Membership websites allow you to create gated or locked content so that you can make money. Basically, the people buy the membership of your website to access the gated or locked content website. Creating a membership website is a profitable part-time business and for a good reason.
Paid discussion forums, digital courses, premium support community groups, and webinars are becoming popular nowadays. If you are finding ways to earn passive income by selling your skillset or prior experience, move forward and find out how to build a membership site.
Choose an appropriate platform for your membership site
While there are hundreds of website generators on the market, you need a website builder that specifically fulfills your requirements.
Here are a few specifications and features to look for:
Content restriction
It must have options to hide your content from the general audience.
Member profiles and user registration forms
It must have frontend options for the users to access their profiles, sign up to make an account, or log in to your membership site.
Payment options
It must have flexible options to accept payment and integrate gateways.
Membership management
It must have the option to create several types of membership packages. Managing member feature is a plus in this sector.
You can add whatever features you wish to. However, you’d require technical assistance or knowledge to streamline your membership site features.
Set up your Membership site
In addition to adding a membership site plugin on WordPress, you’d need an SSL certificate, a web hosting account, and a domain name.
An SSL certificate is essential to make secure payments or transactions, a web hosting profile is used to store your content files safely and a domain name works as a web address for your membership site.
The cost of setting up a membership site is very high. However, BlueHost offers exclusive discounts on WordPress website hosting.
Set up your WordPress membership plugin
You’d have to choose the MemberPress plugin for the said tutorial. After installing and adding the plugin on your membership site, go to the notification bar and click on the link which leads to the options page.
Once you have access to the plugin settings, configure as per your preference.
Add payment methods for your members
Payment options are essential for your users to access the gated content. Click on the payment tab and configure the gateways for your membership site accordingly.
The MemberPress plugin has the default payment gateways on Express/standard PayPal, Authorize.net, and Stripe.
Add different membership levels
After the configuration of the membership site, the last step is to add different types of membership levels that the people can purchase. The MemberPress plugin allows you to create multiple levels, each with different content access, features, and pricing.
Navigate your dashboard menu and click on the ‘Add New’ button to add levels.
Conclusion
By following the above steps, you should now have a working membership site. Once your site is alive with sign-up forms and service pages, you can invite people, increase your customer base and make good money.
