Welcome to THE PROFITABLE MEMBERSHIP MASTERCLASS
1 | Welcome Pillar 1: | |
2 | Pillar 1: The 7 membership models | |
3 | Pillar 2: Your membership idea | |
4 | Pillar 3: Setting realistic expectations | |
5 | Pillar 3: The Calculator! | |
6 | Pillar 4: Content creation & Membership Structure | |
7 | Pillar 5: Picking the right tool | |
8 | Pillar 5: The 3 schools |
This masterclass is divided into 5 core pillars. We recommend you watch the video from beginning to end at least once. Then use the navigation on the left to go straight to the Pillar to want to watch again!
Welcome to the Profitable Membership Masterclass! I am Nathalie de Renieux and I am a membership program strategist and today I am going to share with you the five pillars to a successful and scalable and profitable membership program.
I'm excited to have you here and I can't wait to dive in, so let's go! So pillar number one is the membership model. So before we get into diving into models and things like that,
I want to get clear about what a membership really is. And we're going to compare that to an online course so you can get really clear of what the difference is
and what we're talking about here. I'm going to share with you also how it's become the most popular way to scale a business and why. And we are going to get a first stab
at choosing your membership model. My goal is by the end of this masterclass, you have clarity on your business idea, on who you're going to serve,
what problem you're going to solve, and what membership structure you want to build. So it's gonna be a work in progress, but it's going to give you lots of clarity
on what you need to look at and what you need to think about to answer those very critical questions that I'm going to put here in the masterclass.
So what is a membership? So like in the name where it has members, a membership is a combination of digital content, physical product, access to people and services
that we give to a group of people that are members, whether they are free or paid. As a member, you get access to service, product, services, and people, okay?
So examples of memberships are Netflix, a closing box description, an online course with a membership, maybe a photo library where you pay every month
to get some photos that you can use for your business, for example, or an online community, right? just a paid forum where people come together around a common topic.
The Bible study is an example. So let's talk about membership versus online course because I know that this is something I get asked a lot. So basically a course is more specific
and it goes deeper and it has a set amount of content. So, it has modules sometimes divided into lessons, but it's a finite amount of content to go from point A to point B.
It has a very, very clear begin and end, okay? So, examples of courses could be how to run your first Facebook ad in 48 hours, or how to learn the piano basics in 12 weeks, okay?
It's very, very specific. membership on the other hand is often a combination of content and community, most of the time, where people go through content more at their own pace. And sometimes it's a pick and choose
Chinese menu kind of thing. It has various type of structure, we're going to talk about that a little bit later. But that's really the main difference between a membership and an online course.
So why this is the most popular model to grow an online business? I've shared with you here quite a few reasons. The first one is the recurring income. I mean who
doesn't want financial stability, right? The membership model with its recurring payment, whether it's monthly or quarterly or even if it's yearly, really
ensures that you have visibility on the money that is coming in, okay? And as As an entrepreneur, it's always nice to have one stream of income that is recurring so
that you know how much cash you have coming in every month. The second reason is that it's a great way to create a community as a movement, right? So if this is something that you want to do, you want to create a movement, I'll share
with you a couple of them, the WLA is one for example. You know that people love to belong to groups, they love to be with other people. So a membership model really allows you to do that and to bring people together.
It's also a great way to leverage your time compared to working one-on-one or even doing course launches all the time that really take up a lot of your time and your energy.
So depending on how you design your membership, it can really be raining a lot without you. If you're really strategic about it and you can still provide that level of personal touch
and care depending on how you build the platform. So you can also leverage your expertise with the membership model, right? So for example, if you're a coach and you do one-on-one coaching or even group coaching
and you know you're repeating yourself all the time, then you can take that expertise that you have and put that inside a membership so that it's accessible to people, one that
maybe cannot afford you one-on-one. And also there is only so many people you can work with, right? But also it allows people to have access to it 24/7, right?
So they can actually continue to learn and you can continue to educate them beyond the calls that you have with them, even if it's group. Another reason is that it's a great way to build a loyal audience that you can continue
to serve and sell to. So you probably know really well that the cost of acquisition of a new client is they say four times higher than selling to an existing client.
So why not capitalize on that and continue to serve people that have already trusted you, right? So it's much easier. It's kind of like sell once and then get paid over and over, if we oversimplify, okay?
Another reason is that it allows you to get to make a bigger impact and it's super scalable. I mean, whether you have 10 members or 10,000 members, the amount of work is not thousand
times bigger, right? Because your time is leveraged, your expertise is leveraged, and you don't have that one-on-one effect, you know, and that you're not so tight to your calendar, right?
so you can have that bigger impact, if that's what you're after. And then finally, why is it so popular? Because it's never been easier to set up.
Honestly, it used to be, I mean, back when we started doing membership sites, it used to be that there were not that many tools, and you really needed a developer to code it,
and it would take time, and we wouldn't have all the functionalities that we have today. It's never been easier to set up. So it's a great thing, but it's also a trap for some people
because they go and they do it because it's easy and then they give up just as quickly as they made the decision to do it. So we're gonna talk about that as well.
So what we're gonna do here is I'm going to go rather quickly through seven typical membership models because I wanna inspire you and I want to give you examples
before we dive into picking your membership idea, your model and your structure, okay? So model number one is the internal training platform. This is a centralized library of training
for employees or team members where you can track their progress. This is if you want to have a group of people go through a specific training, either because they're employees and they need to do that.
