Digital goods and virtual products have moved from an ultra-niche market to a mainstream, multi-billion dollar industry. From online role playing games to ultra-detailed advertising training websites, more companies are adopting a continuity billing model to provide customers with high quality membership content.
Perfected by online marketers in the last two years, the recurring billing model is perfect for companies that want to create long-term earnings from their customers. With a developing and evolving membership, customers are always engaged in the product, absorbing and learning from new modules, leaving the provider with long-term sales success and the stability of recurring billing.
Of course, benefits are not just limited to the publisher’s side. Continuity websites are perfect for consumers too. By allowing customers to purchase just a month of access at a time, membership companies have empowered consumers to only pay for what they think is worthwhile. Simply put, if they do not feel that they are getting what they deserve, cancelling the membership provides an easy avenue to stopped billing.
Of course, there are even more benefits to setting up a membership website. While it is impossible to cover everything, listed and analyzed below are some of the potential benefits of membership sites.
Long-term promotional potential:
The more engaging and influential your membership program is, the more likely it is to generate powerful word of mouth marketing power. When your program is time based — for example, a month-to-month membership website — your subscribers are constantly wrapped up in the material, waiting to hear the next piece of information. This ultra-dedicated approach keeps subscribers anticipating what is coming next, and that anticipation keeps them talking to their friends, colleagues, and partners about your product.
Scalable sales and subscriptions:
One thing that puts people off buying online is the large upfront price assigned to high quality services. In this poor economic climate, people are desperate to save money whenever and wherever possible, and a subscription is often viewed as a lower financial burden than an up-front purchase. If you price your product in line with up-front competitors, but spread it over the course of a year, you will find that it appears much less expensive to potential customers.
Subscriptions can build communities:
Building a community around a one-off purchase is difficult. When you are marketing a long-term product, you have got a large pool of customers to create a community around, which can eventually become a selling point on its own. If your membership product is informational, use the community aspect to launch cooperative help groups, collaborative work, and large-scale group projects.
Long-term subscriptions offer sales opportunities:
The most important, and most difficult, part of marketing is building trust. When you have only got one click to make an impression, building that trust is difficult, urgent, and absolutely necessary. However, when you are building trust gradually over a year-long subscription, the opportunity to use that trust for marketing and business presents itself.
If your membership program is generating great feedback and satisfied customers, you have got the trust built up to offer additional products to members. Complement your major product with upgrades and additions, and you will find innovative and interesting ways to create lucrative new revenue streams.
Here are some article links you might find interesting:
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