Building a membership site? Here's exactly how I built mine.

[jonb]

A few months back, it became clear to me that the time was now to build a membership site for my business (we publish a newsletter that teaches people how to become children's book writers). Every step of the way, the single biggest source of information for me has been this forum. So, now that my site is up, running and absolutely knocking the socks off my customers, I wanted to pay it back by telling you exactly how I built my site. I'm considering putting this all into an ebook format with camtasia videos, but I wanted to share it here first for free.

My total cost was about $300 and the thing works better than I could have ever dreamed.

First, the site is The CBI Clubhouse - a Community for Children's Book Writers if you want to have a look.

1. I decided to build a wordpress-based site. It was a great decision, because WP is so easy to use and there are plug-ins to handle every functionality. So my first step was downloading Wordpress.

2. Using the advice on this board, I got space with hostgator.com They kick ass -- no problems whatsoever and set up was a breeze. I registered my domain with namecheap.com. Total cost so far: about $20.

3. I found a great magazine style theme called Branford at this site: BranfordMagazine by DER PRiNZ A premium magazine style WordPress theme It was free, really nicely designed and very flexible. I think it really looks great -- not like a blog at all. It was a little tricky to determine how to tweak it, but then I found an ebook called "Sites that Soar" at WordPress themes made easy - Sites that Soar! in which the author tells you exactly how to make the Branford design your own. $17 for that ebook that saved me countless hours. Cool! total cost so far: $37

4. After much searching and consideration, I decided to go with WP Wishlist (wpwishlist.com Home) as my membership site plugin. It was $97 and it's an utter steal at that price. What fantastic software! It's so well-designed and intelligently planned, and it seems to know, as if by magic, exactly what I need to do and it makes it plain how to do it. My #1 nightmare going in was how to import 3000 current subscribers -- with a wide range of subscription expiration dates -- into my site. I was literally planning on taking two weeks to enter each one at a time. With Wishlist, the entire process took about 20 minutes. Unreal. I could go on and on about this software, but I'll just tell you that, if you're planning a WP based membership site, I can't imagine doing any better than Wishlist. Total cost so far: $134

4. For my logo, I again found the right place to go in the Warrior Forum: Crowdspring.com. Awesome -- so much better than hiring a designer sight unseen. I got a killer logo done for $175, and the designer knows just what I'm looking for and is now doing other graphic work for me. Total cost $309.

And that's it. I added a nice forum plugin called SimplePress, signed up at Viddler to host my videos and I am good to go.

This was an exciting and fun process, and it couldn't have happened without you guys. I hope my tips help some of you along your own membership site journey.

Jon

[jonb]

two other quick things to mention: Wishlist integrates seamlessly with 1shoppingcart, making it exceptionally easy to sign up new members and have them instantly integrated into the site, with full recurring billing. It's really hands-off.

Also, you can set specific member levels to see any page you choose. So, my customers whose subscriptions expire this month will see a "renew now!" page first until they renew, at which time they'll automatically be upgraded to the next level without me having to do anything.

Also, Wishlist has sequential upgrades, so you can, say, set 12 membership levels that a customer passes through -- one each month. This way, you can dole out information every month rather than making it all accessible at once. Very handy if you're selling tutorials and don't want people to join for one month, download everything and then cancel. All of this stuff is "off the shelf" with Wishlist -- no extra programming needed

BTW, I'm not a Wishlist affiliate. This 100% pure appreciation from a very satisfied customer.

[Benjamin959]

better than amember and memberfire ?

[kenj]

Jon

This is great info for me. I am preparing to do something similar so this gives me an easy starting point. The only difference with my website will be that all the content will be from the members and I just supply the shell fir their content.

One Question

Do You think that the number of members will matter to the system you have set up. If you had 2 million members - would it crash the software?

[jonb]

@buylowsellhigh I had a look at amember, but it was over my head. It was just too daunting to learn and I didn't have the time to do it. I'm sure it's fantastic, but I needed something plug and play. And wishlist is certainly that. I didn't look at the other software you mention.

Originally Posted by kenj

Do You think that the number of members will matter to the system you have set up. If you had 2 million members - would it crash the software?

You might ask the wishlist folks if they have any limit. So far, I've imported about 1500 of my subscribers into the site without a hitch.