So, nurses for nursing home, for example, or they are your team members. And you want them to go through a specific training before they can accomplish a certain task.
It's self-study, so there is no calls, nothing like that. It's totally self-study. Usually there is a self-assessment, a quiz, or even a certification.
way for the manager or the team leader to track you know what the employees or what the team members are doing and the beauty of this model is that the training
is available 24/7 so people can actually do it when they want it self-study but there is a progress tracking okay so this is an example this is Eve and she's
she's running the dog and your academy and have is actually a dog decay owner and she created this track this training program for employees because she told
me that employees turn around in the dog decay business is very high so she felt the need to create some training and then she took it one step further because
now she's selling licenses of this training that her own employees are using. She's selling it to other dog daycare owners, you know bulk licenses so that each facility can have their employees
trained as well. They don't have to come up with their own training. They can use eaves, right? So it's a great way for her to get extra revenues, you know, from the training that she's created for
our own team. Model number two is the online space for teachers to sell and to teach online. So it's basically an opportunity for people to help many more
people and it's very different than an online course because an online course like I said is going from A to B and it has a start and a stop. Here with the
online education program it's like ongoing help self-study at your own pace and you can have assessment and tests and certification and things like that but it can also be the place that you
go to you know as a routine right that you that you put in place so let me show you some examples so we have Brian with the reading teacher this membership is basically teaching english to kids
So he has 100 books divided into 25 levels. Each level has four books and it's all interactive and really, really fun. We have Ev with another Ev.
We're teaching people how to use their voice, how to sing in the gene vocal. And actually she created this membership because she had a waiting list.
I mean, she had people that wanted to work with her and she just couldn't take them on. So she decided to create a gym vocal. And then we have Rina,
who teaches how to dance flamenco online, okay? So this is another fun one. And then we have Carly, who is teaching the piano. So she used to teach busy kids do piano, so for kids.
And then we also created busy people do piano. So now she's also teaching moms how to do piano. She also has it set up so that moms can purchase one or two licenses if they have two kids, for example,
and she can watch their progress. So this is pretty cool. Model number three is the DRIPT content platform. So this is the platform where there is monthly
or yearly membership where there is a new piece or a bundle of content that's being DRIPT every week or every month as long as you stay a member. So let me share with you some example.
And that can be for B2C or B2B. So business to consumer or business to business. This one is business to business. It's the Content and Social Media Club.
It's run by Alicia Streger. And what she does is she's helping professionals in the health and fitness industry by giving them content and social media,
content ready for them to use for their social media. So she's saving them a lot of time and she's providing quality content that people trust her works, okay?
This is a very, very successful membership. And then here we have Polar with the Yoga Success Academy. So this is actually also a B2B membership because Paula has a yoga teacher,
you know, 200 and 300 hour training where she teach people how to become yoga teachers. But this academy is for people that have gone through a certification
and that are ready to grow their business. I mean, learning to be a yoga teacher is one thing. Learning the business of being a yoga teacher is another one.
And that's what she's helping them with in this membership where she has monthly training that are being dropped in. Model number four is the certification platform.
So the certification platform is basically a private training area where there is content that is being broken down into modules and lessons with assessments,
sometimes quizzes, certificate of completion. And these can apply to coaching programs that basically teach their method and can certify people in their own method.
I will show you some examples. It can also work with online courses or teaching a specific skills. So let me show you a couple of examples. We actually have here Dana Obalman.
And she's certifying mom with the sleep sense method. And that's a method that, for the little story, that she invented herself because she could not get her child to sleep
and she figured out that method. So it worked for her, she started to spread the word, she started to teach it to mom in her neighborhood, she would get to their home and show them,
and then it grew into a business opportunity for other moms and now she's actually certifying people in that sleep sense method. Model number five is the community platform.
It's a safe and protective place for like-minded people that are looking for support and accountability in a specific area of business or life. So let me show you some examples.
So here we have the Mastering New Motherhood Success Academy, and you have the Moms Club here. And this is run by Stacy and you have the Milk Club as well.
So it's basically a community for moms that are breastfeeding and beyond. We have the Bible Cafe and this is a community for people who want to be surrounded by other people
to do prayer circles and things like that. We have the Society of We, of Women Entrepreneurs here. And then we have the sisterhood. So the sisterhood is run by Talen and her husband, Sirac.
And basically this is a membership for people with PCOS. So it's very specific and she helps them lose weight, be gluten-free, dairy-free. She has exercises, she has challenges
and she basically helps people with recipes and exercise and just being healthy and feeling good in their body with PCOS. Model number six, this is where you can package
and leverage your expertise. It's the coaching platform. You can run live coaching cohorts, you can run an eBread of self-study with scores, you can run group coaching, you can run one-on-one programs
with access to training, resources, call replays, and much more, okay? So this is done many different ways, but here you have Gitan Jali, who is doing training for corporates.
Here you have Natalie Barron, who is doing career training, career and leadership coaching for individuals. And then here we have Sandra Pennington,
who is leading the Women Leaders Association. Again, another leading program with multiple levels inside. This is another one and this is past Griffiths
with her coach approach system. So it's our own method that she's actually teaching and certifying people in. And then finally, we have model seven, which is the combo.
It's a combination of multiple models. It's usually drip content in a community or it can have a, It could be a coaching platform with the community.
