ramp_seeker I think if you could rank high (Top 3?) in the Power Stone rank would mean a contract. All contracted novel had stayed in the Top 3/popular.
However, you need to think about the potential for Patreon. For example Bai, while he took the novel from this site, his Patreon had 90 patrons. (It is still a question whether it is a smart move or not. Some authors only posted a free 1 volume here and led the reader to his own personal page. Some gain popularity here and used that as a promotion on amazon.).
Based on Bai that means at the least $90/month based on the lowest $1 (but I don't think he reward anything for this tier, so I doubt many people pick this tier.). If all on the next cheapest but already removed $5, that is $450/month. Higher than the contract from webnovel. If it was based on his lowest reader $10 then he got $900/month. For a note, he was Top Power Ranking. So that is a high goal for a new author.
Current top ranking Alemillach got a contract. But his patreon was lower than Bai. The second place KecinAscending was even bigger than Bai.
Yet, those are not high compared to the patreon obtained by some fan translation project (There is one with hundreds of backers and more than $10.000/month. Now you see why there is Qidian vs Fans-translation. That is a big piece of cake often not shared with the original Chinese author & the publisher Qidian.)
Best of all without the contract the story is yours (all profit) and you can work on your schedule (Have you tried the words count/month? I may need to stop working my real job to accomplish that word counts.). Worst of all, you have to protect your IP & promote on your own. That are 2 sides of the same coin.
That is the sweet. They are good authors. However the reality, most authors would only get 1 or 2 patrons. Not enough compared your time. :P
When webnovel offers you contract that mean your selling quality is good. When you are good, you have the options. With Patreon you can share a free novel and still feed your family for example. Contract should not be your goal of the writing here, the publicity is. When you got the contract what you need is not the money, but the ability to help you to get even more popular.
PS: If you succeed do not forget the free readers, they were the one who made you popular. (The paying readers are the one who make you money.) :D