[samstephens]

Hi Jon,

Congrats on the new membership site!

There's another interesting lesson for new players in your post: you went out and found the right solution for your project, and you bought it.

A lot of people cringe at spending money on their business. I know some people are having financial issues, but $300 is VERY cheap to start a new business.

I often see people struggling to get things off the ground for months and months (and in some cases, even years later) because of selecting solutions based soley on price (usually free).

Sure, there is good free software out there (such as Wordpress), but as Jon found, selecting the right tools for the job leads to a very smooth launch.

Well done on the new site, Jon!

cheers
Sam

[jonb]

thanks Sam.

And may I point out that the only other option I seriously considered was DLGuard -- but it turned out not to be quite right for my precise setup (I'm linking the membership site to my older site which had some software incompatibilities).

DLGuard is a great option, and Sam was fantastic about answering my questions. I'm sure I'll be incorporating it into something I do in the near future.

[united99]

An offline client of mine was asking my advice on setting up a membership tutorial site. I think I just found the answer!!)
Thanks Jon. Good luck with the site.

[raynman]

Thanks for breaking this down for us like this. Showing us the the cost of every step the way you did really helped put things in perspective. I get overwhelmed by numbers (bad for someone with an MBA) and especially those with a $$ in front of it when it comes to figuring out how much to invest in these things. It all sound so affordable and so easy. I could see how it would get addicting.

I don't know about putting up a forum but there are a couple ideas I have that it could be useful.

[manjit129]

I have been procrastinating for a long time now. I like what you have done and I am going to follow in your footsteps.

Thanks dude for the post.

[jonb]

My pleasure. Like I said, I couldn't have done it without this forum, so it's the least I could do.

@raynman - I looked at a couple of forum plugins. BBPress was good, but SimplePress was really just that: simple. Plus it has lots of powerful features.

[John Taylor]

Nice post Jon.

I've been through a similar process with my new
membership blog, although I used a different set
of components.

Good luck with your new site.

John

[JamesFraze]

Originally Posted by kenj

Jon
Do You think that the number of members will matter to the system you have set up. If you had 2 million members - would it crash the software?

It will depend on the backend database that stores and handles things. Likely it is mysql, which is designed for speed, not stability (don't get me wrong, I love MySQL, but it has it's place).

If you have millions of members, you will probably want a different backend database (like PostgreSQL, which is designed to take a hammering, but is a bit slower than MySQL).

The software designers will (should) know the limits of their software, but as a rule of thumb that should help you determine on your own.

[JamesFraze]

Originally Posted by samstephens

Hi Jon,
A lot of people cringe at spending money on their business. I know some people are having financial issues, but $300 is VERY cheap to start a new business.

I often see people struggling to get things off the ground for months and months (and in some cases, even years later) because of selecting solutions based soley on price (usually free).

Sam,

it's not that spending money is an issue - it's that there are so many products that don't deliver, or will only deliver for someone that has experience. If I knew I could invest a few months and $30000 - only to have it payed back shortly thereafter I'd be tickled to beg and borrow to get that $30k. it's not about the price, it's about delivering on the promise.

Most people have already spent more than $300 on products that simply do not perform like they promised they could.

If a membership site costs me money, then it has to make me more money or provide immediate value somehow - else it's worthless to me, no matter the cost. This is of course assuming that I am working the plan that I just bought.... hehe

I of course am not singling out any product (like DLguard), I'm talking generalities

[Nathan Denton]

Hi Jon,

Great post and thanks for the info. You have outlined a really simple process to create a WP Membership site. In terms of your site, what sort of content do you provide on a monthly basis to keep your members coming back?

[eddiebarkie]

Hi Jon - hello from Arkansas this evening. Thank you much for the great information ! I also followed the links you gave and found more good (basic) information that I didn't know. I apprecite your Warrior attitude toward sharing....ed...

[Ron Rajan]

Hi Jon,

great post....could you also talk about how you get your content created for your site? Is it 100% outsourced or do you develop your own content each month?

Ron

[jonb]

Re: content

First off, we've published a newsletter for 19 years, so we have lots of content around to repurpose.