I mean, it can be a combination of all these models. So for example, you have the Weddings Hink here, where you see you have a community, you have weekly course, but you also have trainings.
And here you have the School of Secredology with Julie Reisler, where you have a membership, and then you have group coaching course, you have a mastermind and other programs
that she keeps adding to the platform. And then here on the far right, we have Crystal Payne, who has a combination of free content and paid courses
and the recurring membership. This is to help women blog, run a business running a blog. So how can the membership model work for you? Well, you need to look at two things.
There is what you want, and then what your old ideal member wants, right? And your membership idea is right in the middle. I know it's oversimplified,
but really it comes down to that. You need to look at what you wanna do and what people want, right? And that's your ideas basically in the middle.
So, from the three models that I shared with you here, is there a membership model that stands out that you feel attracted to, or maybe it's a combination of both.
Maybe you know already the membership model that you want. If you're not sure, write down two or three that you feel might be a good fit. I don't want you to think about how much content
you're gonna have to write, how complicated it is going to be for you to run it, or to get members. Really what you feel in your gut is something that could work for you.
And then we're going to dive into pilar number two, which is your membership idea. So we're going to look into the three audiences that you can serve.
We're going to identify the problem that you can solve for them. We're going to talk about building an interest list, and we're going to refine, choose your
membership model based on that. So let's get started. the three audiences that you can serve. So, I like to narrow it down this way when I talk to people and they want to do a membership,
they want to get online, but they have no idea where to start, how to pick an idea. And I'm like, okay, you have three ways to do this. One, you can continue to serve your clients.
You have, they trust you. You have already established a connection. They've already paid you. you've already provided value to them, so it's gonna be easier to get them,
to convert them, to paying again if you are offering a solution to a problem they have. So first audience is your clients. The second audience is your existing audience.
So this is the people that know you, but haven't purchased your programs yet. So this is the people on your list, your leads and prospect, basically.
Maybe the people that follow you on social media, maybe the people that are in your free Facebook group that maybe are engaging and they say they love you,
you know, they give you likes, they comment, but they don't buy, right? So there could be an opportunity there to create a membership that would be
what we call a front-end membership, where you could help them in a way that could get them to be closer to want to purchase your bigger program, if that's the goal of that membership.
So you want to identify the goal of your membership as well, but that is another potential audience. So of course, if you have no followers, no list,
you don't want to go into that one because your existing audience is very tiny. But if you're the person that has lots of followers and people are engaged and you have a free Facebook group
and you don't know what to do with that, then that could be a serious contender for a membership. And then finally, you have the others, the other audience.
Like maybe you have another interest, another passion that you want to fulfill with a membership, something that's totally different than what you do right now
and people don't even know that you are knowledgeable in that area. So in that case, you're a stranger to them. So it's going to be a little harder,
and I'm going to share with you what you need to do. There is a bit more work, obviously, but it's always possible. So that's the first thing. You want to identify what audience you want to go after.
Are you going to go with your existing clients? Are you go with your existing audience or the others? So that's the question you need to answer now,
and you can pause the video. Who can you potentially serve? Write it down below. And you can put more than one. You know, we're all about like writing ideas right now.
Who can you potentially serve? Write it down below. Next, we wanna talk about how to identify the problem that you can solve for them. So studies have shown that most people's needs and actions
will revolve around three key areas. They wanna get away from pain. They want to get more pleasure or happiness or they want to save time, right? So your membership, if you are struggling to find some of the problems that people could
have, look into that. They want to get away from what pain, what kind of happiness or pleasure you can give them, learning Flamenco is one, right? Or you want to save them time, the content and social media club, that's what she does.
saves them a lot of time. That's why they are willing to pay over a hundred a month to get this content. Okay? So how do you find out? There is what you want
and then there is what your ID and member wants, right? Remember, you can't guess. So if you're gonna go with your existing clients, well, you gotta ask them, right?
get on a call, send them a message, on Facebook if you're on Facebook, if you have their phone number and you've been communicated that way, give them a call,
send them an email to hop on a call, ask them. How can you continue to support them? What can you create to continue to help them in their journey? There is a
very good chance that if you've done a good job when you've worked with them and they're happy with the result that they got, you've already established the
trust. So they are a great candidate to create your next piece of content, okay? And creating a membership for your existing member, imagining inviting all
your past clients, all your alumni to this membership where they can continue to get some type of access to you, something that's very leverage. You know, is that
something that would be of interest to you. So that's if you are going after your existing clients. If you're going after your existing audience, so this is where you have lots of followers,
maybe you have quite a large list, maybe you have a free Facebook group, you have large followers on Instagram and things like that. So you have that visibility. There might be an
opportunity there for you to create a membership around that to help them but again to find out you have to ask them so you can run poll on social media right
you can you can run Facebook lives with Q&As you can write to your list you have to find out what type of problem what type of struggle they have that you could
help them with okay and then finally if you have to go after a new audience well well you don't ask them just yet first you build a relationship you know like
don't go into like a Facebook and find someone and front them and DM them and say you know hey this is what I do you know are you interested you know like
what problem are you struggling with that I can help you with don't do that build a relationship first, show up, support, then you can ask. You got to get
in front of them. So it's gonna be, it's gonna take a bit more time with a new audience, but you have to build a relationship, you have to build a trust
ladder before you can ask. So question for you, what problem can you solve for them, write it down below. So remember these are only guesses right now until
they are confirmed by that audience. Write down everything that comes to mind, then go find out. Go talk to them and go find out. You're going to put things in here
that you think they want and are real problems, but they're real problems. What keeps them up at night is might be something different. Don't think that you
are your audience. You're not. By definition, you're not your audience. Okay? So go and ask them and then update that sheet as you talk to them until you have enough that you have a pattern
for a problem or potential problems that you could solve. And then finally, you start building an interest list. So what is an interest list? An interest list is basically starting to make a
list of people that are raising their hand and saying "hey, yes, Natalie, I am interested". You don't know the price, you don't know exactly what that looks like yet,
but you know you want to help them around a specific area, around a specific topic. And they are raising their hand and they are saying "yes, please let me know when it's available,
I am interested". If you are not able to build that interest list, you are not going to be able to sell to them, and you're not going to get the result that you want, okay? So what audience
are you going to choose to start building an interest list? Based on what we talked about, you might not have this answer here yet. You might have to, you know, go and do more of the
first exercise before, but what audience are you going to choose? And how are you going to reach out to them, you know. Pick one for now that you think you're the most attracted to
and then you can always come back and do this exercise later, okay? The point here is for you to go kind with your gut and what you think is and then talk to people, ask them and then refine.
