How to Ensure Profit on Membership Websites

Posted on April 1, 2011 by admin

How to Ensure Profit on Membership Websites

Members and their paid subscriptions are the bread and butter of most membership sites. Why a lot of sites fail, the business model behind the membership website is not in its proper setup. Take a look at how successful webmasters do it in 5 ways.

1. Clearly define “PROFIT” for your site.

This is an easy trap for a lot of membership websites. A lot are too engrossed with generating revenue that they tend to overlook their expenses. They overspend that don’t make any returns at all. It boils down to your fundamentals; how exactly do you define profit? Does it have to be 20% net of your gross monthly revenue after overhead? As you rake in the dough, you also have to minimize your costs. What requires spending and what can be covered by possible partnerships? Try devising an effective affiliate program and for everything marketing expense, make sure there’s ROI.

2. Allow more purchasing options.

It’s essential that your members can pay you in different ways. Give them a lot more options of payment, recurring subscriptions can come in as monthly, quarterly, or annual.

3. Gain the wisdom on where and how to compete.

One of the most common pitfalls of membership websites is the price competition itself. You don’t have to offer it cheap as it will compromise your returns. A better and a more effective way is to maintain a high price and add more value rather than slashing off your rates to kill the competition. Make every page count

4. Make every single page count.

If you’re making money from subscriptions, this should not stop you from monetizing elsewhere. It doesn’t have to be in the form of annoying ads. Ads are good profit makers but design it in such a manner that it’s more of an extra service requiring reasonable charging. It has to be helpful, and it has to be more of quality than quantity. Offer money-making opportunities both ways where you and your members will both earn to expect action and have it on at least one for every page.

5. Eliminate distractions.

As you have selected the most worthwhile offers, get rid of distractions. If you have 10 good offers, don’t get surprised if they won’t take any action because either all 10 are so good they can’t decide which or all 10 are so insignificant anyway. Highlight the most profitable offers so you can expect more you can expect action.

The most profitable membership sites have demonstrated these over and over, and as a start these should well work for you. Define “profit”, allowing more purchase options, know where and how to compete, making each page profitable while eliminating distractions, success may still be a long shot ahead but you’ll be surprised, you’ve just started off on solid footing.

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Drupal Membership Site

Posted on April 1, 2011 by admin

Considering a Drupal Membership Website? Weigh the Pros and Cons

Drupal, among many other reliable CMS options, is just one of the popular among webmasters. Given the growing popularity of membership websites, Drupal is just one of the options to consider. This will have to stem from the amount of work the webmaster is willing to put in, for instance, to fully set up and integrate all the additional modules they require. There is definitely no right or wrong answers when it comes to CMS selections but as long as you know what you can do with Drupal, coming up with a decision will not be too difficult.

It is important to note that Drupal has a steep learning curve making it rather difficult and tricky to understand. If you’re an experienced Drupal user, integrating your required modules are not so difficult compared to newer Drupal users who are more familiar with other CMS environments. Once you decide on putting up a membership website, you have a lot of important modules that you need to install. These are the Content Access module, the CCK module, and the membership module.

Upon Drupal installation, consider the first things that need to be done. You will need to create a “Role” for your paying members. This is where others classify Premium, Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum Members that includes the new roles along with new “Content Types” for each and every paying member. This is just where you will need the CCK module.

As you create new Content Types, the Content Access module is available to alter permissions allowing for user access. Take care of this first and make sure that the Content Type is well configured so as to ensure that only your Paying members are granted access.

Once you’re done with all the set up, you may now integrate your preferred membership module. Understand that there are a lot of functions a membership module must include. First is the way or method your members will have to sign up. You’re well familiar with the whole registration process; set up the password, choose a payment option, choosing a tier (if at all it applies), and the linking of the payment gateway or processor, including how to set up for trial memberships. Do not forget that you will need to use recurring billing setups and automatic subscription renewals at this stage. The nice thing about Drupal is that, a single module can do all these or you may need additional modules to support these – and these will all depend on which modules you will select.

