Transcription
[Music] Hello and welcome to school news. Yes. So today we're going to talk about hidden fees and specifically how different platforms hide their fees. And we're going to show you how like Kajjabi present themselves as 0% but they're actually 5% fees. Yep. We're even going to show you an ad where they say that you keep 100%. It's juicy. Yep. Juicy episode.
Um, how a lot of people think it's three, but it's actually 13%. Yep. Circle, it's not two, it's actually seven. And Patreon is not 10, it's 14. And then school is just actually 2.9 if you're on the $99 plan. Yep.
Um, and I'm going to show you basically what's going on here. It's quite interesting. So, pricing pages, how different companies show their fees. So, here's Kajjabi's pricing page. And if you scroll down and you click on like sales, you can see transaction fee says 0%. Right? So you're like, "Oh, Kajjabi just don't charge me anything." Yep. And then you know, here's circles pricing page. And if you scroll down and you click on this, oh, it's only like 2%. Yes. And you hover over this, it's like in addition to Stripe processing fees. Yeah. But and then you know, same thing on Kajjabi's one. If you like scroll right down and then you look at like does Kajjabi take a cut of my revenue unlike our competitors, we charge you more. Um, so if you go in here and then you know, you read all this fine print and then you click on this, which no one does by the way or very and then you see all the fees that start to add up. It's like 2.9 plus this plus this plus this, you know. Yeah. So, it's definitely not 0%. Yep. It's and it's definitely not 2%.
Um, and this is kind of the norm honestly where it's like you just show what fee you're taking as the platform, which in circles cases too, Kajjabi's case is like zero. Yes. But you're not showing what the actual transaction fees are. Yeah. And the lame thing about this is with us, we show what our transaction fee is, 2.9%. But this is all it actually is. This isn't on top of anything else. Yep. So, what sucks about this is people think we're charging people more than Kajjabi and Circle and all of these other companies. Yeah. I even asked Chat GPT and it didn't know which was the cheapest. Yeah. So, you know, I thought this was clear that this was all there really was. It's only like 2.9.
Um, but I saw some things online where people were saying like, "Oh, lame. School charges transaction fees." Yep. And then it wasn't until I got this email the other day and I've blurred out stuff here because, you know, don't want to be lame. Um, but basically this guy who's a founder of one of the platforms, he was like, "Hey, I think you guys made a mistake. Can you please correct it? You stated our transaction fees wrong." And I was like, "Hold on a second. If the founder of a company thinks I made a mistake, then what the hell does everyone else think? Yes. No one knows. Yeah. So, I was like, "This really sucks. If we're to use the same method as everyone else, we'd have to put minus minus 2% transaction fees, which just doesn't make sense." Yeah.
So, I was like, "Okay, we I was actually like ranting about this to my wife, and she was like, "Oh my god, you're passionate about this. you should make a video about this. Just like you should tell people. I think they probably want to know 100%. Um, and yeah, usually we wouldn't want to do something like this cuz it's not very cool to like talk about competitors and stuff, but this is like more of a education thing I think for like people in this industry just to show you how it goes. So yeah, what we're going to do today is we're going to give you a breakdown of these specific platforms and show you exactly how the fees add up like Kajjabi 5, WP 13, Circle 7, Patreon 14, school 2.9. Um, we're going to show you a specific breakdown of this and then we're going to show you what this means at different income levels. um a little bit about our strategy, a little update on the road map, and some sneak peeks at some cool stuff. Let's go. Let's do it. Yep.