Based on that, based on the problem that you think you can solve and how you're going to approach them, what do you think would be the best membership model or combo? Which
one do you think you're going to choose? Is it the same that you chose before? Like pick one for now and then you can always come back later here. You can also
go back to the seven membership models PDF so you can have a visual of all the models, okay? The idea here is for you to get a clear picture of what that could
look like. It is going to evolve but you need to start with something and you can keep refining it as you talk with people. Pillar number three is setting realistic expectations. So we're going
to talk about the key metrics that you need to look at to set the right expectations, how to price your membership and the monthly recurring revenue calculator tool that I am going
to share with you. So key metrics when you launch the first time. So this is actually a screenshot of the monthly recurring revenue calculator and what it's
showing you here is the metrics that you need to look at. So you have your list size. So the list size is not just your followers, it's your list meaning the
people that actually have given you their email address and are okay that you communicate with them that way, right? You also have the price that you want to sell your membership.
You have what we call the retention, which is the average stay of a member inside your membership. And those basically are the numbers that you need to look at as well as your conversion rate,
which basically is dictated by how close to your ideal member is your list, right? So are the people on your list, are they the people that you are targeting?
And very often they are not all, and sometimes they are not at all, and you find yourself having to build a new list. So it's important to know from the get-go if your list is in congruency
with your membership idea. Are they the right people? Right? So how do you price your membership? So you want to price your membership based on value. You never want to compete for price
with your competition, but you want to differentiate yourself instead. You are different. You're providing something that they don't. So it's, hopefully it's better, but I would say it's just
different okay and of course you want to price in a way that you are very comfortable selling like you know like you believe you really have to believe
that this is really really worth it and that they are actually getting a good deal because if you're if it's a stretch for you then it's going to be
complicated for you to convert them because they're going to feel it that you're not believing really in the thing. So you also want to price it based on the goal of your
membership. So if it's a front-end membership and your goal is to attract people to another program, you might consider bringing the price lower so that you can get more people, right?
So that's another thing to take into account. so you have two types of memberships really, you have the low price high volume where there is not a lot of your time and that's what we call the top of top of final membership so you know that
in these memberships some people are coming and they they don't participate and they are kind of okay to pay even if they don't participate and there will be some people at the top the one
that participate, that will become ready for your higher price point. Okay? So that's the low price point, high volume. Still good quality inside the membership, but not a lot of support and
accountability. We'll talk about that. And then you have the higher price point, more targeted, more support. And that's what we call the back-end memberships. And you'll see more and more of these
back-end memberships in the back-end of online courses or group coaching programs. So So you have to have gone through the program in order to get into the membership.
And it's a higher ticket, usually 100 or more, because it gives you access to a community of people that have gone through the same training, and you basically continue to get
the support and the accountability from the people that you've gone through the program with. That's a very profitable membership model, as well. So how do you price your membership?
I tell my clients that you have to pick two prices. You picked your item price. So this is the price that you want people to pay and you'll be really happy with.
So for a four-ten membership, you could say, "I want to charge people 67 months." And if people pay 67 months, I'm super happy. They are getting a ton of value.
I have no problem telling them it's 67. If they think it's too much, then they are not my people. You believe that 67 is a great deal for them. Then what you do is you come up with an early birth price.
So it's a lower price point. So it's gonna be, of course, lower than your ideal price. And that's a price that you're okay with to attract your first round of members.
And they are called your founding members. And basically they are the people that are going to help you shape this membership. They are the people that are coming when there is nobody, right?
So they are your beta testers, if you will. And here, you're not really doing it for the money. You're doing it to bring in the right people. It's the low-ingit fruits.
