Membership 101: Building a Successful Membership with 15 Hours a Week (Part 1)

You don't want to price, you know, a membership at $29 a month if you really are only going to get 10 people right away because you're going to live with that for a little while as you figure out the sales and marketing. And if you know you're going to show up and do all these calls and it's worth a lot on a private level, then don't undercharge. That's one of my big things that I talk about is that you, not everyone's going for that volume thing. And is it still a membership? Well, yes, because if people join, they can join at any time. They lose access to the material when they leave and they can stay as long as they want. It's a members and it can also be higher ticket. So those are some of the ways that we need to think about. Hey.

Hey. I am so excited to introduce you to Lisa Prinsik, the owner of Scaling Deep. We had an awesome conversation about membership design, marketing, pricing, messaging, what you want to include in your membership, what you may not need to include, how many people are lurking and how many people are actually engaged in membership memberships on average right now and why lurking may not be such a bad thing. This is going to be a fun conversation and it's going to be a two parter. The first part is going to be a conversation between Lisa and I and you and then the second part is going to be you and me breaking down some of the tactics and things I have tested that Lisa brought up throughout the conversation. So as I was talking to Lisa, I was making notes. I'm like, oh, I should share this. Oh, let me share this in case there are elements that you're thinking. Yeah, I want to know more about that. So, so part one coming up with Lisa. Part two is going to be a separate episode with you and me. So watch out for part two. If this is up your alley, I'm going to take you behind the scenes. But first up, we got to get into this conversation with Lisa. Over the last 14 years, Lisa has helped thousands of impact driven entrepreneurs dive deep into their unique value and business models to build sustainable and profitable brands. She helps niche experts become thought leaders and increase their impact and wealth with membership programs. A staunch believer in business simplicity and intention, love that she helps her clients accomplish their goals by focusing on what to do and what to ignore. Yes, please. Lisa loves a challenge with adventure and can often be found skiing or biking in the mountains of bc. Let's dive in because there is a lot of good stuff here and I'll see you in part two. Also, Lisa, welcome to the podcast. So excited to hang out with you today.

Yeah, thanks for having me. It'll be so fun to talk to you all about the membership thing.

Yeah. Oh my gosh. So we're gonna dive into how to build a six figure membership that runs on less than 15 hours a week. Your clients are doing this?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean it. The thing about memberships that people don't may or may not realize is that they are a lot easier to run than we think they really are. I mean, I know it's that dream, but everyone thinks, oh, it's passive or, you know, leverage revenue. We all want to get to that point. But if you do it properly, it doesn't actually require so much over delivery and so it's really easy. I'm surprised at how little I spend on my membership in terms of time and I spend most of my time trying to get more people in it. So that's the real truth.

Okay. Because this is a thing, right, where we want to put all of the things in to love up our community, to love up our clients, to love up our people and to help them. Is this going to help them get better results? Okay. Yes. Add this, add this, add this. I've been there before too.

Yeah.

So how do you think through and design building a membership that just doesn't have too much for you or for your clients?

Because. Yeah, yeah. So that's what people really struggle with. Everyone seems to want to throw things in and I think it's almost a little bit of insecurity at first, which is fine because sometimes we do that. Right. We're worried that we're going to not have something that people like. And in memberships are very self led. So there's a lot of people who will never even ask a question or show up to the community. They'll just do something in the background and. Or they're just testing it. Right. They're just checking things out or lurking. Right. There's this interesting stat that 90% of the people are going to lurk, 9% are going to be moderate engagers and 1%, if that even are super engagers. So we sometimes take that on and start to feel a little bit uncomfortable because we don't see a lot of activity. And then that makes us want to create more and create more and create more and. And actually not only just create it because it's okay to have it because some people will dive in and really look for it and Find it and get the right things. We will want to ask, tell everyone about it all the time. And then we're like, oh, do this and then do that. And everyone's at different places. And then they're just like, whoa, I quit. Or not just quit, but like, they just give up the journey. Yeah. Yeah.

This is a really interesting stat. 90% of people are just lurking. How are we defining lurking?

Like observing. Like, they're, they're there. They might be looking at something, reading something in an actual community. They, they won't be asking questions and they won't be commenting on everything. I mean, I'm that person. I won't bother commenting on a lot of things in groups. I'm in. Like, I, I don't. I love conversation. I'm not the chit chat typer person. Right. Like, I'm not going to be on text all day long. That's just. So I think that we're gaining value, but we don't necessarily take the extra step to feel we have to contribute or need to share all the time. Right. So that is like most people, I think, and even though they're still gaining value because we can gain value watching a conversation. I mean, how many times have you watched a replay of something of someone else's conversation and got value or. Or a podcast interview?

