I have good news for you: you are not alone. Not even close! 

A services-based business can be rewarding, but it is a tricky business to scale. 

If your schedule fills up too quickly, you’ll find yourself gasping for air and wondering when a break will come. On the flip side, you could hear nothing but crickets from your website, forcing you to drop prices and wonder if starting your business was worth all the heartache and aggravation. 

I have an answer for you. A scalable business model that allows you to offer your expertise to an unlimited number of customers at an attractive price. No, it’s not a magic wand or radical, miracle formula. It’s a membership site.

Read on as I break down everything you’ll need to know to launch a successful membership site that will scale your coaching business well past six figures. 

What is a Membership Site?

A membership site is a gated part of your website (or a dedicated platform) that contains exclusive content only accessible to subscribed members.

The beauty of it? You charge for access. 

Membership sites come in all shapes and sizes, but they are usually built around a specific niche/interest and provide value to their members through regularly updated content and services. 

Membership sites allow you to:

4 Benefits of Creating a Membership Site for Coaches & Consultants

There’s a myriad of benefits coaches and consultants can reap from launching a membership site, but if I had to pick just a few, here are my favorites:

1. Recurring revenue: It’s the elusive dream word for coaches and service businesses. By charging a recurring fee at scale, you can generate predictable growth for your business.

2. A community of fans: Membership sites create a sense of community among members, who share common goals or interests. This allows you to cultivate a network of motivated professionals, entrepreneurs, or others who are eager to learn from you.

3. Establishing authority and brand loyalty: A membership site helps you build that all-important know, like, trust factor - which is key for retaining members and attracting new clients. 

4. Scalability: Unlike traditional coaching methods that are limited by your time and availability, a membership site can serve an unlimited number of members without an increase in workload.

These aren’t just opinions either. Forbes estimates that subscription businesses will hit $905 billion by 2026. There’s no denying it - recurring revenue is the simplest and fastest way to grow your business, which makes a membership site a match made in heaven for coaches.

What to Include in a Membership Site

Here’s the fun part: it’s up to you to decide. 

Just as you design your coaching or consulting packages and offers, you have the freedom to determine what goes into your membership site. If you’re stumped, here is a great place to start:

The precise mix depends on your niche, business model, and the transformation you help members achieve. The key is to create a steady stream of valuable content that keeps your subscribers engaged.

Worried about creating all this content yourself? You can purchase ready-to-sell PLR content to fill your membership site. PLR can turn 10 months of work into 10 minutes, freeing up more time to grow your business. 

How to Price Your Membership Site

Before launching your membership site, you need to have a clear, easy-to-understand pricing strategy. 

This requires a bit more than picking a number out of a hat and hoping for the best. Pricing is part art and part science. It takes practice and experience to get it right. But the following tips will set your site up for success:

How to Position Your Membership as a Complementary Offering

Let’s say you offer one-on-one coaching or consulting engagements for $1,000 per month. Wouldn’t a $100/month membership site offer confuse your existing and potential clients?

It can. That’s why you need to frame your membership site as an extension of your one-on-one services, not a replacement. This approach allows you to maintain your one-on-one work's high-touch, personalized nature while offering a more scalable option for lower-priced customers.

Which Platform to Use for Your Membership Site

Once you’ve settled on your pricing model, it’s time to choose your platform.

Like any other software you choose, make sure to select a platform with the right balance of features and ease of use. While you can always switch platforms, it gets more difficult as time goes on.

I recommend you look for one with the following features:

Prioritize these, and you can’t go wrong. 

Now that you know what to look for in a membership site platform, let’s walk through a few of my favorite platforms available on the web.

Check out my guide to the best membership site platforms for more information.

6 Example Membership Sites to Copy

There are plenty of fantastic membership sites on the web, but the following six do an excellent job of demonstrating those factors we just reviewed. 

I pulled examples across industries and price points to show you how diverse membership sites can be (and give you loads of ideas for your own). My favorites that we will review are:

1. CopyBlogger: A comprehensive platform offering training and resources for content marketers and copywriters to improve their skills and grow their businesses.

2. Better Sheets: A niche website for those looking to master Google Sheets. Better Sheets proves that no topic is too niche as long as you solve a real problem for customers. 

3. Nomadic Matt: A travel-focused membership site providing budget travel tips, destination guides, and resources for aspiring world travelers.

4. Dynamite Circle: An online forum that blends coaching calls and masterminds for a unique digital offering for agency owners and small startups.

5. CopyHackers: An educational platform offering courses, workshops, and resources to help marketers and entrepreneurs improve their copywriting and conversion skills.

6. BusinessMadeSimple: A membership site created by Donald Miller that provides practical business training and resources for entrepreneurs and business leaders.