It's your super fans, the people that are there every time you post something. It's for these people. So it's an early birth price because you want to give them a reason,
a good reason to join now and not later at a higher price point. You can also offer them extra bonuses, like extra time with you in exchange for feedback and things like that
so that you can really refine the membership. And you have to be okay with that price point, knowing in your head that it will be 67 eventually. So those people coming at 37, for example,
will stay at 37 for the life that they stay in the membership. If they leave and they come back, though, they will be coming back at 67. So it's really encouraging them to join early
if they want to and to stay. And then we're going to take a look at the calculator. And we're going to start playing with numbers. So this is the recurring revenue calculator
and you have a link below so you can download that. But I think this is really important that you really spend some time here on the calculator to realize and set the right expectations
for your membership and for your launch to get started and then for what to expect. So maybe you expect a number of members or maybe you expect a certain monthly recurring revenue.
And what I want to draw your attention to is how important it is, how many months people stay in the membership. So there are several things that you can look at.
Your list size. So if you have a list size of a thousand people, for example, and you convert at 50%, Then you know you can pretty much get 50 funding members, right?
So say you get 50 funding members, right? And then we said the membership was gonna be 37, but 67, but 37 for the early birth, right? So 37, and then let's say people stay three months,
which is really not allowed for a membership, okay? This is here the recurring monthly revenue that you can expect if you are able to bring in an extra 10 members a month.
So you get 50 at first and then you bring 10 every month. 2,590 for a total of 30K for the year. Now, if you get people to stay nine months, you are almost doubling that for the same amount of work,
except that instead of saying three months, stay nine months so can you see the value of your retention strategy and making sure that you have the right platform for people so that they stay nine months and not three months because it's double
the money almost well it's a lot more money it's not double but it's a lot more money for the same amount the same effort right the same amount of effort for you okay so play with this and then look
Look at some numbers, maybe you have a bigger list if you have a list of 2000 and say you convert at 5% that gives you your 100 members here. And boom, this is your monthly.
And maybe you want to do an early bird at 47. And this is, if they stay nine months, let's say they stay eight months, 8000, right? this is still an $82,000 revenue a year
that you're building right here, just with 100 members paying 47, staying eight months in average, and then you can bring in 10 new members per month.
All right, so play with the numbers and set realistic expectation based on this list side. This list side is going to be your list if it's the right people or your interest list, okay?
So what's gonna be your price strategy? Here you can write down the early bird funding member price that you're thinking about and then your target price.
This will be the price that people pay when you do your big launch, right? when you open the door. Not for your first round, basically, okay? I recommend that you only do a monthly.
You can do a yearly if you want, but it's easier at the beginning to give people just one option. So I know I've seen people do a lifetime. I don't think a lifetime makes sense, honestly,
because why would people pay a lifetime without knowing, unless they love you and they're like, "Okay, I'm gonna run with it." maybe you want to do like maybe this is a cash injection thing where people want to make cash
but I would say if it's 37 a month then maybe the lifetime is I mean I've seen lifetime for like 200 which really makes no sense to me so I would just focus on a monthly honestly to get
started and just give them one option. Of course it's up to you. Now what are your goals based on now that you've played with the calculator? What are your goals for this membership and how you're
going to achieve it? So what's going to be the price, the number of people that you want to get for this first round and how long do you anticipate that they would stay? What would be a good
a good set of metrics here, that you'd be happy with. Now we're getting into pillar number four, which is the content creation and your membership structure.
So we're gonna talk about content, we're gonna talk about the CSA framework, the ideal membership journey and your membership structure. So more content is not equal to more value.
I see sometimes in Facebook group people saying, I don't know what other content to create. I'm not sure I have enough content. It's not about quantity.
It's about quality. People don't want more content. They don't want to consume more videos. They want results. They want a transformation. They want the promise that you give them
when they join the membership. They don't want to watch more videos. They don't want to spend time doing that. they want more results, they want the transformation.
And actually, the number one reason people live a membership is content overwhelm. So giving them more content is actually going to make them live eventually.
So what do you do? How do you get people engaged and staying and consuming your content? Well, you have to look into the CSA framework. C stands for content.
So you gotta give them content, okay? So you can educate them, you can teach them a method or basically deliver the content that your expertise. So it can be a library of videos,
it can be resources, audios, PDFs, any type of media where you can deliver your expertise. But then you also need to give them support and that can come in many ways.
It can come in the formal community and groups, so you can have Facebook groups, forums, or other type of communities. You can have calls, weekly calls,
twice a month calls, monthly calls, Facebook live calls, Facebook lives inside of Facebook group. You can have hot seats, so people can register to get a 15, 20 minute with you.
You have a limited number per month, but they can apply, and if they have a valid, I mean, they can fill out a questionnaire, then you pick a few when you do that,
so they get what we call a hot seat. You can also offer support on other social media platforms, Slack, WhatsApp, and things like that. So support is really the place
where people can get help where they get stuck, right? Because the other reason why people live is that if they're stuck and they don't know what to consume
or they don't know how to move forward. They have a question, they hesitate, they lack focus and they don't know what to do and they need your expertise.
So that's where the support comes in. And then A stands for accountability. We all need accountability. We are our own worst accountability partners.
Even very successful people have accountability partners, they have accountability people that help them do the thing that they say they would do. So that can be achieved through, again,
communities and groups, accountability body programs where you can pair people, so either you do it, or you have a system with a directory where people can see who's looking for a partner
and things like that. And then they can talk to each other. You can do email follow-ups for accountability. How is it going? You know, you said you would do one, two, three.
How did it go with your goals? You can have a reward system that keeps them accountable, showing them how much progress they've done, how much they've accomplished.