So, yeah, I love that reframe. Because initially when you're like, oh, look, not engaging, not taking in the material, but may still be taking it in just in your own way or style. And it's true, like, I totally get value sometimes when I. When I'm in a mastermind conversation and really just listening podcasts all the time.

Yeah.

So don't equate not being an active. Right. Community conversation starter with someone not getting value. That's really interesting because that is like, jump into an assumption. Oh, they're lurking. Not good.

For whatever reason. I know. And you know, it's interesting because it takes a while to get used to it. But I've had people come into my scaling deep society and I. They don't join the community. Mine's on Heartbeat. Right. So they don't join it. They don't show up to the group calls. Like, I have quite a comprehensive membership that includes that and a, A course and a whole bunch of other trainings. Like, it's more, more advanced ones, but a main course and I won't hear from them. And then like a month or two later they'll be like, oh, I've been going through all the modules. They're so great. They're so, so the value is definitely there, but they're treating it a little bit more like a program or course that they're doing on their own and they don't have any questions. So I've come to the conclusion lately that it's just a pretty damn good course because they're obviously able to get like their, their information they need and the questions answered that they had around memberships via this course that I have inside the membership. And so instead of thinking, well, it's, it's not good, I mean, my parents always had this thing where no news is good news. And so I think we need to learn to adapt to that a little bit more. Insider programs.

I love this. Oh, so good. Already you, on your website, you have this saying, top of the page on your about page. It takes courage to build a business you believe in and not just do what everyone else is doing. And for some reason today that story struck me like, yes, you've got to differentiate. And I know that you differentiate, work with your clients a lot on this, you know, as we're building memberships and then we're going to talk about the marketing of those, which can also be a unique path as well, because there are a lot of memberships out there. I mean, the membership in the subscription industry has just shoosh over the last, I don't know, five years, five to seven, maybe even in the pandemic window of time.

Yeah, I mean it's just, it's just constantly increasing. Like, I think it's just how we are getting used to doing things in general in our whole entire lives. So I think every aspect of it, I think it's really going to just change a lot of ways that we're getting value a lot. So I think it is. And I think that's where people are becoming more used to the idea of that's how they get support. So they know that if they're joining something, they might lose access if they're no longer part of it. Instead, of course, which used to be this, you know, that was the first almost way that education came online in this more accessible way. And now it seems to be more access, which means that when you're in it, you're getting other opportunities to ask questions, whereas a course was just often a good luck if you don't understand it, you know, which is why a lot of people don't finish you and a membership, you can pull people back to some of that material or they can ask a question about it. And so I Think it's shifting. So the way we're doing things. So there have some benefits. But then you also know that, well, I better work on this because if it takes me three years, I'm going to be paying monthly for this thing that I maybe could have done right away. So it's just shifting our way of thinking about how we learn.

Yeah, that's really interesting. And how as we're built. Right. Because there are so many. And it's shifting the way learn. What are some best practices in terms of membership design that you have or that you would recommend so that we can kind of differentiate in this space and still be effective?