So, let's start with Kajjabi. So, this is what Kajjabi's fee breakdown actually looks like. So, their platform fee is zero. True. Then it's plus Stripe fees. And then when you add all of these up, you know, a lot of people think Stripe's only 2.9. Yeah. I've processed over a million dollars through Stripe. That's what I thought. So, it's not exactly obvious to find these numbers. Wow. Humble brick. Um, okay. So, Stripe is usually people think it's 2.9, but it's actually five. And you know, this is how it all adds up. So, the international card fee is actually 1.5%. So, someone Yeah. and subscription billing is actually 7%. And then they add on more for tax 0.2.25 I think and then even more for invoicing. Yeah. So Stripe actually comes to a total of about five. Yeah. And just to explain the method I'm using here. So I'm assuming like 50/50 international and domestic customer split. Yes. I looked at our business. I asked Hormosi to and then I looked at a bunch of different creators on the platform. Yep. And it does seem to be on average about a 50/50 split. Yes. Like the internet's very international. You get pe money flowing from all over the place. So, you know, if you were 100% international, these numbers would actually be a lot higher. But to make it fair, I did it this way. Yeah. So, Kajjabi is actually 5%. But, you know, on their pricing page, they say it's uh where did they do that? Sales and monetization. Yeah. 0% right. And my favorite thing about this is their ad. Oh boy. Oh boy. So you guys can check this out, too. There's this ad that's running right now. You can see it in the ad library. It's a juicy one. Launch. Wait, let me start it here. Test, launch, grow, pay later. Kajjabi's got your back. Whether you're selling courses, memberships, or coaching, everything you need is built in. Even better, zero transaction fees. Keep 100% of your earnings. Start your free trial today. Oh, the double down. Oh, How do I It's not just 0% transaction fees. You keep 100% of what you earn. Wow, that's impressive. And it was probably just some intern that made this mistake. But it's just, you know, it's it's it's annoying when you've got the lowest transaction fees and it looks like you're the highest, right? Yep. So, you know, that's Kajjabi. Looks like zero. They say they're zero even, but it's actually five.
Then next one up, we've got WAP. And this is a super interesting one. They do some very innovative things here. Pioneers. Yeah. Um, so a lot of people just think it their fee is 3%. Because if you, you know, look at different uh links, it says what are our fees? It says what payments? 3% plus payment processing fees, right? But it's 3% is their platform fee. Then they've got their Stripe fees too. And there's a bunch of different fees here like international, subscription, tax, withdrawal, crossber, blah blah blah. Um, comes to about that. But then this is the interesting one. So platform service fee and so here you can see you know they say this and then if you scroll down you can see then they explain if it's international it's more invoicing tax blah blah blah but this is the super interesting one this platform service fee. M so it says in addition to this blah blah blah, they will charge your customers a separate platform service fee at checkout and this covers swaps overhead. So they charge the customers they charge your customers an extra 5%. Which is why So let's say your products 100 bucks. Yep. Then they will make it 105. Yes. They take that five. Yep. and then they take their fees from you and then you get the 100 less the fees. It's kind of confusing. So you let me show you exactly like how this works. So cuz they don't do it to everyone either. It's quite interesting. So if you go to their site and if you scroll down here's like their top things. Like here's one that's 150 bucks. The market lens click. So it's $150, right? That's the price. Click join. Still $150. Mhm. Okay. What's this? $157. Okay. What's this? Hm. Service fee. $7.50. A little service fee in here. Yeah. And if you do the math on that, that's 5%. So this is, you know, this is interesting because there's an argument to say that, well, that's not a fee to you, the creator. Yep. Which is true. It's a fee to your customer. Yes. And it's added on top. But we think that this should be included in this calculation because if you can sell your products for 5% higher, why don't you just raise your prices? Yeah. And keep that money. And there is definitely people that go to buy at $150 and then when they see, oh, it's actually $157, they wouldn't buy. So you lose customers because of this 5% fee. And if people are happy to pay the 5% fee, you just increase your prices by 5% and you can keep all the profit instead. Yeah. So we think it's fair that we actually include this one in here. Um, because yeah, on school you could raise your price and keep that money. Yep. Um, and you can go and spot check some of these for yourself, like, you know, just click on some different Oh, did I already do the market lens? Was this the 150? Yeah, I already did this one. There's another one, I think. Yeah, I haven't yet figured out which ones they charge it to and which ones they don't, but a lot of them they do. Here's another one. It's number two on W. So, top seller. Click join. It's 99, but then down here it's 103 price breakdown, service fee. There you go. Yeah. So, I think they strategically do it to the ones that make money cuz they're trying to make money. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. But I'm curious if these people know that this is happening. Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. Very innovative. Um, so yeah, that's how we get 13% for that.
