One reason membership programs can be so lucrative is that they fill a deep need. Many people are lonely and want to be part of a group where they can feel heard and supported. When you create a membership program, you fulfill this yearning to belong to a community.
If you have a product, course or information that people are clamoring for, and you know your audience will benefit from learning from each other – you have the perfect brew for a successful membership community!
Be aware, though. Starting a membership program is a bit more challenging than starting a blog. If you want to get this going, it’s important to go into it with your eyes wide open.
Although they can be quite rewarding both personally and financially, don’t underestimate the amount of work it takes to start a membership program and to maintain it.
It’s not just coming up with fresh content on an ongoing basis, you’ll find that substantial administrative tasks and technological details need to be tackled on an ongoing basis. In the beginning you will probably be doing most of this yourself, or at least doing the work to access the expertise you need to figure things out.
Even as your program grows and you begin to develop a team of helpers, you will still be hands-on, since you are the creator – and ultimately the one with the answers. You will want to be accessible to your team and also to keep checking in with the activity in the group itself.
So a membership program is not for the entrepreneur who wants to set up something and forget about it while watching the cash flow in. While it is rewarding, it’s important that you truly enjoy your topic and the interaction required to maintain a thriving membership site.
Here are some of the steps you will need to consider when building your own membership site. Each of these is covered in substantial depth in the course “Create Courses That Sell”.
Membership programs require special software (and a bit of a steep learning curve!). The good news is that plugins are available that can turn a WordPress blog into a membership site. Although these plugins are not free, they are quite affordable. This is the easiest way to go, although software is also available that builds a membership site from scratch.
The premium plugin is Wishlist Member. The license costs $97. We use Wishlist Member at A-List Blogging, and highly recommend it.
In the previous article we discussed the various models for membership programs such as community, modular, publisher and inner circle. You’ll be way ahead of the game if you give some consideration to the type and model of your program (or what combination you will use) before you launch it.
How will you deliver content to your members? Are you offering a course that will consist of modules that each member receives at the same time? Or is it a self-paced course with a forum where members can discuss content? Perhaps you plan for your site to be independent of a specific course and you will offer new content on a regular basis?
For example, some membership sites feature biweekly webinars along with weekly teaching articles. Others rely on the members to deliver some of the content. How will your site work?
If you will be delivering your own content on a regular schedule, be sure you have at least a month’s worth of content prepared before you launch the site.
Will you use only your own blog to promote your site? Newsletters? Social media? What about recruiting other bloggers and businesses in your niche to send you customers? Or setting up an affiliate program? Many successful programs offer super-low introductory pricing for new members. Spend some time planning your strategy so that your program fills at the pace you desire.
One warning: Don’t start a free community! You’ll put a lot of hard work into this and it’s very hard to go from free to paid. People resist that move.
One idea is to offer a trial membership for a token amount, like for one dollar. This works out well because people are set up with Paypal (or whatever payment system you use) from the start. Then, once the trial period is over, most people will happily continue and they won’t need to do anything to continue their membership.
Once your site grows beyond about 50 people you’ll want to keep an eye out for active members who may want to volunteer to moderate the forum or help out in other ways. Further on down the line, you will need to hire a team that can handle administrative work, content creation, website development and customer care.
Your team members can live anywhere in the world. You won’t need a physical office for your team to work from.
It’s much easier to retain current members than to recruit new ones, so it’s important to know how you will keep your people motivated and excited to be part of this group. Consider components such as a welcome team, consistent new content, and new member orientation materials.
Although they take some work and attention, membership programs can be a satisfying way to add a significant income stream to your blog and business. If such a program can fit into your blog, you may want to give it a try.
You’ll learn more about the nuts and bolts of creating a membership program in the course Create Courses That Sell.
Author: A-List Team