Once you’ve built your membership site, you need to start marketing it. This way, you can get the word out about your membership program or online course and encourage people to become members. The best way to do this is to start promoting it by implementing different marketing tactics.
In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the best marketing tactics that can help you get more people to register for your online course or membership program.
Best Marketing Tactics That Can Help You Get More Members
Let’s step through nine simple marketing tactics that you should consider before planning for your next marketing campaign.
#1. Social Media
Social media platforms are great for getting the word out about your membership program. Before you start promoting your membership program, it’s important to take a step back and decide which social media platform suits your content and offering best.
For example, if you teach people how to cook or lose weight, most of your prospective members probably won’t come from social media platforms like LinkedIn. Instead, you’d be better off promoting your content and membership program on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram. This is because there’s more B2C interaction there.
You can also use social media platforms to promote upcoming membership programs. It’s an easy way to let your followers know what’s coming next and direct them down your sales funnel. This way, when you are ready to launch your new membership program or online course, more people will already know about it and, potentially, be ready to register.
#2. SEO
Another simple marketing tactic to get more people on your membership website is by leveraging search engine optimization (SEO). Use SEO tools to determine which keywords you should be targeting and produce content that will help you rank in search engine results pages (SERPs). This could be blog posts, tutorials, or landing pages.
When your membership site ranks higher in SERPs, more people will land on it to find answers to their search queries. This is a great way to increase your membership program’s visibility.
In order to enhance your SEO efforts, start by identifying the keywords you should be optimizing for. Once that’s done, come up with a content plan so you can start publishing content regularly. This is also good for SEO.
It’s also a good idea to use SEO tools to manage and optimize content for SEO on your membership website. This way, you can see which content is doing well and which has room for improvement. It’s also a great way to understand what people are searching for and how you can deliver value to your site’s visitors.
#3. Email Marketing
When you’re thinking of ways to promote your membership site or online course, you shouldn’t overlook email marketing. Done right, email marketing messages make it easy for people to go to your website and complete their registration.
In addition to sending out marketing messages encouraging people to register for your membership program or purchase your online course, you can offer people exclusive discounts. For example, you might offer subscribers 10% off the regular subscription fee if they subscribe by a certain day.
Some email marketing tools let you add call-to-action buttons and forms in your email messages so people can register for the membership program directly from their inbox. This reduces friction in the registration process.
#4. Content Marketing
As an online course instructor, you probably already know that not everyone who visits your membership website for the first time will be ready to become a member. After all, there’s only so much information you can publish on a sales page to demonstrate your expertise and convince visitors to become members.
The good news is that you can make the most of content marketing to turn things around. Consider publishing content that convinces visitors to subscribe and become a member. For example, you can publish a tutorial and tell visitors they can sign up for the membership for full access to the entire online course.
Content marketing is more popular than ever and it offers a great way to promote your membership site using your content while keeping your costs low. You can produce different types of content depending on the industry you’re in. Some popular examples include webinars, blog posts, podcasts, polls, quizzes, and e-books that can be linked directly to your membership. Additionally, content marketing can help you improve customer retention too as it allows your members the opportunity to get a better feel for your brand or business even before they become paying members.
#5. Collaborations
A great way of boosting your audience is through brand collaborations or partnerships with other businesses in your niche. Your membership site can gain a huge boost by you implementing marketing tactics such as collaboration or even co-marketing. This can help you tap into another brand’s audience, gain more brand exposure, and eventually turn them into paying members.
Similarly, two brands that produce different types of content for the same audience can help each other grow by hosting contests for their members, co-creating content for both brand’s audiences, or launching a joint product together.
Additionally, reaching out to influencers to help grow your membership site is another smart way of marketing your membership. Influencer marketing can enable you to promote your small-scale membership site to a huge audience. It is also worth mentioning that choosing an influencer who can showcase your product well and positively represent your brand is important when aiming for success with influencer marketing.
For example, if you run a membership site that teaches people to cook, you could partner up with influencers that share recipes or run a food blog. This way, you can tap into their audience and encourage people to check out your membership program.
#6. Exclusive Previews
Offering exclusive previews is a great way to promote your membership program to new, prospective members as well as existing members.
Now, you might be wondering why you’d want to promote new membership programs to existing members.
Since existing members are already satisfied with your program and style of teaching, they’re more likely to introduce new people to your offering. In other words, you can leverage word-of-mouth marketing by offering exclusive previews of your upcoming membership program or online course to existing members.
You can offer existing members a sneak-peak of your final product such as online tours, previews, or a demo. This not only makes members feel special but also provides you with an opportunity to test out new ideas and see whether existing members like them or not. This makes it easy to gather feedback and identify areas of improvement.
#7. Introductory Offers
When you decide to launch a new membership offering, you can choose to make it a special introductory offer to encourage more people to subscribe. You can provide discounted pricing for newly launched memberships as a way to motivate more users to register as members for your membership.
For example, you can offer a 10% discount to the first 100 people or for a limited time. You can also provide free gifts in exchange for referrals. This will give existing members an incentive to bring in more referrals for you. Additionally, you can also offer reduced rate bundles as a limited-time offer to help you promote your membership site and gain new members.
#8. Giveaways
Hosting contests and giveaways for your members is also a great way to promote your brand and get the word out about your membership program or online course. For example, you can organize a giveaway every few months to get your membership site in front of more people.
Other than arranging contests and giveaways for your members, you can provide complementary products to spark the interests of more new users. Additionally, giving away other brand’s products in giveaways can also prove to be a great way to tap into other brands’ audiences and promote your membership site to a wider audience.
#9. Reviews and Testimonials
What could be better than letting satisfied members do the promoting and marketing for you? By asking your members to write a detailed review soon after your membership ends, you make it easier for other potential members to register with your next membership program.
Reviews left by members’ work can be published on your landing pages and sales pages as testimonials. These help prospective members make informed decisions.
In fact, 84% of consumers who shop online, trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. So, by using member reviews to your advantage, you can encourage new, prospective members to check out your membership program.
Conclusion
We’ve gone through some of the best marketing tactics that will help you attain more members on your membership site. You can use regular marketing tactics such as SEO and content marketing to grow your member base passively. It’s also a good idea to put other marketing tactics – like collaborations and giveaways – into action every now and then.
Do you know any other marketing tactics that can help get more members? Let us know in the comments section below.
