Once you have developed your membership program, the fun starts. The fun is promotion. If you want to attract enough potential members to earn a full-time living, you’ll need to figure out how many members that represents. For example, let’s assume you want to make 10,000 dollars per month from your membership program. This will cover all expenses and give you enough to live on each month.

If you are charging $50.00 per month for members, this means you need only 200 paying members on a monthly basis. Since we know from research that most members drop out after three months, this means you’ll need to attract about 10,000 potential members to your website monthly though promotion activities, or about 334 per day.

1. Study Your Target Audience – The more you can know about your audience, the better you can make your products and the easier it is to write and craft marketing materials that get results.

2. Use Social Media – Use social media to promote your new membership by making a free group that you use to attract people and tease information about the membership to. You can also use PPC to promote on social media.

3. Outstanding Landing Pages – Never skimp on your landing pages when it comes to membership websites. A great landing page can make all the difference to your audience and convert more visitors into members.

4. Killer Sales Pages – If you plan to have affiliates, you need killer sales pages that convert visitors to members. If you aren’t sure how to make a great sales page, you can hire someone to do it for you.

5. Content – You’ll need to produce a lot of content to promote your business, educate your audience, and inform and engage with your audience. You’ll need both content open to the public and content that requires a membership to get results.

6. Guest Blogging – Get out of your comfort zone and blog on other people’s websites as a guest. Your authority quotient will go up, and your bio will help people find your membership website.

7. Webinars and Teleseminars – Webinars and teleseminars offer a very high converting platform to membership site marketers. Offer one each month and get affiliates to promote it, and you’ll keep your membership site full.

8. Send Out Press Releases – Don’t overlook the good old-fashioned press release as a great way to promote your membership. If you can frame it as a newsworthy story then you’re going to be more likely to get it published.

9. On-Page and Off-Page SEO – This is an ongoing process that needs to be done for everything you do in terms of online marketing. On-page SEO covers content, headlines, keywords and more. Off-page SEO covers social media, guest posting and things you do off your website.

10. Make YouTube Videos – A great off-page SEO way to get links and views for your website, YouTube videos are also a great way to give your audience deeper information about your membership.

Building a membership site is not the only thing you need to do to be successful. You must promote the site and get members to sign up on a regular basis, month after month. One more way that you can use to promote your membership website is to form an affiliate program where you get people to promote the membership for you. This is a great way to get free marketing and move your website up on Google Search rank.

As you create a successful online business, one of the ways to stop income disparity from getting in the way of your success is to start a continuity plan. A great way to get monthly continuity income is to start membership site. A membership site means that the public is blocked from the content available only to members who pay a fee to access the membership area.

1. Develops Community and Builds Relationships – One way to earn more money online is to build a community and nurture relationships. What better way to do it than a private membership site with a forum that is not open to the entire internet?

2. Makes Fans out of Your Customers – When you spend time in a forum with members, they will become more than customers. They will become your fans. This is an excellent opportunity for building a lucrative affiliate program.

3. Gives You Deep Insight into Your Customers – By observing the things your customers talk about in the private forum, you can come up with new products that they’re basically asking for or showing a need for. They’ll feel as if you are reading their mind.

4. Provides a Captive Audience for Testing – Before you put any products out to the world, you can test them on your members. They will give you feedback that will assist you with making needed changes before you put them out as individual products outside of the membership.

5. Simple to Set Up and Easy to Maintain – Today, technology is a lot easier to use. Even a complete beginner can find the right technology to build a functional and lucrative membership site. If you can come up with just one new product a month and four blog posts, and commit to participating one hour a day in the forums, you’re set.

6. Adds Value to All That You Do – Remember that you can sell each product you create individually too, outside of the membership. The membership will add value to every product that you create as a way for buyers to get assistance. You can charge for the membership, or you can throw it in free for large ticket product purchases.

7. Add Life to Previous Products – If you already have several products that you’ve created in the past, you already have things to add to your membership site. This breathes new life into the old products. Update them a bit and put them into the pipeline, and you’ll be ready to go.

8. Earn Reliable Income – Membership sites allow you to earn, once you get started, a relative consistent income. The lifetime of most memberships is about four months but if you market well, you’ll keep a consistent number so that your income is reliable.

Membership sites are easy to set up, easy to run, and can provide a solution to producing regular and dependable income for your online business. If you have at least one product, and can produce regular content and products on a monthly basis for your niche, you can start a membership site today and have it up and running tomorrow.

Building an online community, and participating in online communities, is an important way to market your business online that is going to really take off  and beyond. The technology has become simpler, and anyone can start a community today. The trick is building it into a productive and valuable extension of your business.

1. Start Your Own Community – If you have your own community focused on a certain niche, you will be able to control what happens and market yourself easier without having to follow anyone else’s rules.

2. Release Limited Programs – If you release limited programs only to the group, they’ll feel as if they are special and unique and be more likely to give you a good testimonial and referral when the product goes live to the rest of the public.

3. Ask Questions – Keep the discussion going by asking at least one question of the community every single day. Not only will it keep the community active for others who are just visiting for the first time, it will help people get to know you by seeing your name and face every day.

4. Conduct Polls – Some online communities have a way to conduct a poll. This is where you ask a question but have set answers that they can choose from. It’s a great way to ask about your future products, such as, “Should I Name my Product X or Y?” By making them part of the creation they’ll be more likely to purchase.