There’s a wide variety of modules available for every need and want in a Drupal membership Site, from the most mundane to the extremely advanced. Just as long as you know and understand how to integrate all these components properly, and you know how to manage all these as required, you’re ready to go. This won’t be a major problem for users familiar with how Drupal is designed, how it delivers, and how it performs. For others, Drupal might just be a tad too complicated, frustrating, and a lot of times, overwhelming. What will determine the difficulty level is the actual and the exact need of the webmaster and if Drupal as it is, matches that need. You may need to be familiar on the Drupal environment first before you decide; bottom line is, whether or not it’s your single best option will entirely depend on you and the needs of your membership website.

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Advantage of WordPress over Other CMS Platforms

Posted on February 22, 2011 by admin

A good and effective webmaster knows the vital importance of choosing a good CMS. It will all depend on his needs because the tools required vary in every available platform. Popular options are always Joomla or Drupal, though WordPress has been more successful in standing out making it the lead choice of most webmasters around. Listed below are some good reasons why WordPress is considered the best CMS option available.

1. They have developed QUICK

If you will notice, WordPress came out with major and minor updates even faster than Drupal or Joomla could have ever done. This includes their most recent update last June which was known to become WordPress 3.0. What caught the excitement? It is now able to integrate WordPress-MU while adding a lot more options to make website creation a breeze – even for first timers and advanced users alike. They reacted so fast to security threats compared to competition. How? It’s obviously the strong development community surrounding and supporting WordPress, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise why updates regularly come in really fast.

2. They are so FLEXIBLE.

Take a look at how WordPress was designed. The plugins itself are designed in such a way that it can literally create a website into anything the webmaster needs and wants. From a mere blogging platform the growing thousands of plugins have evolved it into an impressive power horse; you can now create full blown websites to squeeze pages, membership sites, and sales pages. This is why WordPress continues to enjoy the presence and the support of millions and millions of webmasters (and still counting).

3. They are Search Engine Friendly.

WordPress is just one of the rare few content management systems specifically designed for another important goal: It is search engine friendly. Faster load times with a lightweight core is just becoming too important these days, as their setup controls makes a search engine’s job very easy.
Add the fact that their growing number of plugins DOES enhance SEO big time, it’s nice to know that you’re hitting a lot of birds with one stone.

4. It just requires a Short Learning Curve.

As you try to compare it with Drupal or even Joomla, WordPress is so easy to learn. Take a look at the dashboard, try using some controls, and you’ll be surprised how easy and intuitive it is. Download and install plugins without having to leave the dashboard, update the core, plugins, and get important updates with just one click, you’re done. You’ve done a lot of work in such a short time.

WordPress will continue to enjoy a huge following and the secret lies in its growing community – formidably strong and ever so active. The continuous change has to be there to meet the needs of a growing variety of webmasters too. With its rapid development, sheer flexibility, SEO friendliness and a small learning curve to adapt, these qualities seal in the number one spot for WordPress as the top choice CMS of any intuitive webmaster.

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WordPress InfusionSoft Integration

Posted on February 14, 2011 by admin

WordPress InfusionSoft Integration – Best Option for a Payment Gateway with Auto Responder

InfusionSoft has quickly gained popularity because it continues to meet the needs of every webmaster around – it combines the best of a payment gateway with an auto responder. Few companies only have the resources to offer effective solutions such as this. Though InfusionSoft is too versatile, it offers difficulties in terms of integration when you don’t use a single comprehensive plugin to help you do all the work. There are WordPress plugins that will only integrate one service and not both, and any other service is not accepted – apart from the fact that a piece meal solution will only cause you the trouble of individual updating without any guarantees of a seamless and a hassle free backend management. If you get plugins for InfusionSoft, they do both services, but they do not integrate with other plugins and compatibility issues are often encountered every time there is an important update. Meaning if you change either service, might as well buy another set of system which entails additional costs which are sometimes unnecessary, a lot of work and a lot more time.