Yeah, so I would say differentiation comes down to doing whatever feels right about your program and what you need to deliver and how much you want to engage with people and a whole bunch of things. So I'll, you know, I. I actually have a workshop on this and I go through a lot of this, but getting clear on how you want to deliver value. So what is the primary method that you like to show up me? You love creating content. You love doing group calls and then making sure that you've got that as a focus, as a kind of a cornerstone or pillar and that you make that clear when you're selling it, that that's how they're going to get the most value and then finding that way to encourage them to show up to that thing that you think is the primary thing they need. Like I love coaching calls. I think validation is really important. I think people need to quickly move on and take action instead of sort of sitting in uncertainty for a very long time. And that's a huge differential in business success. So that is important to me. And some people just love doing content. Other people love community engagement. And their whole group is about. We want to bring people who are kind of suffering from the same pain points and have these life situation together. So I think just figuring that out will help and then recognizing that pace is really important that people don't all learn at the same time. And it probably took you a lifetime of learning in variety of ways to get to this point where you're this expert or you're this curator of this information. So we need to recognize that not everyone's going to be there and readily available. And so you can start to figure out, well, how do I create the foundation that most people need? But then I'm also creating the more maybe slightly advanced or exciting kind of new ways of doing things for the people who are ready to kind of go for it. And Then you can really keep that retention there because you're relevant to the people who've learned the thing. So to me, that's part of how you can keep a long term membership going that stays relevant. And then a couple of things I just want to mention is the question I always ask people is, well, how big do you want to be and how much volume are you willing to do? Because you don't want to price, you know, a membership at 29amonth if you really are only going to get 10 people right away. And you're don't really have that out there in front of millions or even tens of thousands of people because you're going to live with that for a little while as you figure out the sales and marketing. And if you know you're going to show up and do all these calls and it's worth a lot on a private level, then don't undercharge. That's one of my big things that I talk about is that you, not everyone's going for that volume thing. And is it still a membership? Well, yes, because if people join, they can join at any time. They lose access to the material when they leave and they can stay as long as they want. It's a membership and it can also be higher ticket. So that those are some of the ways that we need to think about what we're up for rather than just doing what everyone thinks the way is, which is like it's $10, it's $30, you know, all these things, we don't have to do that. And that also differentiates because people will be curious about how you're delivering value and it may just be like, wow, this is exactly what I need to learn.

This is so good. You hit on a couple of things in there that I want to follow up on. The first, being around the tracks, so. Or how I heard them and think of them as tracks. One for people who are advanced and another for people who are stepping in new to something. And how do you design that? Because whether it's a course or a group program, long term group program or membership, this is something I hear come up in conversation a lot is all right, I've got people who are different stages which I think is good for us to think about. We're looking at our client journey. Not everybody is starting at the exact same point. So how do we personalize and customize this journey and what are your thoughts on how to do that?

Yeah, that's. I mean that's something I think I'm just Starting to really figure out. So I like the idea of a starter course that helps people get their feet kind of wet in the thing and come up with the like answer some of the burning questions they have. So I have that in mind. Mine's a little bit more comprehensive than a starter course and, and I, I kind of price around that. So I, I have also a minimum commitment in my membership which is six months to start. And that's because I'm selling it like that huge learning experience and it really is a huge learning experience. So that's part of the way I've done it. And you can stay as long as you want after that and you can, you know, re up another six months or you can go month to month. It's totally whatever is there. But it's like that value, like it would be a lot to give someone to just come in for a month. Right. So that's one of the ways how I get sort of get around that in a way. And that also suits my sales and marketing strategy. But the foundational course will get everyone up to a certain level of like, oh, here's what I know and here's what I don't know and what I need to work on. And then I have a roadmap that has links to basically everything categorized right. So I have that where they can click and get into the different things. So there's that part of it. And then I just use my intuition to come up with things that I think people need. So one, what am I am excited about? Like what am I really finding? That's a game changer in my business. And, and I've been hesitant to do that a little bit because I haven't wanted to intimidate newer people and who are newer ish to memberships or their business. And I thought, well, I've got to do that because that's the people who are like really renewing are the ones that have the memberships are want way more, they're staying right. And they're really eager to be there. And so I do have to cater to that group quite a bit. And that's going to be mostly my leadership. And the easiest way for me to do it is just to share what I'm doing and what I'm learning. So that's working pretty well. And I think the one thing that I'm still trying to totally figure out is how to do the group calls in a way that it is more I would say like helpful for whatever phase you're at because if someone's super advanced and someone's talking about a mindset issue. It's a little. They're different. So I thought, you know, I'm still figuring out because sometimes I'll do themes because a whole bunch of people like, oh, I'd love a theme on that, or not a theme, like a themed call. And then those are the people who don't end up showing up. So, you know, we have to work it out a little bit. And I would say with more volume. Like, if you have hundreds of people, then you can. Or thousands, you can definitely say, well, there's going to be at least a percentage that show up for this and at least that. And, you know, the conversation is going to be rich. But as you're small, I think it's okay to just wing it a little bit and be like, okay, I want to do a sales challenge because most of you, that's your biggest problem. So I'm going to help you sell whatever it is. And I don't even care if it's a membership. Just, you know, figure out what you want to sell and we'll go through, you know, a couple months of cohort where we go through the steps, so that kind of thing. Right. So I'm playing a little bit with it. And I don't also expect it to ever be set in stone. Like, it's never going to be because I'm leading it. It's a membership. It's an evolutionary journey. And I'm evolving, too. So that's. That's how I run it.

