You’ve recognized the value in adding a membership site for your business, non-profit, or association. It’s an important step in the journey of your organization and must not be taken lightly. A great membership site can make the difference between staying operational or having to close the doors. It’s exciting to implement membership in your organization, but it can also be a little overwhelming. Before you jump right in and start setting up your membership site, here are a three things that you should consider:

Free vs Paid Membership

A lot of people incorporate membership sites to their organization in order to gain more recurring revenue. Given that as a basis, it makes more sense to have a paid membership instead of a free one. However, if you remember from a previous blog post, we discussed the advantages and disadvantages of free vs paid memberships. We concluded that for the best results it’s highly recommended to use both. There are a lot of benefits to offering high-quality content for free. It’s the perfect way to offer a sample of your membership to your prospective members. The more people get a sample, a taste of what you have to offer, the higher the chances that they will purchase a membership. Consider incorporating the free taste model to your membership site in order to encourage those who are on the fence to make a decision and trust that you will deliver and exceed their expectations.

Recurring Subscription vs One-Time Purchase

Another major thing to consider when setting up your membership site is which payment model you’re going to adopt. There are basically two ways of handling a paid membership, either through a one-time purchase fee or a recurring subscription. Deciding which model to use depends heavily on whether or not you have enough content to keep your members coming back for more very frequently. For a recurring subscription model to make sense to a member, they have to see the value in receiving fresh, new content on the topic, subject matter or ideology your membership espouses. As a general rule of thumb, if you have a product or course to sell, it is usually more appropriate to charge a one-time fee. On the other hand, if you have a ton of content that can be distributed with a certain frequency or if your membership is based around a cause, an idea, or a recurring service, then it is advised to use an ongoing recurrent paid subscription model. However, do your due diligence as there are exceptions to each. You could have a product, but a part or feature of the product requires a monthly payment. In that case you can’t offer a one-time only fee. So be mindful of what your particular situation is and what being a member of your organization actually means in terms of what is received in exchange for being a paying member.

Where to House Your Membership Site

It may not seem obvious at first, but the location of your membership site makes a difference on how well you can run your membership. You can either house your membership platform on your own website or have a separate platform on an entirely different website. There are pros and cons to each. The main advantage of having your membership management platform on another site is that usually the membership software will come out-of-the-box and ready to use with minimal setup. Most of the work has usually been done for you and more than likely you can choose between different packages to suit your needs. That being said, your situation might be unique. Cookie cutter products or services, though they might serve the masses, are not always a perfect fit for some. If that is your case, Book A Demo with the MemberBoss Team.

As you build your membership site, keep these in mind and come back to The Boss Blog for more helpful tips on how to make the most of your membership.