MBA1336 Is Gated Content a Good Idea?

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Hey O. Welcome to the $100. Because nobody builds a successful business alone, that's why we deliver daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of the Hundred Dollar mba a complete business training and community online and in today's episode you will learn Is gated content a good idea? Many businesses offer content on their website like their blog, like a podcast, like videos on YouTube, but they keep much of their content behind a paywall. This is called the gated content concept. This means that they offer this content only with a subscription. Now there's been modern versions of gated content where it's behind a subscription wall, meaning that they don't have to pay but they have to give their name and email address to get access to it. Basically in exchange for a lead, they will give them access to their gated content. Now is this a good idea? There are many types of businesses that there are podcasts that do this that only offer the most recent podcast episodes in their feed. Everything else gets stored in their archives or in their gated content on their website. Charging their customers money or again asking them to sign up to their newsletter or to their email list in exchange for access to that content. Does this work? Is it useful and should you implement it in your business? That's what we get into in today's episode. So let's get into it. Let's get down to business. Many hip podcasts like Marc Marin's WTF use the gated content strategy. There are many popular YouTube channels that do the same, where they only reveal or give away for free, with no commitment, with no signup, a certain number of episode or a certain number of pieces of content. Beyond that, you may need to subscribe or pay for content on the site. Now this is actually a very good revenue model for businesses that use content or media. If you're a content creating machine, if you're a content or a media company, whether you have a podcast or a video channel or you're a gamer or things like that, people come to you to watch your content. That's kind of your bread and butter. That's really your currency. Then you have enough want and enough interest in your content that people are willing to pay for it at some level, even if that is a low payment, like $10 a month or $5 a month. If you have the audience, you have the numbers, you have the volume, and this could be quite lucrative. But what if you're not a mini celebrity or an influencer? What if you just run a business and use content to market your business? Content marketing. So say, for example, you run a software company and you have a blog and you use that blog to generate interest and attract people via SEO. Is gated content really a good strategy? Well, I still think it has its place. We actually have a form of gated content with Webinar Ninja. Now, it's not in its purest sense, but we have something that we just launched recently called the Webinar Ninja Academy. The Webinar Ninja Academy is basically like the Netflix of webinar training. It's got video training on so many topics from sales to marketing to how to have engaging webinars to on camera presence. Most people would pay thousands of dollars for a standalone webinar course. But we offer the Webinar Ninja Academy as a part of any plan with Webinar Ninj. So our members get this as a bonus, as an add on. And we keep updating the Webinar Ninja Academy with new videos and new training. So you actually have to be a paying member to have access to it. It's not extra, it's not something you have to pay extra for or something somebody can buy by itself. But it's sort of a way for us to say hey, we content market, we have blog posts, we do videos, but we have exclusive content that we only offer to our paying members. And that's a really good way to use gated content to add value to your offering, to add value to the experience for your customers and also to give them the tools they need to be successful with your product. You want to make sure that they win with your product so they can continue to use it and continue to pay you for it. Right? So this is a win, win, win all around. It does take time to really produce this content and obviously it takes more time because you got to continue to produce it. But the reaction we've been getting from our use has been incredibly positive. They absolutely love this new feature, this new academy, and has given them something to do to get ready as they start planning their webinars. So having some sort of content like this behind a gated wall or a gated area for your clients may be a good option for you. Especially if you have a service like you're a coach or you're a consultant and part of your coaching package. You do one on one coaching or group coaching. But they have access to all these great pieces of training or a library of training. And that training can include also exclusive blog posts or books or articles or interviews or things like that with experts. So I highly recommend this model because it gives people other things to chew on, other things to consume and enjoy from your service, from your product. Now one of the things that I have found that is a great lead magnet and I've seen people use this a lot is say for example, they have a platform off their website like YouTube. Let's say you have a YouTube channel and you give lessons or you give tips on self defense. You're a self defense instructor and you have a growing YouTube channel and you produce these videos. Now I've seen this done really well where these videos will be giving them great tips. But then they say, hey, if you want exclusive content on this topic, if you want more on this topic, we have a second part to this video in our members area on our website. And guess what? Signing up for our members area is free. It's absolutely free. Now what this does is it allows you to take the traffic and take the visitors that are going to YouTube and driving them to your website and then most importantly, grabbing their name and email address so you can build that relationship and eventually turn them into customers. You want to turn somebody who's on YouTube into a lead. This is a great way to do because they're watching a video, they find it interesting, they like it, and they can get a free part 2 to this video or free exclusive content. All they got to do is sign up for your free membership area where it gives them access to these videos. If you're looking for a great place to host your courses or your gated content, podia. Com, Absolutely love those guys. Check them out. Another thing I've seen done on podcasts or YouTube channels is they'll do interviews with experts or interviews with the people that are tastemakers in your niche. And they'll have exclusive content, meaning like a second part to the interview, more with that guest, an extra like 30 minutes or so on their site. And again, they'd sign up with their name and email address to get access to that area or to that video. Now this is not taking full episodes. This is actually breaking up the episodes, breaking up the interview and giving access to certain people that are happy to sign up with their name and email address for access to that second part. Another great use of gated content is basically making it an option for implementation. Say for example, you're a coach, let's go back to that self defense instructor. You're a self defense instructor and you actually give instruction. Your business model is in person. You give classes at the local gym and you have a series of classes that span eight weeks. Now one of the things you can do is you can video those eight weeks of training that you do in person and put them up in your video area in Podia, for example, and you can offer that as an alternative to the live instruction. So people might not be able to afford the eight week program or maybe they're not ready for it, or they don't live in your local area and you can offer them, hey, we have the video recordings of the actual sessions. You can't ask questions, you can't get corrected in terms of the way you're standing and the way your hands are moving or your form. But this is like a self study course and you can grab it here and have access to it online. A great way to take content you already have, you've already done and add it to your offerings. It also could be a package for those who actually attend the live instruction. They're in the actual class. You can say, hey, you can just attend the actual class or you can take the class and get the recordings for this price. Companies and organizations do this all the time with live events or conferences where they say, hey, here's the access to the conference, here's the tickets to the conference. But there's a, you know, special ticket that costs X amount of dollars is behind the paywall, behind our gated community, behind our membership area. You'll get the videos of each session in the conference included with your price, and this gives an opportunity for your ticket holders, for your customers to pay a little bit more for a lot extra. Why? Because they can watch those sessions over and over. Maybe they don't have to take as many notes when they're at the actual conference. They can focus on networking. And especially if the conference has breakout sessions, you know, they can't split themselves into three different ways. Of the three breakouts, they can only attend one. That way they can attend all the sessions even if there's breakouts later on. So these are just a few ways you can use the concept of gated content as a revenue stream, as a lead generator, or as a value add to your current customers does it feel.