This taps into something that is also so important, I think, to remember is it's okay for things to change and evolve.

Yes.

And my take on this is just communicate with people. Let people know, hey, here's what is changing when and why Proactively, not like, oh, everything's changing tomorrow. Surprise.

Yeah.

But proactively, like, okay, this is what we're seeing. This is what I am seeing. This is why we need to make this adjustment. This is what's going down and really communicating that. And then people, oh, okay. All right. It's a much easier change process.

Well, nobody really minds. I think, too. Unless, again, I. I don't run a high volume, low, super low ticket membership. I. Somehow the admin part of that just makes me think I can't, I can't. And so I feel like because I'm a relationship person, I would rather know almost everyone in there or at least have a chance to. If they want to show up and ask a bunch of questions, then I will get to know them. So I think that that might be complicated, but that is one of those systems things. Right. You have to train your team and you have to do the communication and you probably have to do it a bunch of ways. And, and I. So that's a different beast. And I don't know that I have all the best, you know, tips and tools on how to run thousands and thousands of people coming and going. Right. And it's just I think that is administratively a bit challenging. And so that's why I'm a big proponent of a little bit more niched, a little bit more. Who is this here for knowing why they're different categories. Like I want to learn this, I want to do this. And here's why I would stay. Like, I think that's the things that you need to think about. And then the other people may or may not come and go and can you mitigate that somehow if it becomes administratively really challenging? And if not, then, you know, I guess outsource, you know, and all that. Yeah. So it just depends on what kind of business you want to run.

I love that you're pulling all this together too. Meaning that you've got your pricing. Right. And if you don't yet have. Right. Tens of thousands. Right. Or if we look at the conversion forecast. Conversion.

Yeah.

If you don't yet have enough people in your community audience or access to them through a partner list, etc. Or a partner channel, if you don't yet have access to that, to have a $10 membership, to have like a Netflix model. Maybe don't say start there. Right. Start with, okay, this is what makes sense for my list. This is the niche. Because that marketing strategy aligns to the offer and the pricing. Like all these things fit together and then ultimately that's going to impact how you show up and serve, which you're touching on as well.

Totally. And I think this, the smaller membership too is really hard for most people to deliver just that bite sized thing in. And what if it doesn't take off? Like, what if you haven't just nailed that niche in that particular thing? Thing that is that, oh, it's so easy to deliver and it's very clear what I offer and it will take off like wildfire. Right. If it doesn't work out like that, then you're in a bit of a situation where you might not be getting the growth and or you might have the same amount of people and you're charging like you know, a third or a fifth of the value and I mean, I know I just joined a really low ticket membership that it's really helpful and I would be paying three to four times more for that without even questioning it.

So Would be or you are?

Yeah, I would be.

You would be.

It's like it is too low. Like I get the no brainer, but it would have been a no brainer at 27 or 37 or 47. It didn't have to be nine. And again, it's our ability to grow it and our growth mindset around it. And also what part of the business does it serve? Is it there because we really just want to almost be doing like mitigating my content strategy that costs money, you know, or it's mitigating ad spend, it's mitigating all these things and it doesn't have to be profitable. But if you really think this needs to be profitable, then you have to think through all those combination of things. Because I don't want anyone to be giving like one on one coaching that they'd be doing for one hundreds of dollars an hour for you know, $90 a month and because like two people show up or something like that and I just. That's when we're kind of doing a disservice to ourselves.

So. Good. Now one of the other things that is important here and that we've started to touch on is the marketing of it, right?

Yes.

What is the audience? How much reach do you have? So as we think about getting the ongoing sales, continuing to bring people into a membership, what are some of the things you're seeing working in membership enrollment.

So I can tell you what I like.

Yeah.

