chat with somebody long enough, they’ll show that they were secretly a whale all along. Or, perhaps more realistically, we hope that they’ll be kind enough to return our available chattiness with a purchase or tip. I am not kidding when I say: I have never, not even once, experienced this.
No amount of sweet chatting has ever convinced somebody to go from a free subscriber to a paid subscriber, let alone a big spender. Every single person I chatted with who was willing to spend money, was willing to spend it before needing attention.
If you’re not sure if the above is true for you and your page, I welcome you to test it out! When people chat with you, start keeping track of how long it actually takes for people to spend money. Change their nickname in chat to whatever their start day is, and update a spreadsheet when they evolve from a “0 revenue fan” to a “$X revenue fan”
How to make sure you’re spending time on the fans who actually matter
To be blunt, if a fan has no intention of spending money, they are not worth my attention. Life is way too busy to spend time on fans who don’t deserve it. Here are two different methods you can use to ensure you’re spending money on the right kinds of people:
Option #1: Turn “tip to chat” on but give fans the option to tip $X to unlock lifetime chatting.
How this works: In your settings, require that fans tip you in order to chat. After turning it on, make sure to send out a mass message explaining this change & include this in your welcome message so new fans are aware.
This is, conceptually, a really fun solution. By implementing this, you’re essentially saying that the pleasure of chatting with you is worth a price. This price can be quite low, too! If you set it to $5, you’ll be able to filter out all fans who aren’t even willing to spend $5 to chat with you forever.
When I tried this, I was somewhat bewildered to realize that the fans I was spending so much time chatting with stopped replying to me, weren’t even willing to spend a few dollars to keep it going.
If you’re unsure of this approach and want to do something more gentle until you form your own conclusions about how long it takes for fans to buy something, option #2 might be better for you:
Option #2: Track user spending in their nicknames.
How this works: When new users chat with you, change their nickname to include their signup date and how much money they’ve spent so far. That means usernames in your inbox would start to look like:
[$0] [8/1] John
[$0] [8/12] Matt
[$0] [8/15] Joseph
Mentally, allow all users a specific amount of time that you’ll chat with them for free before they buy something. That time limit can be whatever you find reasonable, whether it’s one week or one month. When a fan exceeds this length and still hasn’t spent money, I gently sent this exact message:
Hi there baby :) I just wanted to let you know that I’ve really enjoyed your messages - getting to know you has been really exciting and I can tell you’re a lot of fun 🥰 I notice you haven’t purchased any of my content - which is totally ok, but I have a limited amount of time each day and want to really focus on people who deeply enjoy the things I create.
I put a lot of effort into the things I make and I feel most connected and valued by those who show they appreciate that by supporting my content ❤️ please let me know if anything changes for you - but I just wanted to give you a heads up why I’ll be replying less
It’s gentle yet honest.
If a user still doesn’t tip or buy anything after receiving this message, I changed their nickname to denote that:
❌ [$0] [8/1] John
❌ [$0] [8/12] Matt
❌ [$0] [8/15] Joseph
Then, I was aware that any time spent on these users may not be a good use of my time. Seeing it laid out like this in my inbox made it really clear visually that these fans didn’t value my time the way I hoped they did.
What’s funny is, in my earlier days of chatting I actually continued to respond to people that I marked with red x’s. And you know what? Not a single one of them ever ended up buying anything. Not one.
Remember: your time is valuable
I know it’s cliche, but it’s so true that your time is very precious. Chats can be tough to juggle emotionally because a lot of fans do spend money in chats, and chats often feel like they’re incredibly urgent. The stress of knowing that people are expecting a lovely response asap got to me too, so I 100% understand how it feels to think that every person deserves a sweet response instantly.
In reality though, I learned that the more I stressed about everybody’s chats, the less time I had to spend on way more important things like: focusing on big spenders, analyzing analytics, optimizing other parts of the business, or coming up with fun ideas to try.
Once I set boundaries within myself for how long people can go without paying and what my time is worth - I felt an immense beauty in standing up for myself, in a way. It was a great growing experience, both in this industry but also as a person ❤️