In the decades since the advent of online marketing, membership sites have been identified as gold mines for making as much profit as possible as quickly as possible. And the reason is that you do the job once as an owner and are often paid by people who are interested and want to continue learning from you. Or they like to use resources and tools as often as they need to run their own online businesses.

The question is, despite knowing that affiliate sites are the best and fastest way to earn a living, why do so many people hesitate to have one? The most common reasons I have found are from their responses to surveys that they are not technical. They have no idea how to build a website let alone a membership. And in addition, it involves a lot of real work and time as you have to provide value in the form of content, tools, and resources on an ongoing basis for those who wish to remain members. Even though they are available for free like Mark Ling's AffiloBlueprint, the same principles apply as many retailers not only want to sell more but also get more leads. Because for them and for me as well, every subscriber costs a dollar and every paying customer costs two dollars or more depending on what you buy.

From my point of view, building a membership should not be so difficult. You just have to sign up for those courses, read and apply and be ready to move on. For the past 9 years since I started my online marketing journey, I have invested in many membership courses. Apart from AffiloBlueprint, I have access to Omar Martin's My Unfair Advantage, Adam Short's Niche Classroom Classroom, and Dave Guindon and Chris Guthrie's Suites. They all include a set of 20-40 video tutorials, PDF manuals, software applications, and other resources.

Although there are many topics for building membership courses, the one I have and have been using for the past 5 years is Optimizepress. Designed and developed by James Dyson of the UK, it is designed to build blogs, landing pages, sales pages, and affiliate sites. And it is the most expensive but in terms of quality and customer support, it is among the best. After learning and applying what they teach in their video lessons, I have built many landing pages, sales books, and membership sites in many places. In addition to online marketing, I have other topics such as health, personal development, and technology.

So as already mentioned, how do you build a membership site?

It may surprise you if I tell you the answer.

This is -

You do not start by building a membership site.
Instead, start with finding a profitable niche.

As in the forums and Facebook groups, you can search for related interests or problems but you have managed to overcome them.

Then all you need to do to connect with those groups of people is to introduce yourself and get to know them, build relationships and understand them as you normally make friends. Discover your interests, challenges, strengths, and weaknesses before compiling them in your booklet. And then for those, you know what they want.

I hear a lot of people talking about finding, knowing, and identifying your market first before starting any business. True. And in online business, the ones I mentioned above are those markets.

Then work from the bottom of the list eliminating issues that aren't worth the fight. Then assemble them into Microsoft Word or Open Office before saving them as a PDF e-book.

Once I have done that, the next thing I will continue to do is copy and paste the contents of those articles into the PowerPoint slides. At the same time, I will be signing up for the 30-day Camtasia Studio trial to create and produce video recordings by reading and adding some features to those slides.

When it comes to videos, there are two ways you can go. The first is a 10-20 direct video series that will be best for low to medium online courses. But if you look at high-value training programs, I would recommend 10-20 modules per module that include a series of 10-20 more videos. The first module can be about niche and keyword research while the second and third are concerned with finding profitable integrated programs and creating engaging content etc.

Once I get the PDF guide and videos made, I will add some bonuses as resources. It can be discussions with other professionals in the same niche, software tools, and additional series of PDF and video.

When it comes to building the site itself, I will focus on building opt-in pages, marketing offers, and affiliate sites from Optimizepress. Instead of using posts, I will focus more on the pages and make some settings and add plugins to improve the look and use of the affiliate site.

I will also add a menu at the top to allow customers to get what they want quickly and easily. It will include Home, Guides, Videos, Resources, Contacts, and Contact Page. Under videos, there will be multiple pages and each will be assigned to one video on a specific topic.

Eventually, I will buy Custom List Members to allow certain customers their username and password to be received via email and redirect after registration to the registration page to which they will be redirected after receiving their copies.

In terms of pricing, members may choose to pay monthly and annually. They can also cancel at any time if they do not wish to continue as members.

Finally, I will invite them to join my community Facebook group where they can connect and make Joint Venture business deals.