The beauty of the Magic Members plugin is that, it not only integrates with a host of other important plugins, including InfusionSoft. Integration is also easy because Magic Members takes care of both services. It easily integrates with the payment gateway and the autoresponder. Take a closer look at the other benefits.

InfusionSoft Payment Processor –

Accepts all major forms of payment,
It comes with a built in affiliate tracking program which has multi-tiered commissions,
It also has their own shopping cart which can be hosted on your other sites.

InfusionSoft Auto Responder –

Does automation real time. Apart from creating your own autoresponder series, you can also tell the automation engine to stop or start the service when someone fills up a form, opens an email, or clicks a link.
More than 2 billion emails for thousands of websites and businesses have already been delivered by InfusionSoft which means to say that, it already has an established record.
Leads are managed seamlessly as the sales processes are progressed.
Contacts get a single page containing all the information they have included.
Databases are well organized and centralized as you need them.
You are given a lot of multimedia options are also presented.

A plugin that will easily integrate InfusionSoft with WordPress is a must if you are taking the InfusionSoft option to both collect membership payments and manage your contacts with the autoresponder function. The Magic Members plugin has already established its excellent reputation by managing all these tasks being complete with these membership packages in no time. When you install the InfusionSoft API along with the Magic Members WordPress membership plugin, it will seamlessly integrate with WordPress in a matter of seconds and it will do all the work automatically. All you need is to put in all important information like your account info, and a single click will set it all up for you.

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WordPress SagePay Integration

Posted on February 9, 2011 by admin

WordPress SagePay Integration is a Necessity When Targeting UK/Ireland Markets

In Britain and Ireland, SagePay is one of the most popular payment gateways around. If you are setting up a membership website through WordPress and you plan to target the UK and Ireland Markets, SagePay is the way to go. There are a lot of benefits for this. Take a quick glimpse of what it is and the key considerations you will need to think about when you explore that option of integrating SagePay with WordPress.

How much do you have to shell out? Good news is that SagePay does not charge anything for the setup unlike its counterparts. They don’t charge annual or percentage fees on a sale. They don’t charge transaction costs as well. A thousand transactions in a mere quarter will only cost £20. Most likely, the only payment you’ll have to endure is the monthly fee.

Take a good look of what SagePay has.

It has a virtual terminal to allow for telephone and mail orders.
It accepts: American Express, PayPal, MasterCard (Maestro), Visa (Electron), JCB, and a host of others.
Account Add-ons or Bolt-ons have special features. SagePay is integrated with TAS Accounts and Sage software for easy monitoring and bookkeeping. For problems involving fraud they have a live support based in Britain as they have advanced fraud detection and prevention tools.
To ensure data security, it allows your customers to store their credit card information on SagePay serves using the Ten System. This in fact lessens all other hassles with the IT infrastructure and PCI DSS compliance is very affordable.

So how do I integrate my WordPress membership site with SagePay?

The most difficult aspect of this integration is oftentimes the security. If you’ll have to do it, consider adding the following: Server Integration, Form Integration, Direct Integration, and Server & InFrame Integration. This is the pitfall of many plugin designers; they don’t usually design a shorter way of quick integration.

Using the Magic Members plugin makes this all a lot easier. If you integrate SagePay with your WordPress membership site, this is the single plugin you’ll ever need. Just enter your account details with SagePay and watch it do all the work automatically. If you’re too worried about security issues, Magic Members will tell SagePay to automatically take care of all the payment pages, to assure everyone of security, so finally you’ll have nothing to worry about.

There’s no argument that SagePay is indeed an elite online payment gateway and is all that you need if your customer base is in Western Europe. Do remember that most plugin designers will still need to integrate them at the fullest extent. If SagePay is the only way to go, the Magic Members plugin is just exactly what you need.

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Is a WordPress Membership Plugin Better than Stand-Alone Software?

