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For creators with a tip jar: which posts readers tip after.

A tip jar on your own site asks readers to pay what they like after a post, a drawing or a tool they found useful. Tally ties each tip to the visit and the page behind it, so you can see which work readers tip for and who comes back to tip again.

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01How they sell

  • DonationsOne-time tips of an amount the reader picks, usually after a post or a release.
  • SubscriptionA small monthly tip for readers who want to support the work regularly.

02Payments it reads

  • StripeA Payment Link that lets the reader choose the amount, placed under posts; in cookie mode the snippet tags it with the visitor's id.
  • Lemon SqueezyPay-what-you-want products on Lemon Squeezy, linked through checkout custom data.

What Tally can't read

  • Tips through Buy Me a Coffee aren't read; it takes the payment.
  • Patreon pledges and PayPal tips aren't read.
  • Tips on social platforms' own features, such as tipping on a post or a stream, aren't read.

03Where buyers come from

  • PostsReaders tip at the end of something useful; the page breakdown shows which posts bring tips.
  • SearchPeople who found a post by search and solved their problem may tip once, sometimes on the first visit.
  • NewsletterYour regular readers tip more than once; tag the newsletter's links to see it.
  • Mastodon and BlueskyShared posts bring readers with a referrer, comparable by tips.

04What Tally answers

  1. Do tippers read to the end?

    What they read compares engaged time and scroll depth per page for buyers and everyone else, so you can see whether tippers read the whole post and where the tip button belongs.

    What they read

  2. Which post was this tip for?

    The tip's receipt shows the visits behind it and the credited one, with the pages read, and the method that tied the payment.

    Receipts

  3. How many readers click the tip button but don't tip?

    Mark the tip button with data-fast-goal, and the goals view gives its clicks next to the visitors who actually paid.

    Goals and funnels

  4. Can I get a note when someone tips?

    Sale alerts go to email, Slack, Discord, Telegram or a webhook as each tip is linked, with its source.

    Alerts and digests

05Numbers worth watching

First-visit buyers
The share who tip on their first visit, the readers who came by search and found what they needed.
Repeat rate
The share of tippers who tipped again, your regular readers.
Scroll depth
How far tippers scroll compared with other readers, which tells you where the button belongs.

06An example

Example

Reading time

38s

median per pageview

Scroll depth

59%

average depth, of 27,219 views measured

Read to the end

27%

of measured views reached 90% or more

What they read

29,268 pageviews · last 30 days

Open a page to see how far down people read it, and how buyers read it before paying.

  2. /pricing5,527 views78% scrolled on average58s reading time, median

    58s

    reading time, median per view

    78%

    scrolled, on average

    5,527 views · 5,195 with a measured depth

    How far down they read

    Share of measured views that scrolled at least this far

    1. 25% — reached a quarter of the page:95%
    2. 50% — reached half of the page:84%
    3. 75% — reached three quarters of the page:69%
    4. 90%+ — reached the end of the page:48%

    Buyers before paying vs didn't buy

    • Buyers, before paying149 views · 107 buyers96% scrolled on average,1m 41s reading time, median
    • Didn't buy5,343 views · 3,816 visitors61% scrolled on average,44s reading time, median

    35 views by buyers after paying are left out of both.

    Buyers are visitors whose first sale came after viewing this page; only their views before that payment count.

Reading time runs only while the tab is visible and the visitor is active; it's the median per view. A view with no engagement report counts as 0s of reading. Its scroll depth is unknown, so it's left out of every scroll figure rather than counted as 0%. 27,219 of 29,268 pageviews have a measured depth.

Fig. 1What they read on the example site. For a tip jar, compare how far tippers scroll on a post with everyone else, and put the button where they still are.

07Setting up

  1. Any HTML sitePut the tag in the head of your site, so every post with a tip button carries it.
  2. StripeUse a Payment Link with customer-chosen amounts; in cookie mode the snippet adds the visitor's id, and in cookieless mode a success page with ?session_id= links it.
  3. Mark the tip button with data-fast-goal so clicks count even when the reader doesn't finish.

08Questions

  • I use Buy Me a Coffee. Can Tally read it?

    No. Buy Me a Coffee takes the payment, so its tips aren't read. A Stripe Payment Link or a Lemon Squeezy product on your own site is.

  • Are small tips worth tracking?

    Each tip is a payment, counted without tax in US dollars, and small ones add up by source like any other revenue.

  • Does a tip refund count?

    Yes, against the tip it reverses and the source credited for it.

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