If you want to start a membership for your business for exponential income, there are a few things you need to know. First, hosting platform options. The second is pricing information. Third, are the expectations that accompany memberships.

As with all business experiences, your membership is not going to look the same on day one as it looks months or years into it. It is okay to change things up, and change is almost always necessary. Samantha's membership started as a meetup to take photos and create Instagram content in 2018. When Covid hit, the membership changed to virtual meetings. The membership changed the scope of Samantha's business from 1:1 consulting to a full-time membership, which gave her more income and freedom. Memberships can help you leverage freedom of time to live the life of your dreams.

Check out episode 115, How to implement a memberships site to transform and scale your business with Jennifer Dopazo

Dispelling the myth of passive income

Samantha likes to refer to passive income as exponential income. Because money is really never passive, it comes with work. But, it is about working smarter, not harder. With all of the technology we have available to us, it is possible to work smarter and work less. Samantha is all about creating exponential income that breeds authenticity, community, and support for the people that are involved with it.

What happens to your income when you start a membership program?

If you want to start a membership simply for passive income, it may not be the right fit for you because there is work that goes into it. It is similar to a bar graph where in the beginning, the work and time you put in is way high while the income is little to nothing, but as you grow and build, the change. The time and work become less, and the income increases. When you have happy members, they basically do the growing for you. This shift in work/time to income ratio occurs approximately 3 to 6 months into the membership.

As you grow, you aren't putting more work or time into the membership. You may have backend things to do, but a lot of people have community managers for that, but it is really minimal. But what you will see is exponential growth in income because you work the same amount of time in front of your people and more people are able to view it, which means more income.

Is there a "best practice" platform to use to start a membership?

In 2020, many companies launched membership platforms. The platform you chose will depend on your business and your goals. All good memberships will have three things, community, accountability, and education. If you don't have all three of these things, the likelihood of success is low. Not all memberships will have community, accountability, and education in equal amounts.

If your membership is education-heavy, Kajabi may be the best platform for you. However, if your membership is more community and support-heavy, you might need a platform that helps cultivate community more. As well as promote communication. Kajabi is not interactive, people do not interact with one another on that platform. Samantha had to create a Facebook group for a place to go live. Her membership was called content and connection so it was imperative to have a place to build connection and community. Kajabi could only host content.

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