Posted on February 4, 2011 by admin

WordPress has become the popular platform for hosting a membership site for a number of reasons. It is free to use, highly flexible, extremely stable, and has a strong development community that helps it evolve rapidly. While there are a number of WordPress membership plugins available, many people still wonder whether it is better to use one of these plugins, or to use standalone membership site software. Here is a quick look at some of the common factors that people consider and how each option stacks up.

The first thing that people look for in any software is integration. It doesn’t matter how powerful a piece of software is if it cannot be successfully integrated with the WordPress core. With the top commercial WordPress membership plugins this is never an issue. Anytime there is a WordPress update, they often already have an updated plugin, if it is even necessary. Plus, they are designed to work specifically with WordPress as well as other popular WordPress plugins, so there is rarely an integration issue. On the other hand, stand alone software forces itself to integrate with WordPress There are several potential drawbacks to this. The most important problem is that anytime WordPress updates, there is a chance that the software will no longer be compatible.

The next thing that people look into is flexibility. Just because a piece of stand alone software can be integrated with WordPress does not mean that it will also play nicely with other pieces of software, scripts, or plugins. On the other hand, WordPress membership plugins rarely have this problem. The reason for this is that the plugin is designed to compliment and utilize the WordPress core, whereas the stand alone software does not. The more easily something integrates with WordPress the less likely that a third piece of software or plugin will cause any problems.

Another thing to consider is long term support as well as buyer appeal. Most people plan on selling their membership site at some point. It could be quickly or in a decade. From a buyers standpoint, the closer everything is integrated together, the less risk they see in using the membership site “as is”. If you are using a large number of different pieces of third party software, the risk that a problem will arise grows and thus risk-averse buyers will be willing to pay less for your site. If you are using a WordPress membership plugin, the risk is much lower. Plus, the top commercial plugins have a proven track record of providing excellent support which makes those membership sites less risky to purchase and thus buyers will pay a premium for them.

It really doesn’t matter what angle you look at this situation, in both the short term and long term, a proven WordPress membership plugin like Magic Members will offer the best performance as well as the lowest risk. While third party software may seem appealing, there are a number of potential complications to consider before making a purchase.

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WordPress MoneyBookers Integration

Posted on January 25, 2011 by admin

Need WordPress MoneyBookers Integration? Magic Members Can Help You

MoneyBookers is just one of the leading international payment processors because of its strong emphasis on security and cost efficiency. If you need your membership site to accept recurring payments from members, this is exactly what you will need. It is based in the UK which follows UK and EU laws, but as a global system, payments are accepted worldwide. UK Financial Services Authority regulates them which can give your members additional security and confidence that MoneyBookers is safe.

You will notice however that just like good international payment processors around, you may not be able to find single comprehensive plugins when you do MoneyBookers integration with WordPress. You will also need to integrate this with the membership site software you are using. Magic Members as a good comprehensive plugin does all this. Apart from a seamless integration with WordPress, you can also create a secure members area. There’s absolutely no need to find other membership software plus an additional plugin to integrate MoneyBookers because this powerful plugin does all the work you need – in seconds.

The nice thing about MoneyBookers is that they provide for proper streamlining when it comes to payments. Checkout areas are oftentimes the pitfalls of a transaction; the longer time you give your customers for checkout, the more they can decide otherwise to quit the purchase. You will need something to cut through the chase to allow no room for second thoughts here; so what MoneyBookers does, it limits the process. When members click the checkout page, MoneyBookers does this for you by taking them to their portal and take it from there. Upon payment completion, they are redirected back to your website as you designate it, and it often helps to have a page where it says or informs that payment has been successful.

One of the best things about MoneyBookers is their fast registration ability. This will lessen the steps when they check out with MoneyBookers. There’s also a nice feature called Quick Checkout which is more of   an extension with Fast Registration. This method is in fact, so effective in sales conversions because people can pay you without having to sign up for a traditional account.

