8 Rules of a Successful Membership Site

Running a successful membership site will require some work, it’s not all easy, but no business is! You’ll need to be consistently paying attention to what is happening on your site.

Losing touch with your website can cause members to unsubscribe and your cash flow to drop. So how do you maintain a successful membership site?

Learn From Other Successful Membership Sites

There are a lot of membership sites online. It’s a good idea to sign up to some of these, especially if host relevant information to you. You can take inspiration and edit aspects to make content suitable for your site.

Spend some time on the forums of these sites to see what members think of each section. See what other members are angry or happy about and try and implement the positives on your site. Also, be sure to consider your own opinion.

You can be a judge for yourself. See what aspects of membership sites YOU find most impactful and engaging and build upon these for your site. Consider if you can implement specific elements into your website.

Features such as Q&A calls, Seminars and Tips and Tricks are all strong aspects you should be including. However, be sure that you don’t just copy other sites. Be unique to get people to sign up with you.

Interact and Engage With Your Members.

Your members want to know you care about them and not just their money. When people sign up to your site make sure you make them feel welcome.

Have an automatic email service to set up to say thanks to your members. These people are paying to be part of your exclusive club; treat them as so. Reach out to your members and make sure that they are happy with the service that your site is providing. Members will appreciate you showing that you care, set up a forum where members can leave comments and feedback.

Responding to these remarks personally will show members that you are actively looking to improve your site and streamline the experience provided. This bolstered the strength of your relationship with members.

Offer Free Places

Not everyone may be able to afford to sign up for your site. Some people who may deserve to be a part of your site may not be able to get there. Look at people who consistently interact with your website and allow a few people to join up for free.

This is beneficial for both you and the new free member. You get to build an audience. They get free access to your quality content! These free members will be the most grateful.

A lot of the time, these people will end up the most helpful and interactive members. Their appreciation will shine through, and they may help the rest of your community see the benefits of becoming a member.

Offer Multiple Methods Of Payment

Your site needs to be as accessible as possible. People don’t want to have a difficult time just signing up. Struggling at the first hurdle will often prevent people from finishing the race, the same goes for your membership site. If your potential customers can’t even sign up for your sight, not only are you missing out on income, you are missing out on having another member of your community.

Adapt To Your Members Needs

Your site needs always to be engaging. You don’t want to fall behind. Members will have the ability to cancel. They will do so if they feel your website isn’t providing the initial service they signed up for. Bear in mind; you have access to a lot of insights so you can measure what is working and what isn’t.

Build upon the most used parts of your website, but don’t overdo it to the point that is no longer recognisable. You need to add new engaging content to your site, not only to keep people on it but to attract new members.

Doing the same thing over and over again will not inspire change. So change up your formula! Start producing videos different from the norm. Supply members with exciting and engaging content.

Keep your eye on your insights to gain a knowledge of what aspects do and don’t work on your site.

Make It Easy To Navigate

Content on your membership site may be scarce at the start, but after a year, you will be swimming in blog posts and tutorials. You need to keep on top of this.

Having an unorganised and messy website will make people lose interest, especially if they can’t find what they are looking for. Have a clean home screen, with blocked and organised sections.

Clearly, link to each aspect of your site as to not clog up and lose old information. People may need to look through your old content or find an old thread. Make it easy to do so, and you will keep members happy.

Listen To Your Members

Speaking to your members is the purest way you can receive feedback. Hearing user issues straight from the source allows you to tailor your actions to a particular case.

Constructive feedback is precious. Put an optional survey on your site asking questions about a variety of aspects. If people take the time to fill out your survey, their opinion matters. Listen to your members.

Make changes based on their suggestions to carry on supplying an excellent service!

Run Group Events

So, you’ve provided a load of quality content. Tutorials, e-courses, seminars and a whole load of other useful information.

But your members don’t seem to be engaging with them. What else can you do? Well, a lot of people enjoy working in groups. Working in groups can be a lot more motivating, rather than working on your own.

You don’t have to be running a significant event to get people interested. Most of the time keeping it simple is a more efficient format. Matching up the group work along with a few mini-challenges can create some engaging content.

Pair this with adding a level of gamification systems, such as BadgeOS or Credly, and you have a great set of engaging, entertaining content. The buzz that comes with working in a group will help your membership site flourish and is a method you should look at implementing.

Membership websites are one of the most stable, scalable and rewarding business models you can adopt. But they are no easy ride!

They take a lot of work, but it’s rewarding work. You can serve a more significant portion of your audience than the majority of most other products and services. We hope that these tips will contribute towards the growth of your membership site!