This will be a different type of review.

There has been a lot of buzz surrounding this launch. Most readers will have been exposed to the killer prelaunch content. You, like me, may have read over a dozen reviews outlining what the course is about.

Its quality stuff. But most of these promotional materials are targeting those who want to make the transition from blog to membership site. It targets the internet marketing industry, rather than the dozens of niches where it could really help people skyrocket there business.

In part one, I will go through the content and pull out some of my favourite tips. I’ll talk about how these worked with other membership site and product launches. In part two, I will detail the people I could see getting so much out of this program. I don’t want to see my friends ignore this amazing opportunity.

This review is LONG so after each module, I’ll subtly remind you to check out the sales page. I will get a commission if you buy from me but I use that money to purchase more products to review.

Creating the Membership site:

I have been, or am, a member of a lot of membership sites. I will be focusing on:

I will be referring to many other people and products. However, these two are the ones that really helped me understand this business model.

Module 1: How To Choose A Topic and Build Preeminence

I wont be covering much about preeminence as I know most of my readers are already well known in their respective fields. There was one concept that stood out, and was about creating a portfolio of your expertise.

Yaro talked about collecting testimonials. I have two ways of doing this. I favorite all the tweets where people say positive things about me and use that as a portfolio. I also do favors for people and request linked in referrals.

Module 2: How To Generate Quality Traffic

In this module, Yaro talked about three ways to get traffic:
- you can buy it
- you can attract it
- you can gt it via JV’s

This reminded me of a post by David Meerman Scott about four ways to get attention. I recommend that you read this post and also his book, World Wide Rave. Not many internet marketers are using these concepts and it could really help with your membership site launch.

He spoke about building relationships during the prelaunch phase. This video didn’t give any immediately actionable advice but it did wonders for giving me things to research further and ideas on what to outsource.

SEO Tips

The second video focused on SEO. The main tip was to be consistent in the content production on your blog. He discussed what techniques specifically worked for him and also his favorite SEO resources.

I have two SEO resources that weren’t discussed. They are by good friends, are affordable and highly relevant if your membership site is based around a wordpress blog. They are:

Provide value and incentive for JV partners

Hold a joint venture competition

I’ve seen so many affiliates lift their game when it comes to JV competitions. Some people do it by the top referrer, but recently I saw Dave Navarro reward people for retweeting his pre and post launch content. It was really effective and made people find creative ways of promoting him.

Use podcast interviews as a way to network

This works and is a lot better than providing text based interviews. I have no way to create podcasts and am kicking myself at the opportunities I’m losing because of this.

Audio works quicker. It helps people connect with the person and allows you to get more information out of the person. An even better idea is video, which is something I use at conferences with my flipcam.

Do something for something else.

This is something I do constantly. I’m always doing favors for my friends. Now I’m getting so much traffic and referrals sent my way that its hard to keep up. I’ve built a reputation of being extremely helpful. This is useful as people see referring and linking as a free, but very relevant, way of saying thank you.

Post launch traffic building

Yaro talked about three things in this video:

  • paid reviews
  • Offline Marketing
  • Post launch Joint ventures

Offline marketing is something that is widely ignored. One of my favourite techniques is going to conferences and giving people a coupon for discounts on your entry product. I’m not one to devalue products but I see this as a cheap way to market. I only do it when people have already shown an interest but it is a very cheap and valuable way of marketing offline.

I also believe that some people would really benefit from paid reviews. You save the time networking and you get your product exposed to a whole new set of prospects and affiliates.

I really enjoyed this video and recommend returning to this content.

Click here to purchase membership site mastermind

Module 3: What Technology You Need & Who Should You Hire To Help

There are two types of people that Yaro recommended:

  • a project manager
  • affiliate manager

I would agree with both. I’m friends with a lot of information product creators. Many find the managing parts of it frustrating – they want to write it, get it out their and focus on the core parts of their business. This module was very useful for those who want to outsource aspects of content creation for other mediums.

Finding and hiring specialists

Ask your friends when it comes to hiring people.

Even better, you can ask people like myself. I’m the type of person who remembers peoples skills and will connect them with those seeking them. My friends have also helped me. I know most of my work comes through referrals.

Have two tech people if possible.

I don’t have any tech people, but I would also recommend this. When something goes wrong you will appreciate having the two extra sets of hands to help you with all issues.

Build relationships with your contractors

This is vital. I do contract work for people I love those who have gone out of their way to create a relationship. I’ll not only promote the heck out of the work I do for them, but I’ll talk about everything thats going on within their business.

Membership site technology

This is the video that I believe will help most people. He talked about:

  • Web hosting, email delivery. affiliate tracking, payments customer service.
  • The importance of an autoresponder.
  • The difference between broadcast and sequential emails.
  • What type of CMS to use and what extra features – like forums and chat rooms – do you want.

My only issue was that he didn’t cover the WishList Member plugin. This was only recently released and is something that a lot of people are now using. I would have appreciated this being discussed either as part of the course or on the blog.

Options for affiliate management systems.

In this section, Yaro shared an almost overwhelming about of information.

Rather than dumping a bunch of tips, he:

  • talks about the popular affiliate programs out there
  • discusses how this integrates with your promotional offers for your affiliates
  • payment systems available
  • the technology options to consider
  • using gmail as a support desk

I can’t discuss this without giving a lot of it away. I can think of so many of my friends who would pay a LOT just for the contents of this module.

Click here to purchase membership site mastermind

Module 4: How To Create Membership Content & How Much ShouldYou Charge

1) Content and pricing

In this video, Yaro discussed the free content that will make the most impact. Two stood out.

Launch content: the free report

The free report has lost some of its impact. This is due to people releasing substandard reports to get people to sign up to their mailing list. Many people have had wildly successful launches based off their free reports but imagine the potential if you released a really solid one.

That is something that Yaro does. His free reports leaving you craving more. Even if you don’t purchase this course, I recommend that you download the masterplan to see what you can apply to your projects.

Launch content: The video

Video is becoming more and more important during the launch process. However, I would recommend that you avoid this unless you know how to sell via this medium. For introverts like myself, a report may be better for the prospects.

Again, I recommend that you review Yaros free videos to see what you can learn.

2. Promo tools for affiliates

Yaro discussed many interesting options but there was two that stood out for me.

Create multiple destination pages for your affiliates

This is something that I love, and really appreciate. Often, people will provide the affiliate link to their paid content and will give you no way of getting reimbursed for referrals to their free content. I love sharing free content with people but it is somewhat annoying knowing that you are sending traffic to their list and not getting paid.

It is a minor grievance but one that could lead to many lost sales.

Widgets

Gary Vaynerchuk is someone that did an awesome job with this to promote his book, Crush it. He provided a widget that people could share on his blog. The genius thing with him was that he did this outside of the internet marketing niche. People wanted to use the widget so they could show their support. This is something you could try to do in your product launches.

3. Content for membership site

Provide the content in multiple media formats

This is something your audience will thank you for, especially if your targeting busy people. Yaro provided the information via audio, video and text. That meant that people could choose how the content fit in with their lifestyle. I just read the transcripts. I didn’t feel this devalued the course, as I’ll probably refer to the videos.

Offer sequential content

I have trouble justifying joining a membership site unless it consistently provides good value. A course is one of the best ways to do that. I also have trouble justifying quitting a course after financially investing in it so it is a good psychological tactic.

I wont recap the section on membership site pricing as I don’t want to give away too much of Yaros course. The information is awesome. He talks about testing and also relaunching it at different price points. Its applicable to other forms of online business and is something that will help me immensely.

Click here to purchase membership site mastermind

Module 5: How To Conduct A Powerful Launch Process And Make Big Money

The first video was a review of the previous modules and intro into the launch process. However, there was one interesting thing I got out of it.

