Marketing your membership site is all about the perceived value of your site. Members will look at your content and your features to determine value. Members are willing to fork over a membership fee if the perceived value if equal to or higher than your fee. Content is critical when determining membership site value.

Decisions you make regarding your content will make or break your success. There are really only two decisions that you need to make regarding your content: What content will you deliver to your site membership and how will you deliver this content? When making these decisions regarding content keep in mind what your capabilities are and what your members will respond favorably to.

What kind of budget do you have to work with? Can you afford expensive multimedia equipment? Expensive equipment is not necessary. You can still produce quality content with amateur audio and video producers. Your content may differ from other membership sites depending on what your topic is and what your members are looking for in content. Some sites offer teleseminars, or e-lessons, phone consultations, or articles and ebooks. How capable do you feel about producing the above kind of content? Look at what you have previously produced to guide you. Can you provide private coaching? If you have a membership forum ask your members what questions they have on the topic of the site and then set up a teleconference where you answer their questions.

A forum is a great way of staying in touch with your membership so that you can understand their need for content. Make sure you have qualified moderators to answer member forum questions.

Use videos to do tutorials. Make the content personable.

You may also consider a physical product to offer your members such as a book, CD or DVD. Watch out for the expenses involved in producing and shipping physical products though. Physical products have a high-perceived value and you may do very well offering them. Not all of your members will learn in the same way so offer a variety of media such as audio, video, text and physical products.

When it comes to content you want to "over deliver" on the value in order to keep your members happy. In order to know if you are successfully over delivering you will need to have a feedback system in place.

Value and Pricing:

There is definitely a relationship between perceived value and the pricing you can command of the members of your membership site.

The fee you will be able to charge will be determined by the perceived value of your membership site. This can't be stressed enough!

When determining value think about your resources, how much work you intend to put into your site, and how much time you have to put into your site.

There is a broad range of membership site fees from the very low (under $10 a month) to the very high such as $50,000 a year!

In order to have a high perceived value you will also need to have a great offer that you market to your prospective members. You will want to spend a lot of time honing your marketing efforts especially your offer. If you are not a good writer, hire someone to craft your offer for you. Your offer is THAT important, do not skimp on creating your offer. The offer should sell the benefits of your membership.

If you have similar memberships out there being offered by others what type of content are they offering? Is your content of superior quality? What are they charging as a membership fee? What works for other similar membership sites? Do your market research and know what is and what isn't working before you launch your site. Do not undervalue your site's content. If you price your site too low others will perceive it as low value. Value is sometimes equated to financial investment. Charging more than you initially think may make your offer seem like a better value to your prospective members.

Know who your target audience is and tailor your offer to them.

When just starting out you may have to have an initial entry-level fee in order to bring people into your sales funnel and then provide a higher level of service at a higher price. You can always adjust the price as you go along. As you tweak your site you will eventually find the right pricing.

Membership sites are becoming very popular. They provide information to hungry Internet readers and can offer a range of content such as mentoring or coaching, articles and ebooks, product reviews, results of tests or studies, reference information, or a place to share information about a shared interest or hobby. No matter how different membership sites are from each other they have one thing in common: they all allow access by members who have paid for the priviledge of being on the site and receiving the information or resources contained in the site. Some sites have a free trial or a entry level that is free or costs less than a higher level and there are sites that cost less than others but the common thread is that members receive benefits that the general public do not.

You might now ask, "Why would anyone pay for information when the Internet is a super highway of information?"

The answer is that membership sites provide information that is of a higher quality or information that is not available elsewhere on the Internet. It is very specialized information that is contained on membership sites. Being a member of one of these sites gives an edge over those who are not members. There is value in being a member as opposed to not being a member. The value is equal to or greater than the membership fee. The information may be hard to find or time-consuming to find and this is what makes it valuable to go to one site and have the information contained in that one convenient location.

Membership sites appeal to all age groups all over the globe because everyone has a need to be filled and smart marketers are looking for those needs so that they can fill them with membership sites. At the present time membership sites are generating BILLIONS of dollars each year for site owners. Membership sites have revolved around the need for people to share a hobby or to form book clubs, find out how to make something, or learn how to make money online. Membership sites have been designed around the need to find a mate, or find others of the same faith. Membership sites have been started in order to mentor others or to give product reviews.

Those individuals interested in taking advantage of membership sites and wish to start their own need to find a hot topic and one that they have knowledge about. Then they have to design a membership site around that topic. They need to set up the site so that members will be able to easily navigate it and be able to use the resources and information on the site. The site owner needs to build real value into the site and to maintain the site with fresh content on a regular basis.

There are endless possibilities when designing a membership site not only concerning what topic to focus your site on but in the content that you provide to your members. Your content can include informational products such as articles, videos, ebooks, teleseminars, coaching as well as forums, chat rooms and physical products such as books, CDs and DVDs.

You have been doing a lot of reading about membership sites and know the value and potential of running one. You worry though that despite the possibilities you may not be as successful as others. How do you know if running a membership site will be right for you?

There are so many factors involved in running a successful membership site that you are right to question if you will be able to be successful at it. Not everyone is able to run a membership site the correct way. Some do fail, just like any other business. There are so many questions a new membership site owner may have such as do I have a good enough topic? How do I control the access to the site? How do I integrate billing? The fact that the income is residual, ongoing and monthly has a lot to do with the fact that the idea of running a membership site is so enticing to online marketers.

Perhaps the most important key to your success as a membership site owner is that you must be perceived as being an expert in the topic of the membership site. You also must be respected in the field. Not just anyone can make a go of running a successful membership site. To be a success the owner of the membership site will have to have a background in the industry, knowledge, and industry contacts. The owner will also have to be a good salesperson, as they will have to sell the benefits of the site to prospective members.

A membership site is not just something that you can put together and forget about and expect it to continue to bring in revenue for you month after month. You have to actively promote, maintain, and add to your membership site on a daily basis. You need to post new material, interact with site members, tend to customer service issues, and stay up-to-date on industry news so that your site projects the current trends in the industry.

You will know if a membership site is right for you if you can address all of the issues outlined above and with confidence say, "yes I can!"

Membership site ownership will be right for you if you feel passionate about the topic of the site, have a great deal of knowledge about the topic and are viewed as an expert in the field by others interested in the topic. You can become an expert or at least present an era of being an expert by utilizing business forums and forums on the topic and posting informative posts about the topic. It will take time to build up a following of those who look up to you as an expert but it can be done.

Is running a membership site right for you? By the time you have read this article you should know the answer to this question.