Member portal vs Digital download? Your thoughts

7 replies
Looking for your thoughts, opinions on what you feel are the advantages or disadvantages of putting content behind a membership site vs selling the same info in pdf digital download.

why choose one over the other? which do you prefer?
#digital #download #member #portal #thoughts
  • Profile picture of the author Steve B
    You don't have to "choose" one or the other - I use both at the same time. It's just that some downloads are protected in the membership site and some are not.

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  • Profile picture of the author LesterRussell
    For me it would depend on how much material i have in store.

    If i have sufficient quality material to sustain me updating the site regularly i would opt to go for a membership site as that would potentially earn me more in the long term if customers renew their membership for the updated content.

    However, if i would rather create a product that does not require much updating after launch, then definitely a downloadable pdf would be the way to go.
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  • Profile picture of the author fpforum
    I personally feel with a member portal you have more control. Some of the plugins I use will let me know which IP's have accessed the download, how many times it's been downloaded..etc. It just gives me a little bit more information on the tracking side of things.

    As mentioned above, I think it really comes down to what you're offering. For a well developed product that is costly and has had lots of time and energy put into it, you might wanna go with a member area. For something that only costs a few bucks and most people might not really need a member area to handle support, re-downloading..etc. then a simple download link might be all you need!
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  • Profile picture of the author EldonArredondo
    I would go with member portal, it gives you more control and opportunity to sell them more, put pixel on different pages etc..

    But if you want to keep it lean and mean while beginning your journey, nothing beats simple pdf download!
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  • Profile picture of the author Randall Magwood
    Protection of digital products are important, but once a customer has your product in hand, there's almost nothing you can do to prevent them from distributing it wherever they want online. If there exists a software that can only give 1 license per purchase for each ebook download so that distribution of the ebook/digital product is prevented.... then i would purchase it. The closest thing i've found to it is DLGuard.
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    • Profile picture of the author mrdeflation
      Originally Posted by Randall Magwood View Post

      Protection of digital products are important, but once a customer has your product in hand, there's almost nothing you can do to prevent them from distributing it wherever they want online. If there exists a software that can only give 1 license per purchase for each ebook download so that distribution of the ebook/digital product is prevented.... then i would purchase it. The closest thing i've found to it is DLGuard.

      Then what about some member only access where they can view the material but NOT download it. They can print it all they want, read it all they want but its in wordpress article/pages format?
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  • Profile picture of the author JohnnyFanta
    I think long term I would go with membership control but if it's just a short term thing then I'd go with a digital download
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