Use a long form sales page as point of conversion

I always take a while to make a decision if im unfamiliar with the person/product. And as much as I hate the long sales pages, they are often the clincher.

I’ve found that its not the length of the sales page I dislike, its the format. I read and review a lot of information products and have had exposure to plenty of bad sales pages.

With Yaro, I’ve always mad the decision to purchase before seeing the sales page. I like and trust him and don’t need to know why I should buy it. With others though, I need that sales page. I need the story to make me trust them. I need the long list of benefits to help me trust the offer. I need the testimonials so I can see the opinions of people I trust.

Yaro cops a lot of flack for his sales page but you gotta admit, they sure are pretty.

However, he recognized that not everyone is responsive to the long sales page. He wrote about how he created a custom, shorter sales page for a key demographic along with a relevant promotion. The other tip he gave was to use video on the sales page.

The actual launch process

Open up the doors to your early notification list early.

This is something thats applicable to the major launch, but i’ve seen other people do it different. The segmented list in teaching sells and having occasionally a completely different launch cycle with the advance discount list.

Do a teleconference 24 hours before the launch.

Another idea is including a chat on the sales page. I saw Yaro do this on the Become a Blogger launch and it was remarkably effective. Affiliates would drive people to the sales page and stay in the chat room to help out. People were able to get their questions answered by the site owners as well as other experts. They did have some technical issues but I expect it really helped conversions.

Two key success ingredients: traffic and engagement

Stay in touch with affiliates

I’ll be honest – I’ve been a bit of a bad affiliate at the moment. I’ve had some pretty extreme family circumstances occur along with other responsibilities. Thus I am WAY behind on product reviews.

The next two that I do will be by Barbara Ling and Tim Brownson. If possible, I’ll review any other product they have. They’ve kept in touch and offered to support me in any way they can. Also, by keeping themselves in my mind they’ll ensure that I’ll remember them when people ask for product referrals.

Leverage third party case studies

Yaro does an awesome job at this. I actually recommend people take advantage of this as a networking strategy. People like Yaro LOVE finding case studies to leverage as social proof. As a member of this course, you could take advantage of this to get a credibility boost. As a membership site owner, you could focus on mentoring those you want to use as case studies.

Creative marketing and content production

Expect that something will go wrong

Dave Navarro experienced a massive technological problem on the final day of his More Buyers Mastermind. He managed to turn that into a positive. It is important that you have plans and people in place for any problems during launch.

Create content on the fly in response to common questions

This is a technique that not many people try to do. This is fair enough – a launch is a very busy time. However, it is really easy to pump out a video or quick email in response to the common questions. If people are asking the same thing it means you failed somewhere. You should also take note of these issues for future launches.

Click here to purchase membership site mastermind

Module 6: How To Keep Your Members & Attract More After Your Launch

Have a simple, intuitive welcome page.

I would say this is vital for all information products. I’ve often bought packages which consist of multiple audios and workbooks but have no idea where to start. For a non membership site, this can be done via a html page or even the sales email.

I would add that you should try to make the welcome page visually appealing. Its the attention to detail that makes me feel appreciated.

Make personal contact within 24 hours of the purchase

Yaro often did this in the ‘Introduce yourself’ part of the forum. As a buyer, I really appreciated this and it made me so excited to know that such a respected person was talking to me. It was a very small time investment on his part but it made me rave about the program even more.

Chris Guillebeau is a guy that does this well. He is a guy that makes a lot of personal contact and it is a technique that has been vital for him to attract an army of loyal fans. He usually just emails a brief thanks or offer to help. It is a very small act but it is something that has made me buy more stuff off him.

The important of knowing your attrition rate

The biggest thing I got out of this module was finding ways to support those who were struggling.

Two techniques he gave was:

  • suspending their membership or offering some kind of discount on a case by case basis.
  • Provide mentoring for those who cant keep up.

The only problem I can see is that the time invested in mentoring may cost more for you due to time lost. Ascertain whether the time investing into retaining this person is worth the cost of supporting or attracting other members.