You can give them shout-outs and prompts, either in the calls or in the community if you have one, you can make them track their goals. So you can have a place where they can set goals
and then you can periodically have them go back through them and actually say in the platform, "Yes, I've accomplished it," and things like that. And you can show them their progress, right?
So accountability can be achieved many, many ways, but it's important that content alone, I hope you realize that content alone is not gonna do it.
You need support and you need accountability in order for really people to get things going. So that's why even when you have a membership that delivers content that you can download every month,
like the content and social media club, she has a lot of accountability built in because people are busy and they tend to forget. So you have to keep them accountable
and committed to what they signed up for, okay? So you need to build these three things into your membership if you want it to be working and to be profitable.
You're gonna have more or less support and accountability depending on the price point, obviously, but they all need to be there because some of these,
support and accountability can actually be automated. There is a minimum that can be automated right through email and through the platform. So let's talk now about the ideal member
journey. So you have where they are, which is A, to where they want to go, which is C. And to identify your ideal member journey is what is going to help you create your content.
So see it as a journey that they go through. Now not everybody is going to come and join your membership at A. Maybe they're going to be right in the middle.
But you see all these lines, vertical lines are all the steps or stages that they have to go through to get from point A to point Z where they want to go.
And those stages, you can identify them as phases and you can have specific content for these different phases. So here are some ideas for content structure. They can consume the content
at their own pace by going through these different phases. So maybe you have some type of self-assessment at the beginning when they join that identifies, okay, I am in phase three. So if you're in phase
This is real, this is probably how you feel, this is what you need to work on. And this is the core content, this is the content that gets access right away, that
gets available right away as soon as they sign up, that you can start to look at. And then on top of that, you could have some fresh regular content that's dripped every
week or every month on a specific topic, just to get fresh content inside the membership. This is just an idea, I mean, we're just scratching the surface here, but this is how you start
thinking about how am I going to organize my content? What do they get access to right away? What gets stripped? And it really comes down to what do they need to get the result?
So they want to get from A to Z, you break it down and then you start working on every individual piece. So, for your membership structure, you need to look at different things.
You need to look at what content and when, what do they get access to right away and when, what support, do you want to do calls, do you want to do a community, do you want
to do a Facebook group, do you want to do a WhatsApp group, right? So your content, the support and the accountability is part of your membership structure.
And then you're going to look at certain features that you might want to add. Things like do you want points and reward system? Do you want progress tracking?
Do you want to create accountability groups? Do you want to create quizzes with prices? Do you want to set up mini challenges? Do you want to set up retention strategies so that people actually stay nine months
and not two or three? So maybe that starts with creating a memorable onboarding experience to get them committed and fully on board. Maybe it's creating regular roundup emails where you tell them what's been going on
and you select a member of the month or of the week just to reward them and give them the little pad in the back. Maybe you want to run challenges inside your membership.
This is very popular. Maybe you want to release your price bonuses. Maybe you want to do a self assessment to help them find the right content. So if you are going to be one of these memberships
that has tons of resources, it's important that the members understand they don't have to consume everything just what they need but then you need to help them figure out what
they need based on where they are, right? And that's where the self-assessment comes in. Maybe you want to give them an opportunity to get more individual help
from you or someone on your team, right? So how can they reach out to get more help instead of living because they are frustrated and they need help, right? So
So can you offer one-on-one sessions for a fee or something like that? Now we're getting into pillar number 5, our final pillar which is speaking the right tools.
So this is where usually people start and where they get it all wrong, because the minute they get interested into doing a membership, they go online and they start posting "What
What is the best membership solution out there? What platform should I use? And this is the best way to get even more confused because you're going to have people
that have no idea what you want but are going to give you an answer based on what they used or what they are an affiliate link for, basically they don't care about what you want.
They just talk through what their experience is, which can be very, very different than what your experience is. So the first thing is you want to get clear on what you absolutely want
and need before you start asking for help. And I'm all for asking recommendations, by all means you should, but not until you can click clearly articulate what you are looking for. Then we're
We're gonna talk about the factors to take into account before you choose a tool stack. And then three options, the three options that you have when it comes to getting a membership note.
All right, so very common mistake I talked about this. Choose the tool before you know what you want it to do. It's like if I was gonna say I want to buy a car
and then everybody is saying, oh, you should buy this and this, I bought it, it's amazing. And I'm like, wait a minute, you didn't ask me how many kids I have or I plan to have
if I live in the mountain or by the ocean, you're just telling me what you like and you assume that it's gonna work for me as well. This is exactly how I feel every time I see somebody post
and in social media and say what should I use? And people are like, oh, this is the best. No, there is no best, right? There is something that's gonna work great for you,
for your needs, but you need to identify those needs first, okay? So, rent over. Question for you, check the features that you absolutely want in your membership. Based on what we all talked about,
I'm sure you realize that there are many directions that you can go with the membership, And again, there is no right or wrong, you just have to find the best way for you to deliver on
the promise based on where your people are, right? So you've identified a problem, you need to provide a solution. What are the features that you feel you absolutely need in order to make that happen?
Do you need a custom onboarding experience? Do you need to have that experience where the first time they sign up, they get welcomed and there are a set of things that they need to do to get
committed, like fill your profile, join the community, introduce yourself, mark your calendar for the calls, right? Do you need that? Progress tracking. Do you think that this is something
your audience absolutely needs in order to move, you know, through the membership and get results? Self-assessment, are you going to have content that might feel overwhelming to your members?
