With a Vimeo Pro account (or above), Pro and Premium Patreon creators can upload gated videos directly in posts. This means your videos will be completely secure for your patrons, without the fear of content being shared or leaked via unlisted links. In addition, any video you post on Patreon will be securely updated to your own upgraded Vimeo account.
In this article, we will review:
- Setting up the Vimeo Integration on Patreon
- Uploading and Processing Videos
- What this will look like for Patrons and on Vimeo
- FAQ
Setting up the Vimeo Integration on Patreon
To start using the Vimeo integration with your patrons today, subscribe to Vimeo Pro account (or above). If you don’t have a paid subscription to Vimeo, sign up for their free 30-day trial for the Pro or Business plans and try it out.
Getting Started
Step 1: To create a post, select New from the posts section of your left hand navigation. From here, select Video to create a video post.
Step 2: You’ll see an option to connect and select Vimeo.
Step 3: Once you click the Vimeo button, you can login to Vimeo (don’t worry - you’ll only have to do this once)
- If you have an existing Vimeo account, use your credentials to login.
- If you do not have an existing Vimeo account, you will need to sign up for a paid account that uses the video privacy settings Domain-level privacy. Sign up for a Vimeo account here.
Uploading and Processing
Step 1: After authorizing, you’ll be able to upload a video directly to Vimeo from Patreon. Start by clicking the Upload to Vimeo button.
Step 2: Select the raw video file from your computer to share with your patrons. (That’s right – for the first time ever, creators can upload video content directly from the Patreon post flow!)
Step 3: The video will then upload directly to Vimeo from Patreon.
Important: Do not exit out of this window until the video is completely done processing. If you exit out, the upload will fail and you will need to start the upload process over.
Step 4: Once the video is uploaded, it must be processed to generate a preview. At this point, you can wait for processing to complete, choose to schedule the post, which will automatically post at your chosen time once processing is complete, or save your post as a draft which will auto-populate with your video once processing is complete.
Step 5: You’ll get an email notification if processing isn’t done and you decided to publish or schedule the post to be published. If you decide to stick around and not queue up the post to be automatically published, you’ll get an email indicating progress has completed and be able to preview the video.
Step 6: Finally, the the post is ready! You can post as you normally would and your patrons will be able to view the Vimeo video if they have access to the post based on their tier.
If you change the thumbnail for a video on the Vimeo side, it will also update to Patreon.
If you’d rather upload a video directly to the Vimeo side, copy and paste the video link into the post flow, it will whitelist the videos for your patrons in that tier if you have the Vimeo integration.
What will this look like for my patrons?
To view on the mobile app, patrons must download the most recent version of the iOS and Android versions of the Patreon app. Download now.
Patrons, depending on which tier they’re in, will either see a gated video preview or a fully visible preview of the video on your creator page.
What will this look like on Vimeo?
Creators:
Patrons:
Since videos uploaded via Patreon will automatically be whitelisted/protected, these videos will not show up when a patron visits a creator’s Vimeo page.
FAQ
Q: Do the videos I posted on Patreon using the integration take up space on my Vimeo account?
A: Yes. You’ll see videos posted on Patreon in your Vimeo account. They’ll be gated so that only patrons who can access a particular post can see the video.
Q: What should I do if posting with the Vimeo integration isn’t working properly?
A: There are a few different troubleshooting steps that will likely clear up any issues with this integration. Please try the following:
-
Refresh the page
-
Disconnect Vimeo and reconnect
-
Try uploading directly onto Vimeo
Visit vimeo.com and upload the video you want to post on Patreon. Then, make a post in Patreon by pasting in the link: "Video > Add URL." Your video will automatically be whitelisted.
Q: What happens if I end my paid Vimeo subscription?
A: Your videos will become private and you won’t be able to view your previously posted content. In order to continue to view and post your private Vimeo videos, you need to have an active Vimeo subscription.
Q: What if I can't use Vimeo?
A: We recommend using YouTube if you are unable to use Vimeo. Learn more about using YouTube, here. If YouTube, or Vimeo are not an option for you to host your videos, these other video hosting services may work for you:
- https://streamable.com/ - video hosting; $9/mo
- https://www.reelhouse.org/ - for selling/renting movies, but can use it for sharing with patrons
Please note that these are suggestions. Each of these services have their own TOS that we recommend you review before using them. .