Okay. Well, there's two things that I think. I think having an always open enrollment that has some kind of limited. Because sales. I. I like to go with sales first because I think a lot of people have sales challenges before they have actual visibility. I mean it's actually not that difficult to get leads if you know it's worth the sales are coming in. Right. Like if it's not converting then then we don't want to go out there and just throw more attention at the offer. We need to make sure it's converting. So that's positioning and all these things. But I like the idea of an always open. It may be limited for some kind of bonus or limited time for somebody. I mean I've got a deadline funnel on mine. So it's limited to every single person who opts in. It's an evergreen funnel and that creates that urgency and all that. But it Also keeps my membership energized because I need people to come in because things do get quiet. If you go for a couple months or even a month sometimes without getting new people to introduce themselves and get excited, you're not getting that feeling feedback loop and you're not feeling the energy. The people inside might just be doing other things. They might not be as enthusiastic because everyone's always the most enthusiastic when they start something. It's just, it's just exactly right. So I think it's great to always be bringing people in. But make sure you also don't just have this page that you don't even get their lead. You know, they don't even sign up to anything because they just land on a sales page. They're not on your list. They just see it, there's no urgency and then they just leave. So always open versus limited Evergreen or limited open, I think is the best way to do it up to a certain level of members. Unless I think some people have had it the other way where it's always open and it works because they've just like someone's just come across them and go, oh my gosh, this is just a no brainer and I love it and no one else is doing this. That's totally fine. But I think closing it for a long period of time is very risky and I just don't think it works for a lot of people.

I heard you say three things. Correct me if I'm wrong on this. Always open, limited Evergreen and Evergreen. Did I hear that right?

Always open, limited Evergreen enclosed. Meaning you cannot get in like at all. Nobody can get in for months, like in between live launches. So it's kind of live launching, limited Evergreen and then always open. Okay, so live launching, live launching can also. You can live launch and have an Evergreen funnel, which I think is the best method. Right. So you can still have an Evergreen funnel that brings people in, but they can't just go and find your membership sales page on your website. But they can get into the funnel. That's just, I love that. Just the best thing ever. Because it takes off that sort of pressure of having to show up and perform. You've kind of done it already with a really good Evergreen. You put your best out there one time. You can still work on it, improve it, but you've kind of got that foundation there and you know it's working for you. And then you can do live events, but you're not relying on those live events. You're not relying just on the Evergreen and you don't have to put so much into the live event because you're only doing it three times a year. And if not, you don't earn anything. Right.

So it's interesting too, because when I think about Evergreen and even always Open, you still have to set up the marketing engine.

Yeah, yeah.

Like you got to be talking about it. You got to have a way that leads are coming in. And this is one of the reasons I love launching, because it's an event, it's an experience. Like everybody like, come on in and like, like, let's do this together. But you can still do that while you're unlimited. Evergreen or always open. And then the limit of Evergreen. What comes to mind and always open is that you really gotta have patience to deal in each of the steps. Like with a launch, you're like, we're doing it and it's done. And then ever it's like tweak, tweak, like a micro adjustments, looking at positioning, looking at messaging, total looking at the.

Tracking the numbers. But yeah, and I, I think that is a lot easier for people believe. Like, maybe not you. You seem like you would be awesome in a life lodge. Like, you've got this energy and I do enjoy it. But I think that if your result, like there's a readiness around live launching because again, it's a lot of eggs in a basket that if you don't have that team, if you don't have that experience, like, it gets easier, right? So. But it only gets easier if it works well the first time. So in some ways, I actually think people need to get their feet wet with a funnel that's not live, that's not relying on the performance and the practice. I mean, not again, it's a different personal experience. It's one of these things in business where it's like you cannot follow anyone's exact formula because it just won't work for you the same way for whatever reason. But I do think that it is sometimes easier for people to think about things a little bit more like step by step or strategically or like, okay, I don't have to. This is not a make or break, like big event, big failure potential. And that's not right. That's not easy for everybody. So because it requires practice, but then so does your Evergreen funnel. But you can keep working on it without throwing out the whole thing or redoing it. You can tweak one email, you can redo like say a webinar and do it in a different style and test it. I Mean, it's still a lot of work, but you can do it in your pajamas. If you're not on the, you know, whatever, it's a little different.

So I love this. One of the things that I have not historically, I'm getting better. I've been practicing at this, but I've not historically been a patient person, which is why launches have excited me more. But my photography business has grown patients. My business partner is like, no, no, wait it out, Amber.

Okay, all right. Yeah.

And she just grounds us. Okay, slow down for a minute. Okay, okay, okay. And I trust in that process, but I have not put as many Evergreen models into place in the consulting side for that reason. I'm like, oh, come on, let's just go, let's do it. You know, as I. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's interesting.