And then there is circle and we already kind of covered theirs. So they say they're two which is correct plus stripe. Yep. And you add up all of these different things you get 7%. Right. And then there is Patreon and they say they're 10 plus payment processing. Yep. and processing is 2.9 plus they've got their um currency conversion fee which is actually 2.5 but I split it in half assuming half the revenue you receive comes from a different currency the confusing thing is that the processing fee on all of the different ones are actually slightly different they don't even just have a standard processing fee that's that's the problem with this because what's happened is payment processing fees vary wildly Yep. and they move around, especially as you add in different features and things. Y So, just saying our fees zero plus this. Yes. It's misleading. Yeah. Yeah. Um and you honestly wouldn't really know this unless you dug deep into it. Yeah. That was the purpose of my humble brag to say that like even if you're earning money with these things, it's hard to find them and often times you don't look into these things. But they're there. These fees are there if you do look into them and find them. Yeah. I dug deep into this stuff because I wanted school to have the lowest fees. Yep. And I thought people would notice Yeah. from our pricing page, but it just didn't work at all. So, yeah, we have to kind of educate people a bit and hope that people change their ways of communicating fees. Yep.
Um, and then there's school and you know, we're 2.9. Doesn't matter if the card's international or not or any of that. I mean, obviously, if you're on our hobby plan, it's 10%. Yep. But we assume that when you care about this, you're actually making some more money. Yeah.
Um, yeah. And what's interesting is we did an overview to show you what this means at different income levels. So, you know, if you're making 500 bucks a month, 1 grand, 10 grand, 100 grand, 300 grand, this is what the fees add up to at different levels. Yeah. Imagine making 300 grand and giving away 42 grand of that straight to fees. And the worst thing about fees is they're like a tax on the income that you make. But unlike corporation tax where you're taxed on your profit, this you get taxed on your revenue. So everything you earn, you get taxed on. Doesn't matter how much you spend, everything you earn, you get taxed on with fees. Yeah. And what's interesting too here is I even added in the subscription price because you know, WP and Patreon don't have one. They're free. Um, but you know, sir, these ones do. So, I even factored in the subscription price. Yep. And when you're on lower incomes, I figured you'd probably be on the hobby plan. $9. And school still comes in lower than most. No, lower than all of them actually. So, it's even if you factor in the subscription price and the um the higher percentage fee, it still comes in cheaper. But the beauty of school system is that you can start on like the hobby plan which is only like nine bucks and 10%. Yep. And then when you're making money you can flip. Yep. On these other platforms you get really locked in once you're once you start here it lures you in cuz it's like free but then you can't move. Yes. So overall you do save way more money on schools pricing. Yep. Yeah.
So, that's a breakdown of the specific platforms and what it means at different income levels. Yep. And my guess is to say that most people on these different platforms have not a good understanding of how many fees they're getting. So if you know people on these platforms and you feel like they don't know, just let them know. They may thank you for it.
And why we wanted to show you this stuff and it's got to do with our strategy because our strategy is the best for the most for the least. Yes. So, we want to have the best product should be the fastest. It should have everything you need on it. The quality should be the best. Yep. for the most, you know, by having the like a low price like $9 and the lowest fees. Yep. And by making the product super accessible, we think, you know, the most people can use it and for the least amount of money. And this isn't just the price, but it's also the transaction fees and everything that adds up. Yes. And so having the lowest prices is actually super important to us. And we want to make sure that we're always the lowest and we want to we want to fight hard to make them even lower. Let's go.
