Trial Price for Membership Site?

A trial could make the difference of closing the deal. I don't think there are as many "tire kickers" around as there are crappy products. If you have a solid membership that provides quality "how to" information, people will stay after the trial is up.

Take a look at all the IM launches. How many of those courses are designed to help people succeed, or provide what they say they would? Not too many. I've heard many marketers say people need to take action and meanwhile don't deliver the information that makes the whole difference. Most courses and many memberships provide rehashed content with a bunch of holes.

I wouldn't be worried about getting screwed over by your customers. I would be more concerned about providing a valuable service and that you market your membership honestly and over deliver.

If you provide amazing quality, support, and continue to update your membership with fresh content... you WILL retain the majority of your members. As well, if you do the above and honestly care about your members--providing them quality and are not in it JUST to fill your pockets... your brand will grow and so will the word of mouth advertising.

A $1 trial/14 days will get people in the door more than a flat fee, and if customers feel they are getting their money's worth for the price of the recurring fee--and feel you will continue to deliver the goods, they'll stick with you. Of course there will be some people that will bail, but really, most won't if they have enough reasons to stick around.

I hope this helps,

Bryan

Thanks Bryan that was exactly the type of answer I was looking for

I totally agree with you when it comes to offering quality material and 100% customer support this is something that I will ensure to the best of my efforts. The main things I will be focusing on with my membership site is quality but more importantly customer satisfaction as I feel that this is the most important part of any membership site.

Since customer satisfaction includes quality of material and service as well as pretty much everything else that is important I am hoping that a trial price will show people how high our quality really is.

You just made it very clear to me that no matter what the trial price those who actually want the material, those who actually act and those who are sincere will stay subscribed to my membership site.

I will keep sorting out some trial price figures in my head.

Thank you for your advice, much appreciated.

Look at guys like Jason Fladlien and Lee McIntyre. They start with $1 trials (generally 14 days) then bill the rest.

I know both of those guys make WAY more than 10k a month just from their membership site.

You might also consider offering memberships in 6 and 12 month bulk pricing as well because last time I checked, unless there's an awesome community they won't back out from, I'd say most will cancel their membership in 2 or 3 months...

At least with 6 to 12 month bulk pricing structure, you're guaranteed to have members for 6 months to a year (of course you'll be getting paid in advance, and most likely would have to offer a small discount).

Oh, and about trial memberships... I ran a membership site in 2007 and I offered a free trial, then later, I changed it to a 0.99c trial. The people who were willing to pay 0.99c ended up converting way better than the free trial members. In fact, many of the "free trialers" never had a means to pay for a subscription... they were just freebie seekers.

Just my two cents.

Try $4.97 for the first month and then $19 there after. The retention rate is kept high, just make sure you overdeliver, thats the main factor for people staying on!