The Ultimate Guide: How To Create a Successful Coaching Membership Site

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Running a membership site is a fantastic way to make money online.

It has the potential to be a wonderful community of users, a creative outlet, and a lucrative business.

In this post, we’ll look at what a coaching membership site is, how to create one, and some practical advice for ensuring its success.

Let’s get started.

1. What is a coaching membership site?

Source: Freepik.com (edited on Canva)

The term “membership site” is quite broad.

However, simply put, a membership site is a place where members can log in to access their content, online courses, and community.

There are 4 main benefits to running a membership site:

1. Recurring revenue

You can either charge a one-time fee for access or set up a monthly or yearly payment plan.

This way, you ensure consistent revenue regardless of the type of membership plan your members choose.

2. Showcasing your expertise

As a coach, a membership site can be the perfect way to showcase your expertise.

3. Loyal members

Value exchange is the key to successful membership sites.

If you add value to your members’ lives, treat them well, and go above and beyond their expectations, you’ll be creating a team of loyal followers.

4. Rewarding experience

Not to mention that being part of someone's journey and transformation is one of the most fulfilling experiences you can have as a coach.

Building a membership site, however, can be a tricky task.

As a coach, there are some things to consider before creating your membership website:

When it comes to coaching clients, how do you generally communicate?
Can you make an online course out of your coaching?
Would an online community that allows members to help one another be beneficial to your membership?
Is it possible for you to adapt your coaching technique to a one-to-many teaching model?
What do your rivals charge for their services?
Are you going to have to develop material for your membership site?

In the next section, we’ll have a look at what should be included in your membership site.

2. What should be included in coaching membership sites?

Your membership website should have a wide range of resources that is relevant to your membership model.

The following are examples of content types:

Blogs or videos
Live webinars
Online courses
Benefits, such as digital or physical merchandise
Forum or community area
Exclusive content

In the following section, we’ll see which 3 membership models are best for an online coaching business.

3. 3 profitable coaching membership models

A membership model is a type of business plan in which individuals pay regular fees to access the value that an online business creates.

It offers a variety of:

Membership levels
Revenue streams
Marketing activities
Events and meetings
Financial themes

Deciding on your membership model is the first step to creating your membership website.

To choose your ideal membership model, you'll need to answer 3 questions:

1. What will you offer to your clients? — Decide on the kind of service and/or products that you’ll be offering to your members. Here it’s a good idea to look at your target audience and their needs.

2. What membership levels will you offer? — Depending on the membership level of a client, they can get access to exclusive services and/or products.

3. How much will you charge and how frequently? — Find out what your competitors charge for their services and/or products. Decide whether you want the payments made monthly or annually.

We’ve chosen to discuss 3 membership models that can be profitable for your coaching business.

3.1. Group coaching membership websites

Source: LorelleDehnhard.com

Group coaching is when a coach takes a group of individuals through a coaching journey to achieve the desired goal.

The main reason this membership model is powerful is its scalability.

The more paying members in a group the more money in your pocket.

There are a few ways to offer coaching with this model, such as:

Offer live office hours or coaching calls — Members can show up, ask questions, get support, and accountability
Keep track of participants’ progress — This creates opportunities for the coaches to congratulate or encourage when necessary

Apart from scaling your business, group coaching is also cost and time-efficient.

With this model, it's not only the coach who benefits but also the clients.

Here are some perks clients can expect from a group coaching program:

Team building
Problem-solving skills
Accountability
Networking
Continuous support

Utilizing a group coaching membership website helps clients pursue and make their dreams a reality.

3.2. Subscription boxes

Source: Eudaemonia.ca

The subscription box model is effective in many kinds of training.

It’s where you, as a coach, can send physical products to your paying members every month to keep them excited and engaged.

Depending on the type of coaching, the items in the boxes could be:

Fitness coach — Branded water bottles, sweatbands, towels, and merchandise
Health and wellness coach — Healthy recipe booklet, self-care guide, and healthy snacks or vitamins
Career coach — Branded stationery, How-to guides, and career magazines
Life coach — Branded journals, pens, motivational and inspirational booklets

And more.

Subscription boxes offer your members unique experiences curated around products and themes, introduce new brands, and make checking the mail just plain fun.

3.3. Accountability memberships

Source: AccountabilityCoach.com

The accountability model is ideal for members who want to prioritize, stay accountable, and keep track of their set goals.

You can, for example, offer:

Classes that require meeting at specific times
Online programs where participants must log their progress each day
Monthly coaching sessions/check-ins

And more.

There are a variety of ways to provide accountability to your members, however, the value is in the personal connections and feeling of support.

Now that you’ve planned and chosen your membership model, you’re ready to create your membership website.

4. How to create a coaching membership website

Source: Freepik.com

Now that we understand what a membership website is and what should be included, let’s take a look at the steps to create one.

4.1. Define your ideal members and target market

The term “ideal members” can be defined as the group of individuals who are most likely to purchase your product or service.

Factors to determine your target audience and market include:

Define your ideal members and target market

Note that, your ideal members or target audience is not the same as your target market.

The target market is the individuals who’ll possibly use your products or services, while the target audience is those who’ll end up purchasing.

If you know your ideal customer and target market, you can tailor your products and services to their needs and desires.

4.2. Validate your membership site idea

We recommend validating your idea before simply starting to create your site.

You can do this by:

Researching your competition — Take note of what your competitors are doing well, and where you can improve to do better than them
Creating a minimum viable product — Get your business off the ground with the most basic version of your product to test whether the complete version will be a success or not
Asking your audience — Engage with your audience to find out if your product or service caters to their needs

Remember: An ambitious task is bound to take time, so you should not rush it and expect it to thrive.