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So from today's episode, what I want to stress is it's really good to give away content for content marketing, whether you're doing it on Your blog or YouTube or podcasting or whatever it is. But it's also a good idea to attract people to your website via a gated content area. Whether you're looking to make money, make a sale or or capture a lead, or both, you can have a free membership and then a plus membership, which is paid either way. If your content is good and people love what you offer, they're more than likely to be willing to spend their time, give their email and their money for more thanks so much for listening to today's episode. If you love what you hear, hit subscribe right now on whatever you like to use to listen to podcasts. That way you get our updates automatically when the next episode publishes. It's right on your device so it's ready for you when you're ready to listen. We're on every platform, whether it's Spotify or Stitcher Radio or Apple Podcasts or Overcast or Himalaya. You name it, we're on it. Hit subscribe right now. Before I go, I want to leave you with this A word about the quality of your content. Content marketing has become more and more popular. Information and content in general is plentiful these days. It's all over the place. We're bombarded with information, so the cream rises to the top. The better your information, the better the quality of your actual content. Whether it's the writing, the videos, the audio quality of your podcast, the more you're going to stand out, the more you're going to attract the right audience. Remember, you attract what you present, what you model. You want a quality customer. Provide quality content. Thank you so much for listening. I'll check you in Tomorrow's episode Free Riot Friday. I'll see you then. Take care.

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