Membership Geeks Podcast with Mike Morrison & Callie Willows Membership Geeks

When you start up a membership site, you naturally want to give your members a perfect experience. Or at least as close to perfect as possible.

The key to that is finding the right tools, software, and plugins to help you deliver a fantastic membership experience. But it’s tough to find the right tools and even harder to know whose opinions to trust.

In this episode of The Membership Geeks podcast, your hosts, Mike Morrison and Callie Willows share some expert tips on finding the closest thing to ‘the perfect plugin’ and how to find reviews you can trust.

Essential Learning Points:

Why not all reviews can be trusted (they may be paid affiliates)
What works for one membership service may not work for yours
How people’s past experiences can affect their opinions and suggestions for plugins
Why great functionality is the most important thing to look for

Juggling a 9-5 with a membership in a saturated marketplace sounds pretty impossible, right?

But Scott Millar of IT Rockstars has somehow pulled it off and is seeing great growth in his membership. In this episode of The Membership

Geeks, he shares some top tips and insights for others looking to start a membership.

He also delves into his membership's unique origin story, as well as how his geographical cap doesn't limit his growth.

Essential Learning Points:

How Scott found his ‘wow’ factor in a saturated market
Why there’s a geographical cap on enrolment for IT Rockstars
The ins and outs of juggling a 9-5 with a membership business
IT Rockstar’s unique onboarding process
Why it’s important for your idea to align with what your audience wants

Is your cancellation process as effective as it could be?

As a membership site, it’s vital to get the balance right! You need to make the decision for your members to leave difficult…not the process.

It’s very easy to feel hurt or worried when members depart in their droves but don’t take it personally. Members will end their subscription for so many different reasons… and they may well come back very soon.

In this episode of the Membership Geeks podcast, hosts Mike Morrison and Callie Willows discuss some of the most common things membership site owners get wrong when faced with customer cancellations.

Essential Learning Points:
- Why you should remember to ‘think like a member’ – how would you want the process to go if you wanted to cancel a membership?
- Why it’s important to make the decision to cancel difficult – not the process
- Why you should avoid turning members who might rejoin away
- Finding the right software to make the process seamless

Key Quotes:
“During the cancellation process, give it a final shot to try and convince them to stick around. But it shouldn't get in the way, it shouldn't be an obstacle.”

“If that member experience was 100% positive up to that point, you can ruin it all by having a terrible approach to cancellations.”

“If someone has paid for a month, you have to give them that month. If someone's paid for a year, you have to give them that year. This is why we say that you're getting into dodgy legal territory if you don't actually honor that.”

Does old automatically mean useless or outdated when it comes to membership content?

Definitely not. In fact, there are so many things you can do to breathe new life into your archived content. Especially, when the core subject matter is still as relevant as the day it was first posted.

This episode of the Membership Geeks podcast is all about six concrete ways you can reuse your old content and drum up some engagement in the process.

We’re talking about everything from repurposing content to simply giving it a touch-up. By tuning in, you’ll get six handy tips to refresh and reuse your existing content to maximize its value.

Essential Learning Points:

Why watch alongs offer a great way to engage with your audience
How repurposed content helps you meet your audience where they are
How you can grow your audience by giving content away for free
How to drum up new members through a cohort experience
Why you should always have something available for your members to tackle next

Can you use science to boost your membership numbers?
It’s not magic but getting to grips with the science behind how people make purchase decisions will help you transform your own content.
Kenda Macdonald, CEO of Automation Ninjas, international keynote speaker, and author of the best-selling book, Hack the Buyer Brain, joins this episode to talk about the science behind why people choose to sign up (or not) for a membership.
Tune in to hear what behavioral automation is, how the five stages of awareness work, what neuroscience tells us about buying decisions, and much more!
Essential Learning Points:
What behavioral automation is
How the buyer journey typically works
The problem with relying on marketing funnels
What neuroscience tells us about the buying decision
The five stages of awareness and how they can help you build better content
The problem with using scarcity tactics
How Kenda uses automation for her membership

Important Links and Mentions:
https://www.automationninjas.com/ (Automation Ninjas)
https://www.automationninjas.com/hack-the-buyer-brain-3/ (Hack the Buyer Brain)
https://www.automationninjas.com/marketing-automation-academy/ (The Marketing Automation Academy)
https://www.automationninjas.com/blog/what-is-awareness-and-why-does-it-matter/ (What is Awareness and Why Does it Matter?)
https://www.linkedin.com/in/the-marketing-automation-expert/ (Kenda’s LinkedIn)
https://www.membershipgeeks.com/ (Membership Geeks)
https://www.membershipacademy.com/ (Membership Academy)

Key Quotes:
“Understanding the brain and then tracking physical behavior are two parts of what I would say is behavioral marketing automation.”
“We need to create something that's more flexible, more personable, and more catered to where someone is in their own personalized customer journey.”
“We should be utilizing our content to help people make better choices. That is why people consume such a huge amount of content because they want to learn, they want to make the right choice about something.”

Fresh on the back of attending Social Media Marketing World 2022, we're sharing our top takeaways from the event, common themes and trends membership owners should be aware of, and specific tactics to try out in your social media marketing strategy.

In this episode:
How social media marketing is once again becoming more focused on content creators
NFT's, Metaverse and Web 3.0 - what does it all mean in terms of marketing your membership?
Key changes to how what we post on social media is about to change significantly
Specific tips and tactics for Tik Tok, Instagram and more