5. Have Weekly Twitter Parties – Choose a topic or goal for the week and ask the members of the community to participate in a Twitter party with prizes, special hashtags, and fun during the Twitter party.

6. Plan a Monthly Webinar – Your community is the best place to tell about the monthly webinars and they are the ones you should invite to it. Plan it around a particular topic that is applicable to your niche.

7. Promote Yourself Via Your Signature Line – It’s important to have a really well filled out profile as well as a good signature line that sends the members of the community to a special sales page just for them.

8. Invite Others into the Community – Seek to selectively grow the group by inviting others who are interested in the same niche to the community. Keeping new members coming in on a regular basis is a way to keep the community fresh and active.

9. Don’t Allow Anonymity – If you own the group, ensure that people are themselves and aren’t allowed to be anonymous. The reason is that if people are required to use their real name, they’ll be much less likely to be scammers and you need to keep your community safe.

10. Become the Go-To Resource – Within the boundaries of your niche and subject matter, seek to be the go-to resource by always answering questions when they come up. In addition, start discussions and share content that relates to your niche.

Using online communities to build relationships with other people is an important way to grow your business. This is because businesses that have longevity have always known that putting the customer at the center of everything is what works.

When you join memberships, the most important thing you can do is to get involved. Getting involved means that you work to build relationships with the members of your group through the actions at meetings – as well as before, during and after. The importance cannot be overrated, because it’s an essential component that works well if you’re using memberships to advance your business.

* You’re Not Selling – When you get involved in groups, it’s really not as much pressure as you might think. For one, you’re not supposed to sell anyone anything. You are simply getting to know different people, spreading your wings and letting people get to know you.

* Building Relationships Is Vital – One of the best things you can do for your business is to get to know others, build relationships with them, and them with you. It’s great to get to know a lot of people so that you can be in their mind and they can be in yours when the need arises.

* You’re Supposed to Network – When you go to network meetings and get involved, the thing is that you’re supposed to network; no one is turned off by your networking attempts. It’s not like going to a normal party where people are sticking around with their family or clique. Networking is designed for you to step up and do something.

* It’s Good for You – Believe it or not, being involved with something outside of your own business directly is a very good thing to do. Being connected to a community is good for your health, both mentally and physically. Plus, you just can’t know enough people.

* It Will Boost Your Business – It might not happen overnight, but the more people you know, and who know you as someone that gets involved and gets things done, the more business that will come your way.

* It Builds Momentum – Sometimes you may think networking isn’t working, but what you do today will build on what you did yesterday and so forth. You will be happy in a year that you did the networking you did and that you got involved, because your life will be completely different and your business will feel as if it’s on autopilot.

* Puts Experts at Your Fingertips – Not only will people refer you to work, you will be also able to refer others. Being a resource to others is an important role to play, because when you do good deeds for others then they will return the favor.

* Puts You in the Mind of Your Audience – Just like you have experts at your fingertips due to your involvement in memberships, you are also going to be at the top of their mind if you get involved with the groups you join. They’ll see your example and they will like you and trust you to do what you say you’ll do.

The importance of getting involved in any membership is vastly underrated. It doesn’t matter if you have an online or offline business, just step out of your four walls and communicate with others – both online and in person. Getting involved with memberships and your community will pay off exponentially.

If you want to join an online community rather than build your own, it’s important to look at several communities to ensure that you spend your money and/or time wisely before getting too involved. It’s pretty easy to tell quickly if a community is one you want to stay involved in if you know what to look for.

* Uses Real Names – You don’t really want to waste time in a community where everyone is anonymous. You want to make real connections with real people with whom you can conduct business. When you are dealing with a lot of anonymous people that isn’t going to happen; instead you could end up scammed.

* Has Active Discussions – The owner of the group should be working hard to ensure that discussions stay active and productive. If no one has started a new discussion in the last week other than to spam the group, it’s probably not a very good community.

* Offers Plenty of Content – You want to be part of a community that offers informative content to the audience that is helpful to their business. If the content and information that is available is old and outdated, it might not be a community that you want to waste time on.

* Has a Podcast – A really good addition to any online community is a podcast where the host interviews members and also experts in the niche. This keeps everything new and fresh for the members and keeps them coming back.

* Community of Customers – The best community you can join is a community full of potential clients for you. For example if you’re an author’s VA you might want to join a community of authors.

* Community of Colleagues – Alternatively, you might want to learn more about your niche by joining a community full of your actual competition. It can be very enlightening to learn from others who are doing what you are doing.

* Notice Who Is Commenting – When a discussion starts, who is starting it and who is commenting on it? You may notice that the same people are always involved in the discussions. That is okay as long as the comments are well formed, intelligent, and there aren’t a lot of disagreements without someone checking the discussion.

* How Many Blatant Ads Appear? – Some measure of promotion is okay because it’s their community that they started likely to promote themselves, but you want the promotions to be well thought out and not the only thing the community is about.

* Do They Offer Live Events? – Webinars, teleseminars, Twitter parties, and even in-person live events speak to a well-organized and established online community that will continue to grow and thrive.

Choosing an online community to become a regular part of is an important thing to consider, because it takes a lot of time and effort to create value from the experience. You don’t want to spend your time in the wrong place.