Best Practices for Running Membership Sites

Membership sites are a fantastic way to add an new income stream to your current business. While the concept sounds easy enough, we want to go over some best practices that you should include in your own site.

1. Decide on your membership software in advance. Think about if you want to offer a tiered pricing structure or a free trial. Not all membership software is capable of this. So try to think in advance of where and how you want your membership site to grow. Changing your structure later on is not always easy!

2. Plan your content in advance, recommended about 3 months ahead. This allows you to make changes if necessary and ensures you don't have to work all night to make your deadlines.

3. Including video's as tutorials is a great way to show your members how to use certain items. Even something as simple as setting up a new site. Your members will have varying levels of experience and you will need to cater to this.

4. Be open to listening to your members and making certain changes if they are extremely popular. For example your members may wish to have a forum where they can ask questions. Or they may wish to have access to a Facebook group.

5. Launch your membership site using the Early Bird strategy. Be open to offering a lifetime membership or even a 6 month one at a discounted price. Consider tiered pricing with varying levels of content.

6. Always over deliver, this is a fantastic way to retain members for a longer time period.

7. Be open to adding an affiliate program to your site. Yes, you may personally earn less money but the advantages include getting more exposure and branding. Word of mouth is huge and can really help increase the number of your members.

8. Take time to actively promote your site, this helps you increase your members. Plus if you lose a couple of members your new members keep you earning income.

9. Blog about your membership site regularly. Give sneak peeks inside your membership site and be open to answering questions. Create videos about your site which deal with frequently asked questions and concerns from your current members.

10. It takes time for a membership to gain exposure and lots of members. Don't launch your site and close it within a couple of months. Make a plan to spend at least one year actively working on your site.

Remember membership sites are a wonderful business model but they can take longer to take hold and gain traction.