We’re at a point where we’ve built a collection of workflows—maybe 8-10 solid automations that work well for us on Make. They handle common scenarios: lead routing, data normalization, CRM synchronization, that kind of thing.
The question we’re wrestling with is whether these workflows represent a lock-in risk or an actual asset. If we were to switch platforms, these workflows would need to be rebuilt somewhere else. That’s a real switching cost.
But I’ve heard about the idea of selling or packaging workflows on community marketplaces as a way to monetize them or at least recoup some cost. The concept sounds interesting: if these workflows have value beyond our company, maybe we could package and sell them to others, which would offset our platform investment.
Here’s what I can’t figure out: does this model actually work financially? If we package a workflow and sell it on a marketplace, what percentage of our automation costs does that actually recover? And more importantly, does workflow portability and reusability actually matter for a platform selection decision?
I’m also wondering whether platform choice affects your ability to package and sell workflows. Are there platforms that make that easier? And does being able to package workflows materially improve your ROI situation when you’re comparing platforms?
Curious whether anyone has actually tried monetizing workflows on a marketplace or whether this is mostly theoretical.
We tried selling workflows on a marketplace once. The honest answer: it doesn’t work as a revenue stream for small companies. We published three workflows, got maybe five purchases total across six months, and made something like $80. After accounting for the time to package, document, and maintain them, the ROI was negative.
Where it does work is if your workflows solve a very specific, painful problem for a specific industry. We saw better results selling internal templates to other teams than we did on public marketplaces. The value proposition is just different.
The platform choice thing matters more than monetization though. Being able to export and reuse workflows across teams is genuinely useful. Whether the platform charges for sharing them is secondary.
We looked at monetizing workflows but ended up not doing it. The real value for us was internal reuse. Having a packaged lead routing workflow that multiple teams could use and customize saved us probably a few hundred hours over a year or two. That was way more valuable than trying to sell it externally.
What that did do is make us think differently about platform choice. We wanted a platform where teams could easily share and iterate on workflows. That pushed us toward something with better collaborative features and repository management. The monetization angle was a red herring—the operational value of reusable workflows was the real driver.
We tested workflow monetization on a marketplace and found limited market demand. Published five workflows, generated approximately $120 in revenue over eight months. Given the time required for documentation, testing, and maintenance, the ROI was marginal. However, internal workflow sharing and reuse proved far more valuable. Teams adopted packaged templates and built on them, reducing redundant development. The platform’s ability to support template libraries and collaborative workflow development became more important than external monetization potential. We shifted focus from external sales to internal asset management and governance.
Marketplace monetization for workflow templates shows limited viability for enterprise. Market analysis of platform marketplaces indicates 85-90% of published templates generate zero revenue. Of templates generating revenue, median earnings are $50-200 per template over 12 months. Revenue distributions are heavily skewed toward specialized industry-specific solutions, which require significant domain expertise. Internal workflow reuse demonstrates substantially higher value. Organizations implementing shared template libraries report 40-60% reduction in parallel workflow development. The strategic value emerges from operational efficiency rather than monetization. Platform selection should prioritize governance, version control, and team collaboration capabilities over marketplace revenue potential.
Marketplace monetization barely works—most templates earn <$100/year. Internal reuse is way more valuable for cost savings.
External monetization flops for most. Internal template reuse is the real cost saver—focus there.
We actually tested this with Latenode, and the angle is different from what you’ll find on most platforms.
Latenode’s Marketplace lets you package and sell workflow scenarios, but here’s what made it actually viable for us: the platform has native support for parameterized workflows. You can build a scenario with inputs and outputs, make it generic enough to solve a class of problems, and then sell it as a template.
The monetization part is honestly modest—we made a few hundred dollars from templates. Not life-changing. But the internal value was completely different from what we were seeing on other platforms.
Because the workflows are packaged as reusable scenarios, different teams can instantiate them, configure parameters for their context, and deploy. No rebuilding. We saw adoption across teams at a rate that surprised us. A lead routing template got used by three different departments, each with their own customizations.
That’s where the cost savings actually showed up: reduced duplication of automation development effort. Teams stopped rebuilding common workflows from scratch. We measured something like 30-40% less redundant development time.
For platform selection, this matters because it affects total cost of ownership. A platform that makes reusable workflows easy actually reduces your per-workflow cost across the organization. Latenode’s approach to packageable scenarios and the marketplace made team-wide automation adoption cheaper.
If you’re evaluating platforms and thinking about long-term scalability, the ability to package and share workflows operationally (separate from monetization) is worth considering. Check out how Latenode handles this at https://latenode.com