Then road map update. What's going on here? So in progress right now, Apple Pay and Google Pay. And actually we just started releasing this. It's in some We've got lots of different payment flows. You know, you can buy courses, you can buy memberships, you can create a community, and we're releasing it to one flow at a time to monitor the conversion rate cuz these these flows are very sensitive. Like this is your funnel or your checkout, right? If we're going to touch anything there, we want to be very careful that we only make things better. Yeah. And so it's live right now in some places and we'll give you a demo in a second, but it will be rolled out to every flow over the next couple weeks.
Then in progress also is native live streaming. This is going well. Y this will allow you to replace Google Meet or Zoom and just go live natively on school. So cool. Um, and then up next after this will be subscription courses, which is what everyone's hyped about, including Hormosi. This allows you to do the premium model. So, you could have people come in for free and then upgrade to paid, or you could have multiple paid tiers, like $9, $99, $999. Yeah. Yep. Let's go.
So, let's have a little look at the Apple and Google Pay demo. I have it here. So, yeah, this is what it looks like. This is an iPhone. So, if you're on an iPhone, it will say it'll default to Apple Pay if you have Apple Pay set up. If you don't, it'll just default to card. So, it's smart. It knows which one to show. Um, anyway, I'll show you what it looks like. Oh, and we're in. Yeah. No entering card information. So, that's pretty seamless, right? Um, and this will work the same way when we roll it out to your about pages and communities and everything. That's good. It works for free trials, pay, like one time, annual, monthly, all of it. I'm guessing we're charging them a hefty Apple fee on top of that. Nope.
Um, and then so that's what it looks like on an iPhone or Safari on desktop, right? This is the Apple ecosystem. And then if you're on like Chrome on a Chrome on desktop or if you're using an Android device. Yep. Then we you default to Google Pay like this. Nice. And one click to enter the card if you want to do that. Easy. We're in. Boom. So, just like that. So, this like really reduces the friction to signing up and yeah, that will be rolled out everywhere in the next couple of weeks. Nice.
Then a little sneak peek live streaming. So, not a demo here, but this is a a fun post. This guy said, "School live streaming limit. Just wondering what the limit is likely to be on attendees. Most platforms have about 100 before you have to upgrade." And here is our official statement. Our official statement, PR approved. Yeah. So, we're not going to restrict this feature or limit it or anything like that. Both plans will get it. Yep. and we won't try to nickel and dime you.
Um, and yeah, like we haven't even gone into all the other kinds of fees because there's there's a lot there's too many there's too many. Yeah. Like the fact that when everyone presents their prices, they show you the annual price. Yeah. They add tax on top after that. Yeah. And isn't there not like payout fees and stuff like that? There's more. Yeah. So like once they've taken the fees on the transaction before your money gets paid out, there's more fees there. There's fees like everywhere. Or the fact that if you know WOP's going to mark up your price by 5%. Yeah. Then what's 5% of 5% because that's increasing the base price that they then charge their fee on. So they take a fee on their fee theoretically. Yes. Um, but I haven't included any of that stuff or the fact that people charge you for like video storage. Yeah. Yeah. like they'll charge you per gigabyte for bandwidth for storage for file storage. If you want another admin, okay, you got to pay for that. Um, yeah. And so, you know, our live streaming will be like available for everyone on both plans. And here's a little comparison here. So, live stream attendees is like capped. Yep. But then participants, hosts, hours. So you only get so many hours, too. And only so much storage. Yeah. So you're paying $400 a month for 50 people to be able to show up in a call. Yeah. And then that the real thing that will get you is the uh the storage. The storage. Yeah. Because that compounds. Yeah. Um $400 a month. YOLO.
And I think that's the episode. Yeah. We'll end on this one. the best, for the most, for the least. That's what we want to do for you guys. Let's go. And that's what we're going to continue to do. Thanks for watching.