Well, I think live launching is important for a certain type of level of scale. And I think you do need to consider that some people will only join at Live because they need to connect and feel like you're real and this is real. And they just, they'll need it. They'll need the energy. They'll make that decision in a different way. And different people make different, different decisions. So. But you can also make it more low key. So I have like, workshops that I do live and I basically just deliver info. There's no pitch in it, but afterwards I invite them to join this society. And they could actually almost be in my Evergreen at the same time as that. But it's like, that's okay, you know, if they're really wondering if there's a difference between this option and that option or if, or they're confused or whatever, they can reach out. Because I don't know when people are going to sign up for my funnel. Right. But I think that's still happening at a different way than having everything pour into this, like, couple every few months. If you don't have a variety of different funnels or a variety of different sources, like if you're coaching and you've got full practice or fairly full, you can play with things. But if you're really going all in on your program and your signature stuff, you don't really just want to risk everything being like, like once or twice a year. And you don't want to burn out trying to do it every couple months. Because if you do, you're gonna have to keep bringing in that level of leads. You can't just keep launching to the same group of people. So I like the balance and I like starting with what you're most comfortable with. Mine happened to be Evergreen. I tried a couple of live, launchy things, and I realized that I was giving away way too much information. I wasn't selling properly. I wasn't selling enough, actually. So I had to. To learn and to train and to follow sort of like a little bit of a formula that had all of my own content, but was, like, structured approach to making sure that I had a training that helped people really see the potential, and it got people really inspired, and that was more systematic for me. So that's how I came about it. And I have done summits before, but I just found those were a little bit more burnout.

Yeah.

So, yeah, I've just kind of found my way around the best success for me started with Evergreen, and then now I'm layering on so good.

Lisa, I have a really specific question for you about a membership I am creating. Oh, it's called. So Case study. Live Case Study. It's called Stay golden, and it's a space to reach your goals. We have a planning event called the Plan A thon. We're creating plans in our community, but we need to bring them to life. So Stay golden. Getting those goals done. And we started with one set of messaging. This kind of goes back to your marketing. Like, you gotta have the messaging and the positioning down. And we started with one set of messaging. I'm like, I don't think this is working. So now we're in this little bit of an evolution. Like, okay, we hit a number, I think, because there was urgency and excitement because it was new and then.

And they were probably people, like, fairly warm to you. Like, they're like, oh, we love Amber. We totally want to learn from her. She's helped us already. That helps. Yeah, it was totally warm community.

And so now we're adjusting and looking at messaging. And this is like my patience muscle coming into play, flexing, like, believe in the offer fully. Know that that works because we've been working on this model for over a decade, but. And we're pulling it out now from other experiences, programs, things that we have. But the messaging is so clearly is a little bit off to me. I don't want it to be off because I really like that messaging. But when we're going through and looking at these funnels and people are tweaking, how do you recommend we approach this?

Well, I would say that if it's messaging in a funnel, like, do you mean sales page versus the emails? Like, all that details around it?

Yeah. Yeah.

Well, honestly, I Think it comes down to the value proposition messaging in the first place. Because I think that just all the rest of it supports it and I think it comes down to irresistibility. You know, I've always felt positioning is important, but then I upped a level recently and realized that people need to feel like they need to wake up at night or wake up in the morning, go, oh, am I going to miss that?

Yeah.

So it's got to hit a level of like. So one thing that I tweaked that I did that was how I got help with a mentor was that instead of just saying, do you want to grow your membership or six figure membership or all this stuff, which is true. Like, I like that I'd six figure because I feel like that's tangible and I think that's what a lot of people would really love to have. Like, you know, whether or not it's like, I don't need to work that much. I just have this one program or I really want to go for it and this will be part of it. So I added in a piece about a lasting membership and that was like an interesting hook. So it was just an example of how I enhanced the vision for people because they don't want to just do this thing and then hate it and quit. You know, like we didn't want to do something another like dead end or another thing they try. It's like, no, we're going to work on this and we're going to show you how to make this thing like with all the features that will make sure it doesn't just a try thing, like it really can turn out. So I think we just need to play with that. And I think there's ways of testing that. The hook a little bit more that just gets a little bit more of that. Oh, like this sounds like something I really, really want because I really think that a lot of people want the things they want and they just literally talk themselves out of it. And somehow we're not trying to convince the people who are not ready and not there, but we're trying to get the ones who are like, like, you know, I'm just not giving it enough of like enough tenacity and I'm not. So she was goal planning, right?

So good.

Yeah, I think you just, I think it comes down to that overall, overall, like, what is that real pain point. I would just test it. I would test it with just some like traffic ads and just see what is it that gets people clicking to say, oh, this is the thing I identify with. And you can do things like that that are fine tuning, testing, that start to change the same basic message into the different kind of hook.