MoneyBookers, just like any good payment gateway, accepts major forms of payment. This ensures flexibility that your customers will not worry about anything else on the checkout process. They also accept payments globally, so even if you target more countries, you don’t have to marginalize any of your members just because they live in remote countries.

Magic Members is indeed a good and reliable comprehensive plugin that it also takes into consideration the necessary MoneyBookers integration with your WordPress site. Given their stringent security guidelines, it still is possible for a seamless integration with the help of this plugin. This will take care of all the work. Just enter your merchant account and Magic Members can set it up all for you – the members area, payments page, and easy back end maintenance on your membership site with WordPress.

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WordPress ClickBank Integration

Posted on January 11, 2011 by admin

If You Need ClickBank Integration with WordPress – Use Magic Members

ClickBank has been around for several decades and in fact, it has been the pioneer when it comes to affiliate marketing and affiliate management programs in the World Wide Web. This is the reason why facilities and functions in ClickBank are more advanced than the others; being around for such a long time already gave them an advanced foresight in terms of marketability, a universe of products in so many categories you can even imagine, hundred millions of active affiliates and counting, including issues, resolution, troubleshooting, security policies, and the like. In fact, this is the first step to online money making and every e-Book or tutorial will tell you to start from ClickBank. Given the hordes and legions of affiliates flocking to ClickBank, it’s no surprise why it’s the most attractive market to vendors and online moneymakers alike. Just as long as you have the right plugins and tools, ClickBank should not be so difficult to integrate with WordPress.

If you want seamless operations, you will need to make sure that your membership software integrates well with ClickBank. In here, you have 2 options. Either you create a piecemeal solution where you will get several plugins and piece them together (and make sure that it’s all working good altogether), but this is a very long detour. This means that for every move you will have to update every single plugin in that piecemeal solution every time WordPress and ClickBank releases an update, and most of the time, newer updates of these several components are not compatible with each other – exposing you more to a higher crash risk. Or, as a second option, you can find a single comprehensive plugin that will manage everything in your membership website, plus that of the ClickBank integration. This is faster, easier, and you can enjoy the thought that not much work and headaches are waiting for you.

If you go for option one, you will have to determine whether every single plugin has everything for ClickBank and your membership management area during payment. A plugin will usually need a faster way to enter the ClickBank username, secret key, and it will need to allow displaying ClickBank’s logo so your members are informed who does the payment processing. You will also need to ascertain if this plugin will allow a CallBack Thank you Title and a Callback Failed Title, and redirect them back to the members’ area because, you just can’t leave your customers staring at a blank page after paying.

Our top recommendation for reducing all your potential headaches is the use of one good plugin for all these called Magic Members. It will do all the work in seconds. Effecting changes are faster and easier, just add your ClickBank username and secret key with the standardized templates after the sale, and allow it to display or change ClickBank’s logo.

Remember: If you don’t make sure that your membership plugin does not integrate well with ClickBank and it’s giving you troubles to setup and manage, might as well consider using Magic Members for your WordPress membership site.

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WordPress Authorize.Net Integration

Posted on January 1, 2011 by admin

Authorize.Net Integration in WordPress Should Not be a Problem Using the Right Plugin

Authorize.Net is a good payment gateway for most WordPress websites, making it a popular favorite among webmasters. It has been proven time and again that integration of this payment gateway is safe, secure, and properly streamlined that they don’t’ encounter as much problems as with other payment gateways. For any digital or physical product sold online requiring a solid and effective gateway, Authorize.Net is often an excellent choice. This has also been a common favorite among membership webmaster as well. If you plan to set up a membership website through WordPress, Authorize.Net is a highly recommended option because the plugin can easily integrate where you can expect a smooth and streamlined transaction, and if you don’t want to encounter any major difficulties with the backend.

Authorize.Net has been used for over a decade not and is in fact, one of the original payment gateways that even started. It is owned by CyberSource, a company notable for their reliability and being one of the top IT security companies around.

