Revenue Share or Fixed Fee and What Actually Pays Off

01Compare the purchase before the payment model

A revenue share charges a percentage of a defined revenue base. A monthly fixed fee buys a recurring scope for a stated amount. A one-time fixed project price buys an agreed deliverable, such as a custom website. None of these descriptions tells you whether the underlying service is good. You still need named outputs, acceptance criteria and ownership terms.

Ask each supplier to price the same brief. For a website, describe the page types, languages, mobile behaviour, analytics setup, content responsibilities and handover. Separate ongoing content work or promotion from the initial build. Otherwise you might compare a complete marketing service with a bare landing page and mistake the difference in scope for a pricing advantage.

MyQuests Digital is a Hamburg online-marketing agency providing custom websites, SEO, digital PR and promotion through the SirenSpot web directory. It does not manage creator accounts or chat with fans. The relevant purchase here is an owned marketing asset, not a promise to operate your business. Use the custom website service to frame that project brief, not as a substitute for a written quote.

02Define gross and net before discussing percentages

As of 2026, the OnlyFans Creator Center states that creators keep 80% of earnings, corresponding to a 20% platform fee. Our examples define gross revenue as eligible fan payments before that fee, excluding fan taxes. Net platform revenue means the remaining amount after the platform fee, not your taxable profit or personal take-home pay. Refunds, payment reversals and currency conversion are excluded from the illustrations and must be addressed in a real contract.

Example: on €10,000 of eligible monthly fan payments, the platform fee is €2,000 and net platform revenue is €8,000. A 40% agency share on gross costs €4,000, leaving €4,000 after both fees. A 40% share on net costs €3,200, leaving €4,800. The same headline percentage changes your monthly remainder by €800. Neither remainder allows for production, advertising, tax or your own working time.

Do not accept the word net without a formula. Name the report, reporting currency, deductions and reconciliation date. Decide whether subscriptions renewed by existing fans count, whether refunded payments reverse the commission and whether another platform is excluded. A calculation based on a bank payout can also shift merely because money was withdrawn later.

03Put the full contract cost in one table

Every price and revenue level in this table is an illustrative assumption, not a MyQuests quote or an industry benchmark. Revenue stays constant throughout each period. The share is charged on net platform revenue after the verified 20% fee. The alternatives are an illustrative €1,000 monthly fee and an illustrative €6,000 one-time project. The table shows supplier fees only, excluding VAT, hosting, advertising and any additional scope.

Read across a row before reading down a column. At €2,000 monthly gross revenue, a 30% net share costs €5760 over twelve months, slightly below the project assumption. At €20,000 it costs €57,600 for that same period. A higher bill might be justified by additional valuable work, but revenue growth alone does not prove that the supplier did more.

For a share on gross instead, multiply each share column by 1.25. That factor follows from dividing gross by the 80% remaining after the platform fee. At €10,000 monthly revenue, the illustrative 40% gross share becomes €48,000 over twelve months and €96,000 over twenty-four. Keep this alternative beside the quote if the base has not yet been settled.

04Find the crossover and test a bad month

For a monthly fee F and a net revenue share s, the gross revenue crossover is F divided by (0.8 × s). With the illustrative €1,000 monthly fee, that is about €4,167 at 30%, €3,125 at 40% and €2,500 at 50%. Below those amounts the percentage costs less in that month. Above them the fixed monthly fee costs less, assuming genuinely equivalent deliverables.

Cash risk matters as much as the crossover. A share without a minimum falls when revenue falls. A fixed retainer remains payable unless your agreement allows a pause or reduction. Before accepting it, model a period with no new sales, keep essential operating expenses in the forecast and ask whether you can still meet the invoice. A one-time project can sometimes be split into acceptance-linked payments, but that must be negotiated rather than assumed.

Also calculate what a supplier must add to pay for itself. Comparing an agency with doing the work yourself requires a baseline, not merely comparing two agency prices. Use profit contribution after platform fees and incremental costs. Revenue that would have arrived anyway cannot finance a performance claim just because it appears in the same reporting month.

05Ask who earns more when you succeed

A share ties the invoice to revenue, but not necessarily to value created. Your own publicity, an old video or a returning fan can increase the agency bill even when the supplier did nothing to cause the sale. On a whole-account share, you effectively pay a commission on parts of your audience you already built. That is the hidden cost to quantify before calling the arrangement risk sharing.

Attribution needs its own agreement. A tracked link can show that someone passed through a campaign; it does not prove they would not otherwise have subscribed. Existing fans may switch devices. Someone may see a press feature and later search your name. Use channel-specific destinations and available platform reporting, but do not pretend missing purchase data can be reconstructed from website clicks.