This is so good. I'm taking notes over here. Everybody test your hooks with simple traffic ads, which don't cost thousands.

No, like they can be like $25, believe it or not. Like they're really cheap. And I think like one of the things that I did is I did this method and I started testing with these traffic ads and I ended up with a really good ad that's a lead ad. And it's almost got slightly different messaging on the banner that, that says like how to launch your membership or something with little or no content. Because that was the one that came. And that leads to my free training, which is full of like, here's how, here's different ways you can do memberships. You don't have to over deliver content all the time. But that is the thing that keeps resonating with people. So that's people's fear. So it's not like, am I going to undercharge? Like, there's a few people who are interested in that. But it's mostly this content creation thing and this over delivery that's what keeps. Keeps coming up in my little testing. So it's not to say the other stuff isn't totally amazing. And when I have a workshop, a lot of. Because it's live and people can like literally on zoom with me asking questions about pricing and stuff. So they always seem to ask about that. But I think the fear is around that content piece and that getting exhausted and burning out. So that I never would have quite known or said if I didn't test it.

Yeah, that's so good. That's so good that we gotta test it every step of the way.

I know. So even though your overall purpose of the membership might be working, you might be not leading in people with that thing that's quite sort of like close enough to home.

It's so true. And actually this was the. Aha. I was out there meditating. I'm pointing to my pool. I was sitting in the pool meditating on the stairs. Like, your messaging's off. You're not getting to the heart of it. And that's exactly it. What do people wake up, up in the middle of the night or wake up in the morning like, oh, this is the thing.

Yeah, like this is calling to me because it's calling to something inside of me. And that's, you know, part dream, like part excitement and part Like a nervousness about oh, if I don't do this. Like you want people to think about it. You want people to be like really seriously thinking about it and almost a little bit nervous about it. And so I think that I just, I can't say what that is because we don't know what it is because we not might not be that person that that would appeal to in the same way. Like I've never worried about content in my membership. I've never worried about that. Like it's never been the thing. Like I started a membership before the my current one that was just I invited old clients, like past clients to come in and we just hung out and had three calls a month for a year and then every new client, like VIP day client I just invited in and, and it was like I charged more than I do now for my big membership and I created nothing in terms of content. So it was just like so simple. And so that wasn't my issue. But that's what I'm saying. We don know, right? So we need to kind of test the resonance value a lot.

I love that example. So you've got one where you. That was an example of where you didn't create any content. You brought people together live.

That was just a follow up membership that I literally like said, hey, who wants to join this? It was just my task, right, Because I'm a bit cautious. Like I really, I'm not the kind of person who just wants to like go out there and like just spend all the money and just invest all the time. Like I kind of like to scaling was, you know, a bit of a step by step thing for me. Like you don't have to just be an overnight sensation. Just in case you're wondering. You can literally pull it out after 10 years and be like, wow, I'm doing really cool stuff now. It can be overnight. It can be overnight, but within like 10 years of like toe dipping. Right. So that's basically me. But yeah, so I did that and then I kind of decided to put my hole in for the what's now the Scaling Deep Society, which is a membership for membership business owners. I'd say mostly women, I think with all women. And I'm not quite sure what I let in a guy, but yes, probably, but it's basically for women. And I even called it like, I, I swear like my, my start of it was just so crazy. Like I called it something different. It was way different price point. I went back and forth on my price so many times. I'M just trying to help people not do all of that where they launch without confidence. They don't even know how they're launching. And then they keep changing their mind on things. And then because you get you said something that was really valuable and that I learned in the the last four or five months, is that you've got to fall in love with your offer. Like, you've got to love it. Because if you don't feel that confidence, like, this really is the best thing anyone who wants this could buy, then you're not going to either give it a chance or work on it or even stand by the value of the, like, the price point and things.

Yeah, it's true. When I see things not working in my marketing or in offer, I'm like, you don't love it, do you, Amber? Like, no. Like, it's not going to work if you wouldn't buy this, you wouldn't pay if you wouldn't engage in it. And then, you know, over time, my love affair will change. Like, don't love it anymore. I used to love you. Not anymore. Time for an update. So it's okay for those evolutions? Yeah. One question I have on membership design as well, because we talked about the community live, we talked about content. Have you seen and what are your thoughts on no community in a membership?