4.3. Choose a platform to host your membership site

Once you’ve defined your ideal members and validated your idea, you’ll need to determine where your site will be hosted.

Here are a few crucial features you’ll need from a membership site platform:

Multiple payment gateways
Membership website builder
Drip feeding of content
Email functionality
Webinars
Unlimited members

We recommend looking into a membership platform that is built to host your site and includes all features in one place — like systeme.io!

4.4. Create your membership website

The design of your membership site plays a significant part in the general experience that you make for your individuals.

Here are some factors to consider for your website:

1. Branding

Ensure that the overall website design stays consistent with your branding.

You should, for example, keep to similar colors and themes.

2. Navigation

You want your visitors to be able to easily navigate themselves around your site.

They’ll then quickly and without any hassle access your products and/or services.

3. Menu

Make sure your main menu is clear and contains all the most important links that your visitors would like to visit.

4. Sign-up page

Your sign-up page has only one purpose, and that is to persuade your visitors to sign up.

A successful sales page includes (almost all of) the following elements:

A compelling headline — Captures your visitors’ attention
An About section — Introduces the problem
The offer — Introduces the solution and your product and services
Benefits — Increases the perceived value
Testimonials — Supports the statements of your product and services
Pricing details — States what you charge to gain access to the solution
Risk reversal — Provides a satisfaction guarantee

All these contribute to creating an exceptional membership website.

5. Social proof

Testimonials are key.

When your sites’ visitors see that others have joined your membership plan and have had positive experiences, it encourages them to join.

You can collect your customers' positive testimonials and include them on your website.

4.5. Create your membership content

When creating content for your website, you need to understand that you’re going to be working with different and unique people.

You want to create content that will satisfy each visitors’ learning style preference.

Therefore, it’s smart to make content that includes:

When creating your content, it’s again important to ask your members what they need.

If you listen to your members, you’ll never run out of ideas for new content.

After you have created your website and its content, the only thing left is to launch and maintain it.

In the next section, we’ll cover some tips on how to run a successful membership website.

5. Tips for running a successful membership site

Source: Freepik.com

You can build a thriving coaching business and help more people without spreading yourself too thin if you use membership websites correctly.

Let’s have a look at how you can run a successful membership program.

5.1. State the advantages of becoming a member

It’s critical to clearly state what your membership site’s purpose is, as well as the value and benefits your paying customers will receive after joining.

If you’re a coaching business owner that sells individual coaching sessions you should:

Emphasize the added value that new members will receive outside of coaching sessions
Create a community where your clients feel heard and supported while achieving their set goals

5.2. Set a reasonable membership fee

While the benefit of owning a successful membership website is that you can make money monthly, it's critical to offer pricing that corresponds to your members' perceived value.

The following are types of pricing models you can use to determine your membership pricing:

Value-based pricing — Charge a membership price that is far higher than both your cost and markup. As long as your program is loaded with perceived value
Cost-plus pricing — Add up all of the costs involved in bringing your product to market, and set your profit margin on top of those expenses
Fixed/flat-rate pricing — A single product, a fixed set of features, and a fixed price per month
Tiered pricing — Offer multiple packages with different features and product combinations available at different price points

This is why it's crucial to spell out each membership perk in detail.

You can more simply tally up the value-based benefits that your consumers receive once you've developed a list of them.

It's important to remember that it's your audience's view, not your own, that counts.

5.3. Consistently create new content

It’s important to keep your members updated with new content on an ongoing basis.

Not just any new content — exclusive new content.

When you send out fresh content to your members, you want them to feel like they’re a part of an elite online community with access to trade secrets.

In addition to engaging your members with exclusive valuable content, it’s important that you do so regularly.

You can ask your members questions like:

How are you progressing?
What more would you like to learn?
Is there something you specifically need?

After you’ve conducted your research, only then should you tailor your content to meet their needs and desires.

5.4. Provide excellent customer service

Providing outstanding customer service is a critical component of any successful organization.

Here are a few ways you can provide exceptional customer service:

Make your members feel special and appreciated — Open a clear channel of support and communication that helps them feel heard
Respond quickly — Get back to customer queries as quickly as possible. Your members’ time is valuable and you don’t want them to feel like you’re wasting it
Actively listen — Show your customers you hear them when they take the time to speak to you
Be proactively helpful — Going the extra mile is one of the most important things you can do to deliver great customer service

Regardless of how you choose to gratify your members, maintain a high degree of customer service throughout time — this is a fantastic approach to creating lifelong fans and members.

Beyond the customer service aspect, there are also the practicalities of your members' user experience, which leads us to our final tip.

5.5. Make the user’s journey as smooth as possible

Providing a smooth user experience is an important aspect of having a successful membership site.

You must ensure that the functionality of your membership site is:

Simple to use
Easy to navigate
Appealing to the eye

One way to ensure your sites’ functionality is simple and smooth, is to partner up with a digital marketing platform and utilize its features to build a membership site.

If you want to keep things nice and simple, we recommend joining systeme.io’s Freemium plan, which allows you to handle all aspects of your online business.

6. How to build a coaching membership site with systeme.io

systeme.io logo

Systeme.io is the only tool you’ll need to build and launch your coaching membership website.

With systeme.io, you can:

Create your membership website with our easy-to-use editor
Integrate your membership access with payments from your sales funnels and websites
Give timed access to your membership via our drip feature
Create, market, and sell your membership website all in the same place

You can build a membership site with our online course features.

An online course functions as a membership site, and the modules and lectures are ways for you to release your exclusive content to your members.

Let’s see how you can build your coaching membership website with systeme.io’s platform: