This presentation is from Affiliate Summit West 2017 (January 15-17, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada). Session description: Successful strategies to implement a membership site component into your affiliate marketing campaigns. Increase loyalty, increased affiliate revenue and additional recurring revenue at the same time.

1. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites

2. What is
Membership?

3. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Belonging, either individually or collectively, to a
group. Some memberships may require a fee to join
or participate while some do not. Others, as in the
case of MENSA, have specific skill requirements that
must be reached prior to be accepted into the group.
Special privileges or benefits are entitled to members
although not all members may have the same rights
and privileges.
Membership = Exclusivity

5. Groucho Marx
“Please accept
my resignation.
I don’t want to
belong to any
club that will
accept people
like me as a
member”

6. What is a
Membership Site?

7. A membership site is
a website that people
join in order to get
access to exclusive
members only
content, benefits,
community interaction
or special features.

8. Types of Membership Sites

9. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Online Learning
Digital or Physical
Products
Blogs & Content
Event Management
Exclusive
Community
Custom Combo

10. Online
Learning
Sites

11. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Notable Facts
Over 500 Employees
Purchased in 2015 by LinkedIn for $1.5 Billion Dollars.
Thousands of Topics
Lynda.com
Online education company offering thousands of video courses in
software, creative, and business skills. Founded in 1995, the company
produces video tutorials. Members have unlimited access to watch the
videos, which are primarily educational.

12. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Notable Facts
Over 400 Million members
Purchased in 2016 by Microsoft for $26.2 Billion Dollars.
Largest Social Business Site
LinkedIn.com
LinkedIn is a business-oriented social networking service. Founded in
December 14, 2002 and launched on May 5, 2003, it is mainly used for
professional networking.

13. PROJECTED 2017 GLOBAL SPENDING ON ONLINE
LEARNING
$32 BILLION
Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites

14. Estimated
$12.2 Billion
In 2017
$4.23 BILLION
2015
Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
2014
$2.55 BILLION
GLOBAL
LEARNING
MANAGEMENT
SYSTEM

15. 55%
25%
65%
30%
Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
ONLINE LEARNING
ANNUAL GROWTH
RATE
40%
35%

16. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
plan createdesign launch promote support

18. number of membership sites still
operational after 18 months.35.7%

20. Customer Profile

21. Avatars
Create a customer avatar to
profile the typical user of your
membership site.
Eventually you will call your
avatar by name and think of
them when creating content
or during marketing phases.

22. Avatars
Who is a typical member?
What do they do for a living?
What is their lifestyle like?
What are their problems?
Why can’t they find a solution?
What does your site change?
How can I get to them?

23. Successful Site Examples

24. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Luxury Designer Fashion
netaporter.com
NET – A - PORTER

28. Is it a Membership
Site?

31. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
How much does it cost to get in
the
EIP Program?

32. NO Membership Fee…
But…

33. BIG Annual Spend

34. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Net-A-Porter representatives will
contact a customer when they have
reached a specific level of total
spending and invite them to participate
in the exclusive EIP program.
In some sense, the regular customers
are just buying up the things that the
EIP members have not purchased!
eCommerce

35. Membership Site
Success Strategies
Prepping and Survival
Membership Site
thesurvivalpodcast.com
The Survival Podcast with Jack Spirko

37. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
THE SURVIVAL PODCAST
focused on practical advice and
community contributions to promote a
preparatory mindset.
Members are involved in every aspect
from basic support to product reviews
and sponsor approval.
Specialized
Niche

38. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Online Learning & Certification
digitalmarketer.com
Digital Marketer

43. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Digital Marketer found a pathway to
shape their existing and revised content
into specialized certification programs.
Certified members get their own
verification page and access to a private
community designed to engage others and
use their skills cooperatively.
Learning &
Certification

44. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Blog Content for WP Pros
poststatus.com
Post Status

51. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
Post Status turned WordPress blogging
and news on its head. Brian Krogsgard
understood who his ideal member was
and built a community around what those
members wanted.
He uses the same technologies that his
members use. He speaks the same
language and provides real community
networking for WordPress professionals.
Content &
Community

52. Final Advice

53. Members
Get to know your ideal
members and what they want
before you even think about
starting your membership
site.
The most successful
membership models make
sure that the users are
always the main focus.
Give them what THEY WANT,
not what YOU think they need
or what other sites are doing.
You are not your members.

54. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
be ambitious
Don’t be restrictive in
your Membership site.
You can transform
almost any business to
a membership model.
be loud
Promote your site with
complete intention to
get people in your
Member site. The
competition is fierce!
be available
The most successful
sites provide the most
hands-on interaction
and live presence to
their member base.
be original
Though there may be
others in your niche, there
is only one YOU in the
niche. Fixate about
content, not competition.

55. Increasing Affiliate
Revenue Through
Membership Sites
MEMBERSHIPCOACH.COM
@marcuscouch
Marcus
Couch