Here are the other types of content we'll be delivering:

(by the way, stop by the site -- The CBI Clubhouse - a Community for Children's Book Writers -- and have a look. You'll get a good sense for the content we launched with)

1. audio interviews (in our case, with children's authors) done over Skype. recorded with CallGraph (a free utility)

2. Camtasia tutorials. We do a few things: website walkthroughs (where we take you through publisher's websites and comment on how to "read the tea leaves" about what they're looking for; software/online tools tutorials (I have one up about setting up Google reader so you can become an expert about inything in a matter of hours); video manuscript critiques, etc.

3. webcam videos. We have a Q&A features where members can e-mail questions and we answer them on video; we do a regular commentary about top publishing subjects of the day and so on.

4. Podcasts. Using existing articles as a base, these are brief recorded tutorials in MP3 format.


And we'll be adding webinars, teleseminar recordings, member uploads and more. Content is king -- we really wanted to blow folks away from day one with the quantity and quality of our content. And it's working -- we were up for no more than an hour when a customer said "Simply Outstanding. This is the most complete site I have ever seen on the topic of writing for children. This is truly a blessing. Thank you."

That. Felt. Great.

[lstoops]

Jon,

This is really great info! Your site looks great. Quick question...why did you choose Viddler instead of YouTube? Thanks!

[jonb]

Hi Lisa -- thanks for the compliment!

I went with Viddler because the quality is higher and I can make the videos completely private. It defeats the purpose of a paid membership site if the videos can be viewed for free by going directly to the hosting site.

Best,

Jon

[samstephens]

it's not that spending money is an issue - it's that there are so many products that don't deliver, or will only deliver for someone that has experience. If I knew I could invest a few months and $30000 - only to have it payed back shortly thereafter I'd be tickled to beg and borrow to get that $30k. it's not about the price, it's about delivering on the promise.

Hi James,

You're absolutely right!

There ARE a lot of products out there that don't deliver, and price isn't always an indicator.

The ones I was talking about in particular were the ones often seen that say "I was a product that does this, this, this, and this, and it has to be free or really cheap."

But as your brought up, even when you buy commerical software, it isn't always the solution you wanted, whether it be poor quality, not matching your requirements, or simply too hard to use.


The issue I was speaking about, though, was the idea of looking for the cheapest tool, not the best tool for the job.

This often leads to extended periods of indecision, and indecision is always more of a business-killer than selecting the wrong tool, then needing to try again.

Does this make more sense?

cheers
Sam

[RevenueRabbi]

so is your site a paid membership? could you share how you got your first members, etc.??

[jonb]

Originally Posted by BizBooks

so is your site a paid membership? could you share how you got your first members, etc.??

We've been a monthly subscription newsletter (in print and electronic versions) for about 19 years, so we have base of customers already. They're all being migrated into the membership site (which includes a link to download the current issue of the newsletter, so it's all being positioned to them as an extra benefit rather than a new product they need to purchase). Needless to say they're thrilled about this, and I believe the enormous extra value of the membership site will really help with customer retention.

We'll get new members two ways:

1. The page on our existing website that used to sell the newsletter subscription now promotes the newsletter + membership site combo

2. Anyone who gets directed to the membership site by other members, search engine listings or our own promotions will only be able to view the main page and some freebies. when they try to click on anything, they'll be brought to a sales page where they'll need to subscribe to access the site. Wishlist makes doing this really easy, and it's very powerful.

To see this in action, go to The CBI Clubhouse - a Community for Children's Book Writers and try clicking on some content.

Best,

Jon

[jonb]

One more cool tool that anyone with a Wordpress based members site (or just a wordpess blog) should consider. It's a plugin called Seesmic that allows members to post video comments to any piece of content. It's very easy to install and use. this is one of the reasons I love wordpress -- so many cool and free goodies out there to add on.

The URL is http://www.seesmic.com/

[lstoops]

Duh, thanks Jon!

[Lance]

This is the same membership script I have decided to use on my upcoming projects. I looked at several and chose this one. Many people don't know it, but it is produced by Tracy Childers and Stu McLaren, both well respected internet marketers.

By the way, there will be a major feature upgrade to it around January 15th. After that, they intend to start promoting it more. I don't know if the price will go up or not, but I'm buying the unlimited site license for $297 now. Plus with that license, they throw in some videos about other plugins that are useful for membership sites and how to use them. Around 90% of them are free.

