Archive for September, 2011

Membership Sites Explained

• September 29, 2011 • 22 Comments

Do you have a membership site setup yet? (it's okay if you don't)

When you sell products and services online, you can't avoid the steps that people need to take in order to buy from you:

  1. View your offer on your sales letter
  2. Pay you money using your payment processor
  3. Collect that offer on your download page

And you can literally take any payments without software of any kind. I did that for the better part of the 2000's. It was simple:

  1. Add HTML page called index.html to your website (presenting your offer)
  2. Add HTML page called download123xyz.html to your website (presenting your download)
  3. Login to PayPal, create a Buy Now button that charges $17.00 (and sends people to download123xyz.html after checkout)
  4. Right click and copy button from PayPal (and paste on the bottom of index.html)

Sounds like a great way to get started but why wouldn't you want to set things up this way?

  • Your buyers aren't added to an email list for updates (unless they signup themselves on your download page)
  • You can't easily provide lots of bonuses or drip content (refund reducers)
  • There's no community (customers can't talk to each other)
  • The download page can easily get passed around (you have to rename the page every week)
  • It's almost impossible to charge a monthly fee and keep track of who still gets access
  • You have to manually setup a new download page for EACH product you want to sell

Instead, you should use a membership site to handle your product downloads, here's all you have to do:

  1. Add HTML page at www.example.com/index.html (presenting your offer)
  2. Install WordPress and Wishlist Member at www.example.com/members (presenting your download)
  3. Create a membership level called "Full" so when someone buys, they get access to everything for now (you can add more levels later)
  4. Add your blog posts or pages (click "Add Post", type a title and type out the content or paste in the video)
  5. Login to PayPal, create a Buy Now button that charges $17.00 (and sends people to a special link provided by your membership software)

That's a "slightly" more involved, but you basically go through the same steps, and now:

  • Your buyers specify their own unique username and password that they can't share and can always recover (using "lost password" tool)
  • Your buyers can get added to your email list for updates (when you specify it in the membership settings)
  • You can add more levels and sell an unlimited number of products or packages from the same website
  • Any WordPress plugin (including popup software, drip plugins, forum add-ons, and tracking software) can run inside your membership site
  • You can easily drip or manually add bonuses for your buyers to reduce refunds
  • You can easily switch the payment button to charge in installments, or a monthly fee, for access
  • If someone refunds (takes the money back) or cancels (stops paying a recurring payment) they lose access

Do you have a membership site? If so, what's so special about it? If you don't have a membership site, what's stopping you and what are you planning?

↑ Back to Top