A fixed-price supplier has a different incentive: finish efficiently and avoid unpriced revisions. Protect yourself with concrete acceptance tests and a change-request process. A monthly supplier may keep doing routine tasks after their usefulness declines. Ask for the work log and a reason to continue each workstream. No pricing model removes the need to inspect what was delivered.

06Make a performance share narrow enough to audit

A share can be fair when a supplier funds or delivers a measurable acquisition channel and bears a meaningful part of the downside. Ring-fence that channel rather than assigning every euro from your account. State which customers qualify, how long their purchases remain eligible and how existing subscribers are excluded. If the platform cannot provide the necessary evidence, choose payment for deliverables instead.

An illustrative hybrid might combine a €500 monthly base with 10% of attributable net revenue, a six-month term and a €6,000 total supplier-fee ceiling. Specify whether the base counts towards that ceiling; here it does. Advertising spend is separate only if approved in writing. These are negotiation examples, not recommended market rates. The right ceiling depends on the work, commercial risk and your downside budget.

Do not make the hybrid complicated to sound sophisticated. Define one reporting method and settle disputed transactions separately from undisputed fees. A perpetual tail on returning fans can defeat an otherwise sensible expiry date. For related contract questions, use the agency contract checklist before you let a percentage become a long-term obligation.

07Treat a website as an asset with ongoing costs

An illustrative €6,000 website costs €500 per month when spread over twelve months, or €250 over twenty-four. That is a management comparison, not a tax depreciation rule. Add hosting, domain renewal, maintenance and any ongoing marketing to the relevant period. A project is not truly one-time if compulsory subscriptions or licence restrictions make continued use depend on the original supplier.

For a simple payback calculation, suppose the website produces €500 additional monthly contribution after platform fees and incremental operating costs. The €6,000 outlay is recovered in twelve months. At €250 contribution it takes twenty-four months. If the site merely redirects people who would have subscribed anyway, incremental contribution could be zero. Do not treat all clicks through your own domain as new sales.

Before acceptance, test the mobile journey, platform links, editing access and recovery process. Register the domain in your own control and secure the agreed rights to the deliverables. Ask for a list of recurring charges and an export or migration plan. The owned website versus link hub comparison helps define what you actually need before you buy a larger build.

08Negotiate a ceiling and a real end date

Negotiate while the supplier still wants the work. A ceiling added after a successful campaign is harder to obtain because you are asking someone to surrender an existing income stream. Bring your forecast, the comparable fixed quote and a precise list of services. State your maximum cash exposure before debating a percentage.

A cap should be an amount, not a promise to review pricing when you grow. A sunset should stop charging, not merely trigger another discussion. Check that setup fees, minimums and cancellation charges cannot rebuild the cost outside the agreed ceiling. Any continuing services after expiry need a separate written decision.

Use the steps below as commercial drafting instructions, not a ready-made legal clause. Read them alongside the definition of eligible revenue. A beautifully drafted expiry date is useless if another section grants an indefinite commission on the same fans.

1. 1

   Write the scope and baseline

   List the channel, deliverables and excluded existing revenue. Attach the reporting example used to calculate an invoice.

2. 2

   Set the total ceiling

   Propose a cash maximum covering setup, base fees and performance fees. Identify any approved external spend separately.

3. 3

   Add the sunset

   Specify an end date and stop when the cap or that date is reached, whichever comes first. Explicitly address renewals and trailing commissions.

4. 4

   Agree reconciliation and handover

   Define refund adjustments, reporting access and final invoicing. Preserve your domain, assets and analytics access at exit.

5. 5

   Test the draft against scenarios

   Calculate no growth, strong growth and early termination. Ask a qualified adviser to review unclear or conflicting clauses before signing.

09Check German tax treatment before comparing cash

For creators operating a business in Germany, commercially caused agency fees generally fall within the business-expense concept in § 4 EStG. Keep invoices and evidence of the service. A deduction does not reimburse the invoice: it affects taxable profit subject to the applicable rules. A website may need different accounting treatment from a recurring service, so do not assume the entire purchase reduces taxable profit immediately.

As of 2026, cross-border services require particular care. § 3a UStG generally locates qualifying business-to-business services at the recipient, subject to exceptions. § 13b UStG can make the German recipient liable for VAT on qualifying foreign services. A foreign invoice without VAT is therefore not automatically tax-free; check the supplier location, your business status and the actual service.

Ask whether a domestic quote includes applicable VAT and whether you can deduct input VAT. Do not assume small-business status eliminates reverse-charge obligations or grants an input-tax deduction. Have your adviser confirm invoice requirements and your reporting obligations before the first payment. This guide is not legal or tax advice. To discuss a defined website scope rather than account management, contact MyQuests about a website project.

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