Lance

[elsiedixon]

My sister is a member of your site and says your website walk throughs rock! Thank You for sharing your info.

[Brandon Johnson]

Thanks Jon... that is a great solution for the eternal question of what membership site scripts to use.

For mine, I did use DLGuard (Good work Sam!). In my implementation, I installed Wordpress for my front end site.... For my protected membership site, I power it with Joomla. DLGuard was really easy to install in the footer of the Joomla site, thus protecting the whole installation.

Thanks for sharing!

[Kurt Chrisler]

Awesome information!

[dail]

This a a great site and an inspiration to others.

Thanks for your post.

[jonb]

My pleasure, everyone.

Can't wait 'til the 15th to see what other goodies Wishlist has to offer!

BTW -- regarding my website walkthrough: it's a Camtasia video that non-members can view. if you want to check it out, go Tour the Clubhouse - The CBI Clubhouse - a Community for Children's Book Writers

Youc an also see the sales letter I use to convert visitors into members here: Join the Fightin’ Bookworms! - The CBI Clubhouse - a Community for Children's Book Writers

[Alan Petersen]

Hey Jon, thanks for all the great info! Your site looks awesome. I'm setting up a membership site for one of my niches so the info you've shared has been fantastic and it's much appreciated!

I was wondering on the viddler videos you mark them private but then inside your membership area do the members need to enter a special password to view the videos? I was going to go the self-hosted route but using viddler would be a great bandwidth saver but I thought if the videos were marked private the members would then need to plugin another password once insde to view each video hosted with a third pary service provider like viddler.

Thanks!

Alan

[write-stuff]

This is a great little case study and example of how some imagination and a little perserverance can really pay off. Nice one, Jon. Thanks for posting your story.

- Russ

[Amanda_Davis]

another vote for WP Wishlist Member - good software that's super easy to use

P.S. Love the site jonb - seems under-priced to me!

[jonb]

Originally Posted by Amanda_Davis

another vote for WP Wishlist Member - good software that's super easy to use

P.S. Love the site jonb - seems under-priced to me!

Thanks, amanda. The writing market is a great niche -- except for pricing. Writers are frugal by nature At any rate, that is a charter member price -- it will go up at some point in the near future.


Regarding making Viddler videos private -- it can be done but it's not obvious. I had to search for the solution. Here's it is (at the end of the thread) Viddler.com - Forums - Support - Sharing Private Videos

[Joanne Greco]

Thanks for sharing your story Jon!

Is your site for people who are already authors or it is open to people who want to get information on how to get started? I ask because my daughters (10 & 13) want to write and illustrate a children's adoption book.

[jonb]

Originally Posted by Joanne Greco

Thanks for sharing your story Jon!

Is your site for people who are already authors or it is open to people who want to get information on how to get started? I ask because my daughters (10 & 13) want to write and illustrate a children's adoption book.

As soon as someone sits down to write -- they're an author! In other words, lots of unpublished folks are members. We do our best to get the "un" out of that description, though

If you want to give it a shot, sign up using your name -- the COPPA rules limit the information we can accept from kids 13 and under. But they'd certainly be welcome to enjoy everything on the site!

best,

Jon

[peter gibson]

That is a brilliant sales letter/pitch. I don't think I've read anything better or more convincing. I don't write children's books and I almost signed up lol!!! I love your site and I'm glad you shared this.

[Joanne Greco]

As soon as someone sits down to write -- they're an author!

Yes, I believe that also....what I should have said was "published" authors.

Thanks....I'll pass the information over to them and see what they think.

[jonb]

Originally Posted by peter gibson

That is a brilliant sales letter/pitch. I don't think I've read anything better or more convincing. I don't write children's books and I almost signed up lol!!! I love your site and I'm glad you shared this.

Thanks, Peter. I spent 20 years writing sales copy for others, but it's always harder to write it for myself! I agonized over that copy for days, but I'm pretty pleased with it.

[Andrew Maule]

Awesome thread, thanks a lot for posting this.

[countonuspr]

Thank you for sharing this valuable information. That is a very interesting niche and a great example of how you can start a membership website and make money online in other niches away from Internet marketing. Good job, and this is helpful.