As you consider your options with Authorize.Net and perhaps sign up for an account, there are things you will need to consider overnight. Authorize.Net does not and will not market its services directly and every transaction, for you to acquire it, needs to pass through a reseller. This means to say that if you want to get the best deal, you have to scout for the best possible deals around on which reseller offers the most affordable price. Remember however that they are not and they cannot accommodate support or customer service issues primarily because they are mere resellers. Your issues will have to go directly to Authorize.Net which means that you won’t have to worry about resellers, and your customer support issues will be handled by them.

How to shop around for the best deal? Compare several expenses. Setup fees range from $100-200. Monthly fees range from $10-50 depending on the reseller. Transaction fees cost from $.05 to $.20.

When you do Authorize.Net integration with WordPress, it should not be a major difficulty compared to other payment gateways. Realize that many integration tools around do a poor job with a lot of plugins in WordPress. Prepare more work and monitoring ahead. Even as you integrate WordPress with your Authorize.Net account, WordPress dashboards can either be so overwhelming – only if you do not have more plugins to help you streamline the process of setting up and managing your Authorize.Net gateway. Tedious in terms of menial tasks, you can expect a lot of those, and prepare to be overwhelmed and frustrated if you do not have other plugins to help you with a smooth sailing integration. One good suggestion we’ve heard is the use of Magic Members plugin where everything will automatically be taken cared of, and all you will need to do is to add your account details.

Once you do all these, the experience won’t be so bad. Authorize.Net works well with WordPress and the reason why it can sometimes be overwhelming is because, there are missing plugins that you will still need to get for it to be working seamlessly. In theory and in practice, integrating Authorize.Net with your WordPress membership site should not be too difficult when you choose the right tools, and when you do the setup properly.

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Membership Sites – How to Choose Your Subject

Posted on December 29, 2010 by admin

Membership sites are just one of the many ways to enjoy residual income for the long term. This does not necessarily mean, however, that you will make money right away. If no one’s interested on your topic, your efforts are just going to be wasted. Five lone members in six months won’t give you what you need either. So how do you hit off? Take a quick look at our top 3 tips to help you choose THAT subject that will spell out your success.

1. Refine your category.

If your subject is too broad, expect a lot more competition that is tough to handle, and expect a lot of difficulty with visibility and rankings. Trick here is to refine your niche into a subtopic. What’s your specialty? Which particular areas of this niche are you good at – and the most credible for? Choose a niche that is relatively small – not so small that can only bring 10 people for the whole year – but not too big that’s too difficult to get a share of the pie. The logic behind this is very simple. If you’re too broad, your site will lose its overall focus which will compromise your content that is supposedly of great value. If your niche is refined, don’t expect hordes to just come in, but at least you’re starting off on a solid membership base that can guarantee recurring subscriptions and the least number of cancellation and refunds.

2. Target a receptive and involved audience.

If your topic lacks an active niche, expect your members to leave. Goal here is to keep them subscribed, involved, and participating. This is exactly why you need to build relationships based on trust and credibility. Give them more reasons to stay rather than leave, or worse, demand for a refund. Take a good look at the most active forums and discussion boards that talk a lot of sense. If you see hundred active users per day, find out their secret, that’s a good example to follow.

3. Why You?

Naturally, good and valuable content means it’s solidly backed by an authority. This will only mean building relationships through credibility and trust; this is your important ingredient for success if you want your members to stay and continuously subscribed. If you have been actively participating in other forum discussions or blogs, it’s easier to invite people to join and subscribe because they know that you already have established some level of authority and trust. You can still participate in more discussion boards and forums to make your name and credibility known. In the process, it’s important that you research your competition too.

What will make you stand out and win more members? Look everywhere. Remember that your membership site has to offer more value than a free resource can ever provide. By refining your category, targeting a good audience, and giving all the importance on you, you can well justify your price, you can establish better relationships to loyal members who keep coming back, and you’re providing such a valuable service not available elsewhere on the Web.

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