The yellow brick road to monetizing a site

Let’s say one of your customers is a fitness instructor, and she’s asked you to build her a  freemium based website. To do this, you can set up 2 membership plans for her: A free one and a paid one.

The free membership plan can serve as a lead generation source, with limited content of, say, 1 or 2 video classes plus a contact form. The paid membership plan can be a monthly subscription that includes unlimited access to all video classes the trainer has and will upload in the future.

How membership works? 

Paid membership is essentially the option of creating exclusive content behind a paywall (if paid) or a desired user action (if free). Membership is made possible by these main components:

1. Setting members-only site pages.
2. Creating membership plans.
3. Allowing site visitors to purchase a membership plan.
4. Letting existing members log in and enjoy their exclusive content. 

Membership plans can be either free or paid, and you can have multiple plans on a single site. With the flexibility that membership plans offer, you can even create multi-tiered membership sites. 

Is membership right for you? Try it out for free

Feel free to take the paid membership capability for a test drive - you can try it out using the included Demo plan - a sample plan in place to show you what paid membership is about, so you can decide for yourself if it’s right for you before upgrading to Business.

For a complete walkthrough of creating membership plans, consult this support article.

Getting started with membership

To apply the new membership capability to your site, add it through the left panel in the editor, and then follow these 3 easy steps:

Step 1: Set members-only site pages

1. In the editor, go to the Pages panel on the left to see a list of your site pages.
2. Click the Settings icon next to the page name of the page(s) you’d like to restrict to members.
3. Click Set page access > Members only

Step 2: Create a new membership plan

Here’s how:

1. In the editor, go to Membership on the left panel. Then select the Membership Plans tab. 
2. Click + New Plan, and fill out the information including:

• Name
• Assigned Pages = The site pages members with this package will be able to access
• Pricing = Choose between Free or Paid, and select your preferred recurring billing frequency (weekly, monthly or yearly). Enter a price for the plan if it’s paid*

*If you haven’t already set site pages as members-only, you can do that here on the new plan page, under Assign pages.

Step 3: Make it possible for site visitors to sign up and purchase a membership plan

It’s easy to encourage site visitors to purchase a membership plan. Here’s how:

1. Open the Widgets panel and add a Button. Place it wherever you like - it’s best to position it next to where you’re advertising the plan.
2. Click on the button to open its settings.
3. Under Button Content, scroll down to connect it to your Membership Checkout.
4. Select the membership plan you’d like people to sign up for.
5. Add a login widget to your site’s header, so paying members can easily access their exclusive content. 

So give paid membership a try - add it to any site, and show your clients how they can enjoy a recurring revenue stream, and how they can make their customers stick around for much longer.



A quick note on setting the entire site as members-only

If you want to, you can make all pages of a certain site members-only - here’s more info about it. Just keep in mind that if you do this, the first thing people will see when they land on the homepage will be a login screen. You can customize its design and add text to explain why this is the page they’re seeing.