[Charann Miller]

Wow thanks for sharing, I'm planning on launching my own membership site this month and this information will come in very handy. Your niche sounds like fun too.

[rsteadm2]

Hi Jon,

I have to say this is an awesome thread that you have started. You have really given some quality information here. I say thank you sir!

Ray S.

[Johnnyboy83]

I love this post, short to the point and I learn a few tips that some expensive course did not teach me at all and best of all it was free.

[Nathan Hangen]

I took a look at your site. It is very professional looking and very classy. Well done. How is your membership rate looking at the moment?

[Scott Million]

This is great Jon, I almost bought another WP membership pluggin, but this is over the top, especially for the price.

Quick Q's:

1) Is it easy to integrate with an affiliate program?

2) Can you collect customer leads into Get Response or Aweber?

I sent these questions to the admin of the member site, but if you have a moment I'd love to hear your experience.

Bravo on the site and post. Just goes to show that you can really turn your passion into a full blown business with membership sites.

Children's books authors? I bet you 100s of people you met said it would never work...or maybe you have a more positive circle of buddies than I do . Either way, nicely done. A great testament to all.

Originally Posted by jonb

A few months back, it became clear to me that the time was now to build a membership site for my business (we publish a newsletter that teaches people how to become children's book writers). Every step of the way, the single biggest source of information for me has been this forum. So, now that my site is up, running and absolutely knocking the socks off my customers, I wanted to pay it back by telling you exactly how I built my site. I'm considering putting this all into an ebook format with camtasia videos, but I wanted to share it here first for free.

My total cost was about $300 and the thing works better than I could have ever dreamed.

First, the site is The CBI Clubhouse - a Community for Children's Book Writers if you want to have a look.

1. I decided to build a wordpress-based site. It was a great decision, because WP is so easy to use and there are plug-ins to handle every functionality. So my first step was downloading Wordpress.

2. Using the advice on this board, I got space with hostgator.com They kick ass -- no problems whatsoever and set up was a breeze. I registered my domain with namecheap.com. Total cost so far: about $20.

3. I found a great magazine style theme called Branford at this site: BranfordMagazine by DER PRiNZ A premium magazine style WordPress theme It was free, really nicely designed and very flexible. I think it really looks great -- not like a blog at all. It was a little tricky to determine how to tweak it, but then I found an ebook called "Sites that Soar" at WordPress themes made easy - Sites that Soar! in which the author tells you exactly how to make the Branford design your own. $17 for that ebook that saved me countless hours. Cool! total cost so far: $37

4. After much searching and consideration, I decided to go with WP Wishlist (wpwishlist.com Home) as my membership site plugin. It was $97 and it's an utter steal at that price. What fantastic software! It's so well-designed and intelligently planned, and it seems to know, as if by magic, exactly what I need to do and it makes it plain how to do it. My #1 nightmare going in was how to import 3000 current subscribers -- with a wide range of subscription expiration dates -- into my site. I was literally planning on taking two weeks to enter each one at a time. With Wishlist, the entire process took about 20 minutes. Unreal. I could go on and on about this software, but I'll just tell you that, if you're planning a WP based membership site, I can't imagine doing any better than Wishlist. Total cost so far: $134

4. For my logo, I again found the right place to go in the Warrior Forum: Crowdspring.com. Awesome -- so much better than hiring a designer sight unseen. I got a killer logo done for $175, and the designer knows just what I'm looking for and is now doing other graphic work for me. Total cost $309.

And that's it. I added a nice forum plugin called SimplePress, signed up at Viddler to host my videos and I am good to go.

This was an exciting and fun process, and it couldn't have happened without you guys. I hope my tips help some of you along your own membership site journey.

Jon

[ss61288]

wow! you have saved me a whole lot of time cheers jon

[Mark Dulisse]

Yes...great information.

I too would like to know about integration with GetResponse and does it support recurring billing with Clickbank?

[dmarze]

Originally Posted by kenj

Jon

This is great info for me. I am preparing to do something similar so this gives me an easy starting point. The only difference with my website will be that all the content will be from the members and I just supply the shell fir their content.

One Question

Do You think that the number of members will matter to the system you have set up. If you had 2 million members - would it crash the software?

It will take some time to get 2 million members and you will have time to upgrade your software with new better verrsion.