Membership Mastermind: Starting a Membership Community

If you’ve used any social media platforms, there’s no doubt you’ve heard people discussing a membership community they’re a part of, or maybe you’ve been invited to one yourself.

Building an online community is one of the best ways to engage with your customers, users, or members. It helps you break down barriers and offer something truly exceptional.

If you haven’t considered starting your own membership community yet, there are many benefits in doing so.

You’re in the right place to learn how to create a membership community of your very own!

What is a Membership Community?

A membership community is a quiet place, tucked away from the confusion and buzz of social media, where your members pay a nominal fee to access your community. It’s a place, usually on a third-party platform, where your members can pay a nominal fee to access your community.

In doing so, you can provide them with exclusive content, meaningful interactions and the opportunity to access member perks such as discounts for long-term and loyal members.

This helps to build brand loyalty, increase engagement, and keep your members in the loop.

The perks sound great, right? But with anything new, there are always difficulties when getting started.

You might be asking questions like:

• What software can I use to start a membership community?

• How do I get the most out of my community?

• What can I offer my members?

• Why should I start a membership community?

Maybe you’re not confident about starting your community on a new platform, worrying about what it entails.

Perhaps you’ve already established a group on Facebook and you’re unsure how to migrate them to a new, unfamiliar platform to offer them even more value.

Well, fear not. We’ve addressed the most common concerns in our post 3 Tips for Building a Membership and Subscription Community... but don’t leave just yet!

Stick around, read on and take note of all the extraordinary things that can come from your new membership community with Ugenie.

Your Community is Waiting for You

We know it can be difficult to run a business on a crowded platform that’s not suitable for your needs. You give away your expertise, spend money you aren’t earning back and all with a lack of guidance.

Social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram serve a purpose for boosting brand awareness and making yourself heard when first starting out, but times are changing.

People aren’t consuming media on these platforms the way they used to.

It’s not that your content isn’t relevant anymore, it’s that the algorithm has changed. This means your posts are probably not promoted in the same way they used to be.

It’s a constant battle, keeping up with the whims of these giant social media platforms.

Putting all that effort in and concentrating your time and attention in the wrong direction can leave you feeling despondent and (even worse) out of pocket...but don’t worry, we’ve got you covered!

A Membership Community That Supports Your Business

Within your community, you will be able to interact easily with your members on a personal level. By initiating and participating in discussions, it’s easier to form connections and foster brand loyalty, while at the same time discovering how to better your service.

Through the delivery of content and other services on your new membership community platform, you’ll be offering real value, so you’ll be able to charge a fee for access, generating revenue. This allows you to provide the best content possible and enables you to put money into refining your business.

You can use this profit to go on courses to learn new things that will benefit your community or to put into a new service for your members. Whatever you decide to do with it will be worth your hard work.

Above all, the connections you make with your membership community will help you long term when refining your strategy.

Coming to know your audience, like how they consume content, what they want to see or read, and how they engage with other members, will help you to establish the types of content they will be interested in. Ultimately, this will increase engagement and strengthen retention.

The longer your members stay by your side, the more you can give back to them. We recommend delegating tasks to your active community members as time goes on. Not only will this incentivise members to participate, but it will also allow you to use your time to focus on other tasks to further your business.

How to Bring Members to Your Community Platform

Finding members for your community can seem a daunting task, but luckily others like you have developed tried and tested ways to ensure success on this front.

Have a read of The Membership Guys’ blog post, where they will tell you how they built their audience.

But also remember you already have prospective members – your social media followers. Work on converting your following to members first, before expanding your search for new members.

Generate excitement for your membership community by posting behind the scenes content, upcoming events and snippets of content. This FOMO, fear of missing out, will help galvanise and engage your group even more.

Also, when you successfully transition members from one platform to another, ensure you have a way to welcome them. You can find a range of templates at ugenie.io that will be helpful for you. One we recommend using is the community joiner welcome survey.

So you see, a membership community can feel daunting at first, but it’s a valuable tool to have at your disposal.

We’ve made Ugenie intuitive for you, taking away the headaches associated with building a membership community that will flourish and thrive, generating revenue and boosting brand loyalty to new heights!

If you are a community leader, or in the business of community, try a Ugenie hub, for free, for 45 days.