Membership sites seem to have become a really popular way to make money online. And, this is understandably so.

One great thing about membership sites is that if you do have a great product/site, then chances are, you will have recurring income – weekly, monthly, quarterly, or even annually – through membership or subscription fees. Your best strategy is to make sure that you take care of your existing members and to encourage them to keep their memberships.

So, how do you get started with setting up membership sites?

There’s a lot to cover regarding this topic, so I’m hoping to break this down in to a series of articles/posts. This one’s just an introduction to the whole idea of membership site building.

In any case, here’s a quick overview on what to do to set up and to make money from membership sites -

1. Choose what kind of membership site that you would like to run. Consider your niche and your target audience. What kind of products/benefits will you offer? What’s your “hook”? What would make people want to pay money to be a member of your site? This is really a very important part of your planning process when it comes to creating memberships. So, take your time in considering your options.

Just remember that all paid membership sites offer premium services that you can’t find easily for free on the web. That’s why it’s vital to think about this aspect of your business.

Some examples of paid membership sites that I have come across include:

• a guitar or piano membership site where you can download free music sheets
• a blogging services site where they offer free installation a blog software plus some premium plug-ins
• a food site where they offer restaurant vouchers and other freebies
• an educational site that have printable lesson plans and other resources
• a web design site where they offer free premium blog/site templates

2. Decide on the technology that you wish to use for your membership site. Although this may seem daunting, there are many ways now that you can run membership sites with just very little programming and designing expertise.

Some ways of setting up a paid membership site include:

• Running a WordPress blog and adding on membership plugins
• Using third party services such as Ning to run membership sites and then charging member fees
• Creating a website with both free and premium content. You can then charge for the premium content. To help you to automate the process, it is highly recommended that you use a membership programme/software.

3. Decide on your membership programme. You need to consider things like: What’s the membership duration that you wish to offer? Weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually? How much will you charge for membership? There are no hard and fast rules here. It will really depend on the kind of site you have and the services and products that you offer.

4. Think about how you will market your membership sites and attract members. Just putting up a membership site isn’t a surefire way to make money. It’s important to know how you can actually encourage your people not just to sign up to become a member of your site (this in itself is a challenge, even for free memberships!)… but to part with their hard-earned cash just to be a member.

Some questions to consider: Will you advertise your site? If so, how? Will you run ads on your member site? Can paying members have the option of turning off those ads? What kind of functionalities will members get? Will you offer a free membership? If yes, what are the benefits of becoming a premium member? For example, popular photo sharing site Flickr has a free membership option. However, they offer a premium (“Pro”) version by giving paying members some benefits like increased upload limits and other improved functionality.

5. Have a plan to keep your existing customers happy! Although it’s very tempting to focus a lot of your attention to gaining new members, you must always remember to think of ways to encourage existing customers to remain loyal. Give them a reason to be a member for as long as possible. And perhaps, even talk about the benefits of being a member of your site to people that they know.

This post is originally from Just Make Money Online. Please respect copyright.

Making Money with Membership Sites

Every now and then, I receive specific questions from JMMO readers who are seeking real advice about making money online. Here’s one email* that I received recently about the social networking service called Ning, which I wrote about last year -

Hello, I have created my own art studio network on ning and want to feature workshop videos. I have spent the last two days trying to find out how to charge a membership fee using paypal for the payment processor on Ning, to no avail. I have been looking for add ons, etc. I see others doing it but I can not figure it out. Can you help me?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you, Karen (cottonpickinranch.com)

Thanks for your email, Karen. As far as I’m aware of, there is no built-in solution yet at Ning for charging membership fees. From what I learned from other Ning creators/social media group managers who are charging membership fees, this is what they do:

1. Create a private social media group on Ning.

2. Set up a subscription payment scheme on Paypal. Grab the code.

3. You can either use that code directly – or find a widget that you can use.

4. Set up another site, blog, or another public Ning group (free membership), which can be your “launching pad” for your paid membership group. (For example, see this page.)

5. Add your code or widget to that site/blog/public Ning group.

6. Every time someone pays for a membership to your private paid membership Ning group, you can add them manually by sending them an invite to your paid group.

7. Of course, every time someone doesn’t pay their membership fees, you’ll have to remove them manually too.

As you can see, it is a bit of work. And, while I know there are people doing it, it’s not the most ideal solution from what I can see. That’s the bad news.

The good news is: I heard that Ning developers are trying to come up with some monetizing scripts that will enable easier integration of Paypal, etc with Ning. I’m not sure when this is going to happen, and if it’s going to be a free or a premium service (like their Adsense module). But, if it does come through, it will be a more attractive solution for folks who wish to run their own membership sites on Ning.

In any case, good luck with your membership site, Karen. I hope it works out for you. Do let us know how it goes!

And, to other readers who may be running their own membership sites, we’d love to hear about your experiences too.

* Email slightly edited for presentation.

This post is originally from Just Make Money Online. Please respect copyright.

Money Chat: How do you charge membership fees on Ning?