Paid memberships and subscriptions have become the popular business model these days in the media industry, with publishers believing quite rightly that a closer connection to readers leads to a deeper customer relationship and ultimately more sustainable revenue.
That’s certainly true at big media companies and there are also a spate of startups like Substack and Pico building out models for smaller publishers. But what if you want to build your own stack with an open-source foundation?
That’s where Ghost comes in. With Ghost 3.0 you have subscription and membership features. Ghost 3.0 allows publishers to connect the CMS directly to Stripe, which processes credit card transactions as well as Apple Pay out of the box.
What can Ghost Members be used for?
The members features in Ghost are suitable for publishers and creatives of all types, who need a reliable platform to share content and generate income from a membership business. For example:
- Premium publications - create unique content that your audience can't find anywhere else and offer premium memberships with recurring subscriptions.
- Paid newsletters - Publish to email and the web at the same time with a native email newsletter feature, or integrate with your favourite tools.
- New media - YouTube creators or Podcast producers can use Ghost to grow a list of paying members who subscribe to support their work.
- Communities - Create comments sections and communities for logged in or paid-only members to foster engagement with your work.
Ghost vs other platforms
Unlike closed platforms, Ghost is flexible, open source and stewarded by a non-profit organisation. You'll benefit from:
- No transaction fees - We're a verified Stripe partner which makes taking payments extremely secure and simple. Plus, we don't take any transaction fees. All the money you make is paid directly to you.
- Imports - It's possible to import an existing list of subscribers from anywhere. You can connect any mailing list, Patreon supporters or user database directly to any Ghost Members site.
- Integrations - Bring all your favourite tools with you and integrate them in a few minutes or less. Ghost gives you the opportunity to use your preferred tools to speed up publishing workflows.
- Open source software - All our code is released under an open source license. You own your customers, content and code always and forever. Ghost is the platform you can depend on!
