Making Money With Membership Sites

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5 Steps To Making Money With Membership Sites

There are several ways in which you can make money online. The goal of this post is to introduce you to proven and innovative marketing strategies that will generate income. Today, we’re going to explore how you can make money with membership sites.

There are a number of powerful advantages to operating one or more membership sites. You can enjoy a predictable income, devote yourself to your paid membership base, and promote related products to an audience who trusts you.

Plus, through smart outsourcing, you can build a portfolio of subscription-based sites, scaling your income in the process. In today’s post, I’ll give you a 5-step blueprint for making money with your own membership site.

Step 1: Developing Your Reputation

The most common mistake I’ve observed others making is launching their membership site without first building their reputation as an expert. Even though you can attract members solely through PPC and search engine optimization strategies, your success will be limited. If you can develop a loyal fan base through a blog, forum participation, or even a weekly newsletter, you can launch far more successfully.

Step 2: Marketing Through The Funnel

You’ve likely heard of the sales funnel. It’s a proven internet marketing strategy that is used to qualify your audience and motivate them through the sales cycle. One of the most effective ways to use it in marketing your membership site is through an email list. By focusing the content of your emails on topics that interest your prospective members, you can disqualify those who aren’t interested while pushing others further through the funnel toward joining.

Step 3: Lining Up Your Tools

You’ll need software to build your membership site, a payment processor that can handle recurring payments, and a few other tools, depending upon your plans for content creation.

There are a number of robust software solutions that you can choose to build your site, such as aMember and MemberGate. You can also find free scripts online, but you’re better off using a proven application with reliable tech support.

Next, select a payment processor. You can use PayPal, ClickBank, 2Checkout, or your own merchant account. In my opinion, PayPal is a fantastic choice because it’s cost-effective and fits seamlessly with most high-quality membership site management software.

Finally, you’ll need to determine how you intend to deliver content to your members. You might choose a forum (for example, vBulletin), video production, or weekly webinars. The key is finding the tools you’ll need ahead of time so that you’re not scrambling when you launch your site.

Step 4: Creating Your Price Structure

The subscription price that you charge your members will depend upon several factors. First, realize upfront that a lot of your members will cancel their memberships. Most of the high-profile membership sites build retention rates into their pricing formula. Also, your price structure should represent the perceived value of the content you provide for your members.

You’ll also need to consider your market (some markets are willing to pay more than others) and the amount of income you’d like to generate. Obviously, charging $2.95 a month with only 500 members won’t generate much income (unless you’re operating a dozen such membership sites).

Step 5: Launching Your Membership Site

Finally, the launch. To truly explode out of the gate with hundreds of members, you should treat the launch of your membership site as you would any product launch. That includes building anticipation in your space as well as attracting affiliates and keeping them excited. We’ve touched on product launches before and we’ll do so again in the future. The important thing to remember is that launching your membership site properly will not only generate more income, but it will also provide valuable conversion data on your sales page.

I’ve given you a proven 5-step blueprint for making money with membership sites. We’ll cover the above steps in more detail in future posts. For now, understand that subscription-based sites have the potential for generating a high level of reliable income.

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Tags: create membership sites, lauching membership sites, make money with membership sites, membership, membership sites, paid membership sites, product launches, subscription services

This entry was posted on Monday, February 9th, 2009 at 2:52 am and is filed under Internet Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.