How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 9: Selling Your Membership Site

Written by Yaro

October 01, 2007 | 7 Comments | Print This Article

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Membership Site For SaleSelling your membership site is a real option and worth considering as an exit strategy. If you enjoy the set-up and launch of a membership site, but the ongoing maintenance is not a role you want to perform, you can sell out and move on.

Some people deliberately focus on site flipping, buying under performing sites, optimizing them to increase profits, and selling for a nice gain. There’s no reason you can’t do the same with membership sites, once you understand how they work, or you could start sites from scratch with the intention of building them up quickly to sell off for a big profit.

It’s worth bearing in mind that selling your site is an option at any point. You may have problems with marketing or dealing with attrition, or you just don’t want the responsibility anymore, so your best option is to hand over the site to someone else.

You will get more money selling a profitable, autopilot membership site, but that isn’t necessarily a point you can reach by yourself and if your focus is moving elsewhere, selling your site today is an option. There are plenty of people interested in buying web property at all stages of development.

Preparing for Sale

I have not personally sold my own membership site as I write this, however I have purchased and sold several sites over the past seven years and I know the process very well. Selling a membership site is no different from selling any form of web property, buyers are interested in the same metrics and the more you can do to present your site in a good light, the more money you will make.

If you have ever taken an interest in buying businesses in the real world (bricks and mortar) you might be quite surprised when you head online and investigate the web property marketplace. Web property can be very under priced when compared to their real world counterparts. This might be because the whole idea of buying and selling websites is very new, or it could be because of the virtual nature of the asset. Whatever the reason, your job when selling your membership site, if you want to get a high price, is to prepare well.

Here are a list of the metrics you should collect and provide in a concise document, which you can give to potential buyers who demonstrate serious interest in your site.

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How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 5: Triggers

Written by Yaro

August 23, 2007 | 17 Comments | Print This Article

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TriggersI’d like to tell you that your hard work is done, but really you have only just laid the foundation for a successful membership site and now the real work begins. Everything you learned so far in this series - building and demonstrating preeminence, finding ways to market, bringing together the right technology components, deciding on the content you will provide and how much you charge - all come together during the prelaunch and launch phase. This is the make or break time for your membership site - it’s the money time.

Triggers

Before discussing what you do during the prelaunch and launch phases in the next article I want to briefly relate to you some of the major triggers you are attempting to elicit in people. It’s these triggers that create the right conditions for people to feel comfortable making the decision to join your membership site - in fact they should feel an overwhelming compulsion to join if you use these triggers well.

Note that many of these elements are going to feel like you are “tricking” people, that you are attempting to force them into a decision that isn’t necessarily in their best interest by manipulating their emotions. Guess what - it’s true!

I don’t want to jump into a deep philosophical debate over the current state of our capitalist driven, self-serving, environmentally destructive, self-esteem crushing society in this article, but I can’t lie to you - everything you are about to learn is designed to make people desire something they don’t need (in most circumstances anyway).

Marketing is a social science - it’s the study of human behavior - and everything you are learning in this series relates to human behavior. Remember that marketing and these triggers are not inherently wrong, they are simply understandings we have come to as a result of testing. It’s what the knowledge is used for that the potential for abuse arises.

The problem is - and this is where the agitation many people feel towards marketing arises from - that we use our understanding of human behavior to manipulate people into making purchasing decisions for things they don’t need, purely in the interest of profit. It’s a self destructive formula that we feel the negative effects of every day, no person is immune to it and most of the problems in western society are at least somewhat related to it.

It’s not my job to present alternatives to these methods and frankly, I don’t have any good answers anyway. I personally make the decision every day to be a marketer and use these triggers when I run my business and I don’t think I could argue that anything I sell or recommend are necessities in life. I offer “wants”, not “needs”, chances are you do too.

What I can say to you is when you use these triggers that you attempt to be as “honest” as you can, which is the philosophy I apply. Don’t say anything you can’t back up, don’t make promises you can’t keep and use your own internal compass as a guide.

Now, with that out of the way, let’s take a look at these triggers.

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How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 2: Communication Channels

Written by Yaro

July 30, 2007 | 14 Comments | Print This Article

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CommunicatePreeminence is the key ingredient necessary for success with a membership site (or any business), but without means to communicate your message you will find it impossible to create an awareness of your expertise and convince people of the benefits of purchasing what you offer.

I introduced the concept of communication channels in the Blog Profits Blueprint as it pertained to building a successful blog. Communication channels are as important when it comes to launching a successful membership site, because you need a means to attract attention and funnel people into the process you set-up to demonstrate what your membership site is all about.

The Email List

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