My thoughts on that are that I like the way of communicating in that way. So it depends on where your community is. I think it's perfectly fine. Mine, actually, I really do. Like, I think that it can work. I have. My engagement is kind of my least so for my particular membership, my number one thing is learning the things. Like, and then coaching probably, and then learning the how to do the thing. Right. It's the coaching and I think content, like trainings. Like, I'm not doing themes and I'm not putting out tons of content, but I've got like a pretty good library of like sophisticated trainings on marketing and sales and memberships and all that and design. But engagement is to me, like, I'm not putting in prompts or something. Like, so what are you guys doing this weekend? Like, I am not doing it that way, but I do have it on Heartbeat. I actually started on Slack, believe it or not, because I just wanted something to test. Like, I wanted something free. I didn't want to be on Facebook. And the one thing that was not that great about it was that I was also emailing people because if people weren't in Slack, so I felt like I was doubling up my communications. But What I love about Heartbeat is that it has a weekly digest. So now I send one email a month to everyone. Here's what's on. For the people who aren't in it, just so they know that, you know, we're here and we still have these cool new things like trainings and that. And then, you know, people can ask questions or stuff or not. And it's got an events in there, right? So it's got, like, events. And that was my other Achilles, is people weren't signing up for the calendar. I don't know how people can't live without their calendar in their. In their, like, actual calendar. It's my, like, everything, right? So that's in there. And so now I feel like that just made it administratively really easy for me to make sure there's just no way people cannot not see this. So I think that I like it from my communication, but in terms of how much they connect, I have coaching calls, and that's actually where they do it the most. So I'm fine with it. I'm totally fine with it. It depends on your, again, your personality and what you think the value is for what they need to learn.

Yeah. Oh, so good. I have so loved this conversation.

Throw it all out.

Oh, my gosh. Do we miss anything?

We covered a lot, right? But it comes down to people making the individual decisions because they'll still be. This is where, you know, things come in. They're like, well, what should I price it based on this, this and this? And so it's like, you are going to think through a lot of things. They're complex offers. They are, but there's beauty in that complexity. You get to actually design your dream program that, you know, will give everyone what they need, and then you can scale it. And that's where you don't have to work that many hours, because people are getting value in different ways. And once you set it up, you don't have to. To again, recreate the whole structure and content. It's there. So a new person joins and they're getting value somehow, and you're not responsible for it. And that's, again, a lot of women especially, have a hard time with that. It's like, it's okay to go off on your own and get value without me knowing about it.

It's really okay.

I love.

It's so hard because we want to be involved and make sure people are getting those results. And, and. And I think space to process and learn and grow is something that's needed right now. We have a lot of data coming at us and a lot of pings. So allowing that space for people to evolve.

Yeah.

And their personal journey is a beautiful thing.

So we need to do the mindset works. That's the one thing that I'll say is that you do want to make sure that your insecurity or whatever that happens to the triggers are. We all have them, right. Isn't the, oh, I'm going to cram more content, you know, at them or throw more things at them, because that's just not going to help at all. And that's going to make. Make them feel uncomfortable and you feel uncomfortable. So we do need to have the mindset, the readiness to stick to our principles around, like, what it takes, what our experience is, what other people's experiences and, and just also find out what we do best. Like, we can also do things like what are the best call times? And then you do this thing and then the people who you're kind of trying to revolve around don't show up for the call times. You know, like, I've had times on things like I gotta make sure I can fit and, you know, New Zealand and Australia and then they don't come to the call. It's like, okay, I quit. So I think we need to just also just stick to the. It's not going to be perfect for everyone and it's okay. And they'll find a way. And if things really, really mushroom and you are making so much money with it, you can add extra things, you know?

Yeah.

Oh, so that's it. That's it. Now we've covered it all.

It's so good. It's so good. I'd let you keep going. Where do people find you?

Yeah. So My website is scalingdeep.com and you can pop into my free training and that's just freebie. So scalingd.com forward slash freebie. And I've been running a lot of workshops lately called the Membership Method. So if you hop on my website, you'll see that. And that's a. A paid workshop, but a really good, like, chance to come in and actually sit on the zoom with me and go through all this stuff in a bit more detail and then ask questions at the end. So, yeah, find that as well.

Thinking good.

And I'm not much on the socials, even though I'm someday going to do it.

So right on time. It'll come right on time. In the meantime, thank you so much for being here. Obsessed. Had a great conversation and I can't wait to do it again sometime.

You are so welcome. Thanks for having me. And, yeah, I'll come back anytime to talk about this.