Check out my guide to these membership site examples (and a few more) for a deep dive into what makes them tick.

How to Find Content for Your Membership Site

A steady flow of new customers to your membership site is great in theory, but that content needs to come from somewhere. 

Once you launch a membership site, you need to provide a constant stream of valuable content to attract and retain your members. 

Here are a few of my favorite sources for content:

Now that you have ways to source high-quality content, let’s talk about my favorite ways to manage content for a membership site:

Whether you create the content yourself or use PLR, you’ll still need to release it to your members regularly.

How to Welcome New Members to Your Membership Site

Take a deep breath. Most of the hard work is done.

Now that you have a membership site, it’s time to welcome new members as they flow into your funnel.

What you include in your membership site sequence will vary depending on your customer, content, and price point. 

As a rule, the following are good things to include in your emails as you lay down a welcome mat for new customers:

5 Tips for Promoting Your Membership Site

Now, all you need is customers!

If only it were that easy to get strangers on the internet to know, like, and trust you (and pay a monthly fee). 

Fortunately, with these tips, you can gather your first customers quickly and scale your site. I wrote a guide on my 10 favorite promotion channels for membership sites. Here are my top five on the list:

1. Leverage free content: Create valuable, free content that addresses your target audience's pain points and showcases your expertise. This could include blog posts, YouTube videos, podcasts, or social media content.

2. Offer referrals: Encourage your existing members to refer new customers by offering incentives. This could be a discount on their membership, exclusive content, or even cash rewards. Word-of-mouth recommendations are powerful, especially in the coaching and business world.

3. Collaborate with your industry: Identify businesses or influencers who serve a similar audience but don't directly compete with you. Propose mutually beneficial partnerships, such as joint webinars, content swaps, or affiliate arrangements.

4. Run ads: While organic growth is ideal, strategic paid advertising can significantly boost your reach. Use platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google Ads to target individuals who match your ideal customer profile. Focus on creating ads that highlight the unique value of your membership site and include compelling calls to action.

5. Fuel your funnel with a lead magnet: Create a high-value free resource that potential customers can access in exchange for their email addresses. This could be an e-book, a mini-course, or an in-depth guide related to your area of expertise.

How to Boost Member Retention and Reduce Churn

While a membership site is a scalable way to grow your business, you can probably tell that it’s a bit more than a weekend activity. 

I won’t lie to you. There’s no ‘easy button,’ and it requires work and consistent effort. But that effort will pay off as your business grows beyond your capacity to manage clients. However, you still need to provide a stellar experience for members so they don’t churn (cancel their subscription). 

Here are a few quick tips to reduce churn for your membership site:

Selling a lower-priced subscription product will take a bit of trial and error at the start. By practicing these good habits and engaging your customers, you can put your business on the path to six-figure growth.

3 Mistakes Coaches Make When Launching a Membership Site

As thorough as this guide is, it can’t prepare you for every potential obstacle or challenge on the road ahead. 

There are three common membership site mistakes coaches make that you need to be aware of. They are:

Overcomplicating the Offering

I get it - you’re excited. Many coaches (with well-intentioned enthusiasm) try to include too much content or too many features in their membership site. 

This quickly overwhelms you and your customers. Instead, it's better to start with a focused, high-quality core offering that addresses a specific need for your target audience. You can always expand things to new topics or types of content later on, but the simplest is best when you start out.

Underestimating the Time Commitment

It’s easy to underestimate the time and effort required to run a successful membership site beyond the initial setup. Often, coaches focus so much on creating the initial content and launching the site that they forget to account for the ongoing upkeep after launching. 

While a membership site is much more passive than one-on-one coaching, it’s not completely “set and forget.” You’ll need a steady stream of new content to keep your audience engaged, which is where PLR content can come in handy!

Ignoring your Community

Remember also that you’re building a community, not just sharing content and hoping it makes an impact. 

Failing to cultivate your community can lead to churn (customers canceling) and members feeling isolated or demotivated. Actively encourage and facilitate member interactions, whether through discussion forums, live Q&A sessions, member spotlights, or collaborative projects. 

Ready to Launch Your Membership Site? Get the Free Guide and 30% off A Year’s Worth of PLR Content

Coaching and consulting can be rewarding, but it is a tough business to scale. 

If you have your eyes set on mid-high six figures, then you will need a semi-passive offer that can help you grow your business without filling up your entire calendar or hiring staff. That offer could be a membership site. 

I’ve created a downloadable guide to creating a membership site to help set you up for success. Click the button below to download your guide. I have an extra-special bonus for you too: if you want to fill your membership site with stellar content, then you’ll also get a 30% discount on your first order for my shop.

So click that button and build the membership site of your dreams!

Enjoy!