I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the first technique. I would probably still be a member of a number of membership sites if they had suspended my payment for a month. Sometimes, I would have really bad months financially. I would have to choose between the membership site and eating and hated that feeling. I’d find other ways to justify why I was leaving but the main reason was that I didn’t like feeling vulnerable. If that feeling was taken away, I would have been so thankful.

Intoduction to ongoing marketing:

Create a unique landing page for certain affiliates.

I’ve helped my friends create custom promotions for certain affiliates – the latest being Navarro, but this technique has also applied to creating custom landing pages for their guest post efforts.

Some audiences are more sensitive. Rather than ignoring their concerns, you can cater to them on a specific landing page. Both the prospect and the affiliate will appreciate this.

Host a unique teleconference

There have been multiple times I’ve signed up to mailing lists around specific teleconferences. One example was the one Chris did to promote Darrens 31DBBB. What Chris did was a really good example – he asked the readership for questions in a blog post and involved them in the teleconference. He also donated the proceeds to charity which is a useful way of making additional commissions.

Secret technique: offer a higher affiliate rate to certain partners

I’m still a small time blogger but I have definitely seen the benefit to this. An alternate idea is to give a 25% cut to someone who brings on leading affiliates. Some people realized that I’m the person that can hook them up with people that can help them. I’ve gotten my friends tonnes of free promo and I do this because I think they’re worth it. Some have recognized this and offered me a cut of the sales acheived through my help. Others have also given me permission to share review copies of their products because I know the ’sneezers.’

I say this to highlight the importance of rewarding the right people. For me, I get a lower than normal rate but I work harder at the stuff I’d otherwise do for free. I’ll work with the person to create the best offer and then give them tips on making an impression on the right people.

Leveraging multiple launches for expontential growth

Create a product funnel

It’s always easier to sell to someone who has already bought from you, rather than acquire new customers.

He discussed how the positive after effects of a membership site launch can help you with building your product funnel. Some of the benefits he listed were:

  • building your email list
  • more respect and JV offers
  • you get more affiliate income

Based on the success of my friends launches, this can even apply to smaller sites. I’ve helped some of my friends get that initially exposure for their first product and they have since gone on to get a lot more offers of help. Additionally, if you signed people up to segmented product lists you may have a better chance of upselling later.

Pay affiliates in a timely manner.

I agree with this – especially when it comes to the big numbers. I use most of my affiliate commissions to reinvest in my business and its frustrating not getting paid. One way to deal with these is specifying the date you’ll be paying them and send out newsletters should their payment need to be delayed.

He also spoke about encouraging affilates with things such as a top affiliate competition, providing affiliates with useful resources and creating new promotional tools. I know that a lot of my business friends would have loved this content.

Whenever people come to me for advice on setting up an affiliate program – which happens at least once a week – I usually tell them to create a mailing list (with Aweber) and PDF resource for their affiliates. These are things that have helped and motivated to do more with my promotional efforts. Mike CJ and Havi have awesome newsletters while Sarah Prout and Dave Navarro have useful affiliate ebooks.

So - Who would benefit from this?

Yaro targets the internet marketing industry with this niche but it has so much potential for those outside of the niche. If you are creating some form of content online then this product will help you. Let me explain.

  • There are so many small business owners and consultants that are starting to deliver their information online. They could use this course to find cheaper ways to deliver their output. Even those who are just marketing online could get a lot of use out of this
  • Those who are struggling with a business model could learn a lot simply by being inside the course. You can learn a lot about this model without necessarily reading the content.
  • If you are selling information products, or even blogging, you could learn techniques to take your site to a whole new level. You can just ignore the modules specifically related to membership sites.

I would recommend this to anyone

This is one of the most expensive products I’ve reviewed. I’m used to buying products up to about $200. As such, I’ve come to expect a certain level of quality. This product has taken the infoproduct experience to a new level. I learned so much just by observing his models. If you are planning to create a membership site then this product will pay for itself multiple times over.

Click here to purchase membership site mastermind