Do you want those self-assessments to guide them and make them stay focused on their step and showing them the content that they actually need? Not the one that they want to gravitate towards because it feels better?
Do you want to dream content? Or do you want to give them access to everything? Some memberships have access to everything and it's totally fine. It really depends on your target, but for some people giving them access to everything is overwhelming and they will leave because they're like, I don't
know what to do. It's too, too much information, too much content I can't keep up. So do you want drip content? Do you want a combo? Do you want some content right away?
Some content dripped because not all tools can deliver all this feature. So that's why you want to make that exercise before journaling. This is something we haven't talked about,
but this is a great retention strategy because it is allowing you to get the member really involved in the platform, not just as a passive listener
of your videos or reading your text, but actually typing and writing down some of their own words and feelings. So of course, if they leave the membership,
they lose that journal, right? So it's a great retention strategy and you can use this in your trainings, you know, instead of them taking notes on paper
that are gonna be lost, they can actually journal, you can ask them questions and they can answer them like right below the video, right below the audio.
So is that a functionality that you want? Do you wanna run challenges inside the platform? That means that you need some type of content being dripped, right?
They wanted to do three things like that with resources and people being able to come back and run the challenge multiple times. You know, it's kind of like a program inside a program.
So your platform needs to be able to support that. Do you wanna do quizzes and rewards? This is more like gamification stuff, But do you want to get people more engaged in the membership
and complete those quizzes and maybe earn bonuses and unlock surprise content when they complete it? Do you want a community inside the membership?
Do you think your members need and want to connect with each other, to support each other, to partner with each other, to form partnerships? Is that something that you need?
Or can it be some places where they have to log into something different, like a Facebook group? Does it need to be inside? Do you want to mark? Do you want them to be able to mark as favorites
some of the content? Do you want them to be able to easily access videos that they want to watch later? like especially if you have lots of video,
yeah, let me bookmark this to watch later and then they have their playlist, if you will, of videos. Is that something that you want to implement? So, and you probably have more.
I mean, here, if you have other features that you're thinking about that you want, then you can write them down here, okay? So, post the video and then fill this out
just as a starting point. Now, do you have other features that would be nice to have or would be nice to have later on? Write them down as well. Because you need to pick a platform
that is going to allow you to grow as your business grows. So you need to make sure that if there is something you want to do in the future, that it's going to load.
I'm thinking affiliate programs, for example. You want people to be able to promote your membership, members promote your membership and get bonuses or money in exchange for it. Maybe
you have other functionalities that you're thinking about. Maybe the community is something you want to add later. Or maybe you want to add quizzes later.
Maybe you want to be able to have a signature course later or a mastermind. Write all of them down just to make sure that when you pick your tool you can
go through that list and make sure yeah that can be done, that can be done, that can be done. So what do you want to take into account before you choose your tools?
You want to list the tools that you already use and you need to integrate with. The main one to look at is your email system. So if you're using a specific email system and you don't want to move
away from it, then you have to pick a tool that works with it. So that's one criteria that is a non-negotiable, okay? So it's going to weed out some of the other tools that you can't use anymore
and that's okay, but list those tools. I absolutely want to work with Active Campaign or Mailchimp or ConvertKit or Infusionsoft, Entraport, you know, whatever your email system is.
If you're okay to move, then don't put it there. If you're okay to transition, but write them down. Maybe it's Stripe. I absolutely need to take payments to Stripe
for credit card. I absolutely need to take PayPal payment, right? Write down all the tools that you are already used that need to fully be automated and integrated with
the system. Remember, we're building a platform here that's gonna be scalable, so So we want tools to integrate really well with each other. Do you want to host more programs on that platform in the future, like do you want to
host a signature course, a coaching program, a mastermind, free content, challenges, summits? If you plan to do that, then you need to write it down as well because you need to pick a
platform that's going to allow you to do that. Do you want full control for the platform or you're okay to run space on a hosted platform? There is no right or
wrong but you kind of, if you want full control then you need to write it down because it's going to weed out a whole bunch of platforms, okay? Do you have a
team. This is important as well because if you want to build it yourself and if you don't want to hire but build it yourself, then you cannot expect to get
the same result as if somebody was going to build it for you. You want not only going to spend a lot more time, you're not going to get the quality and
you're certainly not going to get the results. So you're going to be very frustrated okay so you're gonna have to you don't have a team and if you want to
build it yourself that's okay but you're gonna have to compromise on some things that is if you want to make money with the membership okay or you you can
learn you know you can spend months and months learning how to do it you will never get it as well as a pro that's sole job is to doing that okay so you
have to see where you are there is no right or wrong but you have to get the right expectations based on that. So once you've made that list, you can pretty
much start thinking about your tool stack. Okay? And the tool stack, there are actually three schools. There are three options. Number one is the hosted platform.
So this is the platform that you pay every month to host your content. catch-up, podia, cartra, news-and-learn, sync-effic, teachable, all these platforms where you
have a subscription and with that subscription you have an account and you can put in your content, you can take payments and people get a login and they can get access.
Then you have WordPress. So WordPress is the most popular platform to build websites. WordPress itself is free, but even though this is something that you can do yourself,
it's very not recommended because it's going to take you a lot of time to learn it and this is not your zone of genius, so your time will be better spent somewhere else.
