What a revenue share deal looks like The parts that should be on paper before anyone starts.
Menno Kater · October 18, 2026 · 5 min read
A revenue share deal is only as good as what is written down. The percentage gets all the attention, but deals that go wrong usually go wrong on something else: what counts as revenue, what the starting point is, or what happens when someone stops. Below are the parts every deal with a growth partner should cover, and the question to ask for each one before you sign.
Why the percentage is not the first question
Ten percent of the wrong number can cost more than thirty percent of the right one. Before you talk about the share, agree on what it is a share of.
Two founders can sign the same percentage and end up in completely different deals, because one shares all revenue and the other only the growth, or because one counts refunds and the other does not.
The parts every deal should have
| Part | What it settles | The question to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Starting point | Whether the partner shares in all revenue or only in growth on top of what you already made | Do you share in revenue I already have? |
| What counts as revenue | Which offers, before or after VAT, refunds, payment fees | Is it gross or net, and which offers are in? |
| Measurement | Where the numbers come from and who can see them | Do we both read the same dashboard? |
| Scope | What the partner does: content only, or also funnel, sales and community | What exactly is your job, and what is mine? |
| Fixed fee | Whether there is a fee next to the share, and how big | What do I pay if nothing grows? |
| Ownership | Who owns the channel, the content, the accounts and the members | What do I keep if we stop? |
| Stopping | Notice, and what happens to the share after a stop | What do I still owe after we stop, and for how long? |
The starting point: everything, or only the growth
There are two common ways to set it up. In the first, the partner takes a share of all revenue from the offer. That is simpler, but you also pay for revenue you would have made anyway. In the second, you record what the offer made before the start, and the partner only shares in what comes on top of that.
Neither is wrong, as long as the percentage matches it. A share of everything usually comes with a lower percentage than a share of the growth only. What matters is that both sides know which one they signed.
Measurement: one dashboard, the same numbers
The cleanest deals measure from the payment system itself: Stripe, Skool or whatever the offer charges through. The partner gets read access, and once a month both sides look at the same statement.
Working out which member came from which video is useful for steering the content, but it is a poor basis for payment. People watch three videos, read a post and join a week later. Agreeing up front which revenue counts saves a monthly argument about where someone came from.
Stopping, and what happens after
Content compounds. Videos keep bringing in members long after they are published, which raises a fair question for both sides: if the deal stops, does the share stop on the same day?
Many deals settle it with a notice period and a tail: the share continues for a set time on members who joined during the partnership, then ends. Without a tail, the partner carries the slow first months and loses the share right when the work starts paying off. With a tail that is too long, you keep paying for work that has stopped. Agree on it up front, in writing.
How we handle it
We work as a growth partner for owners of an offer that already sells, and sometimes build an offer from the ground up with someone. The terms differ per situation: how far the personal brand already is, what the offer makes today and how much of the work and the risk sits with us. We discuss them on a call after we have seen the numbers, and then put all of the parts above on one page. How a growth partnership works.
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