But this is another option. So if you go WordPress, you should hire or you have the WordPress framework frameworks. So what is a WordPress framework?
A WordPress framework is basically a company that has worked on a framework for a membership using WordPress. So it's leveraging the whole capacity of WordPress, which is the most flexible that it can be
because sky is the limit. But it's also not starting from scratch, so it doesn't take as long, and it's not as expensive. So it's a bridge between the hosted platform
and the WordPress. You get the benefit of a platform that's kind of like almost prebuilt for you, so you save time and money. But it's flexible because it's WordPress,
so you can take it to wherever you want. So as a starting point, this is the best because you quickly get something very professional, superscalable, okay?
So, I've kind of made a little board here to give you an idea of my opinion from having worked with all three, okay? Hosted platforms, so the Kajabi, the Cartra,
the New Zealand, La Podia, et cetera. The main issue is the customization and the scalability because they are made for one specific thing and one specific thing only.
And although you can use the tool to make it do certain things, it's very limited because you are gonna be limited by what the platform can do and the layout is gonna not be flexible either, right?
So you're not gonna have that customization, the gamification and the progress tracking and all that stuff. So depending on your membership model,
it can be okay or it can be a big no-no, okay? WordPress on the other hand is super flexible. Sky is the limit. And the WordPress farmers is super customizable as well
because it's WordPress, okay? Now let's look at the investment. In terms of the investment, the hosted platform is a monthly. So the upfront investment is very interesting
because you don't have to spend an amount of money once, but you spend it every single month, okay? WordPress, the investment upfront is usually not that great
because usually you have to pay upfront, but you pay once and then you just have maintenance, which is a lot, lot, lot cheaper than the monthly for the hosted platform, okay?
And then you have the WordPress framework. So the WordPress framework, like our framework, the membership launch box, is not as expensive as WordPress
because we are not starting from scratch, but it's a one-time payment. So the investment upfront is gonna be a bit more than the hosted platform like Kajabi,
but you don't have to pay us on an ongoing basis, okay, for the platform. So it's kind of in the middle. In terms of speed, and when I mean speed,
I don't mean speed of the website. I mean speed of implementation. For the hosted platform, it's fairly quick, because there's only so much you can do, right?
So you can get something up and running fairly quickly. A lot of it is pre-made anyways. You can plug in your stuff and be done. WordPress, that can take more time, right?
because again, you're starting from scratch, so you have to redefine all the layouts. So it's great 'cause you can do anything, but then that means that you have to come up with the design.
Okay? And then the WordPress framework, actually in terms of speed is great because we actually build the frameworks in like a week. And we can do that because we have several frameworks
that we share with clients and they tell us, okay, we want this, we want it like that, like that. we have tons of examples that we can show people.
And then finally, Scalility, Hosted Platform, not really Scalable. You can't, some of this platform, you can't add certain other programs or things like that that you want.
It's, you just can't. WordPress, very Scalable. And then WordPress Framework, very Scalable, was at as well because it's a WordPress, right? So these kinds of give you an idea of the three
options. And of course, you you understood that our thing is the WordPress framework because we believe that the customization and the scalability is the most important. And this is where the
Osteed platforms fail. I also personally believe that you should not be renting space for your platform, but I understand that some people are okay to do that and that's just fine. So again,
there is no right or wrong here, but you have to kind of decide with which call you want to go. I see people going back and forth all the time. They go to the Osteed platform and they're like,
"Oh, catch-up is not flexible, I can't do this, I can't do that." So they come to WordPress and they're like, "Oh, WordPress is too complicated, "I don't wanna have to handle that."
And they go back to the hosted platform. And then you have people on the hosted platform that say that it's too complicated. So if you ask people,
you're gonna get so many different messages. So I think for you, the easiest is to really look into these three options and make the decision, what do I want?
Do I wanna go with that hosted platform? If you're going to do that, my best advice is to be flexible with everything that you've done up until now in this master class,
and to really learn the tool, the hosted platform that you wanna use really, really well, and then build your membership, design your membership around the tool.
That is the best way to get the most advantage of the tool, and not be frustrated by things that you wanted and that it cannot do. Okay? So what option are you leaning towards and why?
I mean, it's not an easy decision. You really have to look at a number of things. Like I said, you know, there is the budget, there is the time when do you need it,
there is the complexity of your membership. There is the experience that you wanna bring to people. If you know that they're gonna need a lot of handholding
that you probably need something a bit more robust. But again, there is no right or wrong. There are successful membership in all three platforms. Okay, so what option are you going to lean towards?
Write it down in the box and write down why. And if you can, don't make the price a condition. Because if you stop thinking, oh, I will spend when I make money.
No, that means you don't really believe in your idea. If you believe in your idea is what is the accelerator? What do I need to do to get the best experience,
fastest at the best price of course why pay more than you have to write so it becomes not when I succeed what if I succeed but when I succeed okay so speed
matters now I have one more thing for you if you're an action taker and you are actually going to be doing the work I'm offering you a 30 minute clarity and
review session. But for this you have to have done the homework. So mark your calendar, come back and fill out the questionnaire as much as you can, and then with the link below you can book your
certainty and review session with me. And together we can go over your audience, your idea, the problem you're solving, the structure, and the tools. This is not a sales call, this is just me helping you
getting the most out of the masterclass. So I hope to talk to you soon. I hope you're going to take action and until then, thank you so much for watching and I will see you
next time.