A product launch is both an exhilarating and terrifying time, especially when you’re launching something brand new.
There's a lot of anxiety that comes with it with constant questions springing to mind…
What if nobody buys?
What if too many people buy and your website goes down?
What you can't handle them all buying at once?
A membership launch is no different.
But unlike some other products, a membership site doesn’t need to live or die based on a launch alone.
And while this takes some of the pressure off, you do still want your membership launch to be as successful as possible.
After all, the goal of any launch is to get as many people as possible aware of your product and, hopefully, purchasing.
For a membership site that means you want your first influx of members to give you some momentum to move forward with…
To get your community up and running, to get people engaging and consuming your content and giving you feedback that enables you to make your product even better…
Which in turn makes it easier for you to attract new members in the future.
So how do you ensure that your launch is a success?
Let's start by talking about your audience…
Whilst having a large existing audience can certainly help, it’s by no means essential.
You can still do a lot with a relatively small audience.
We launched Membership Academy with less than 500 people on our email list!
The key to a successful launch is not in the size of your audience, but the amount of interest and buzz that you generate…
It stands to reason that the more people who see what you’re offering, the greater the number that will buy.
So, how do you get people excited about your membership launch?
How do you get your launch in front of as many people as possible, even if you don’t have a large list?
Let's explore six of our favorite tactics to create interest and buzz for your membership launch…
1. Share behind the scenes & sneak peeks
Offering your audience some sneak peeks of your upcoming membership site, or a look behind the scenes of your business, is one of my absolute favourite things to do in the build up to a launch.
Not only does it get people excited about what's coming…
It also gives them something visual to think of when you talk about your membership.
The more people can actually picture your membership in real terms…
The more interested they will be and the more likely they are to know whether it's the right fit for them or not.
So you could do a full behind the scenes walkthrough of your site as you're putting the final touches on it…
Or you could do a slow tease with occasional screenshots showing different areas of the site…
Or things that you’re working on as you're creating it…
You can also utilise videos or photos of you in the process of creating the site and content.
Your potential members after getting that sneak peek behind the scenes…
Getting a look behind the scenes has the added benefit of letting your audience feel more involved in your site and your launch…
Which means they're more likely to be interested in what you have coming and will be more willing to share your content.
Social media is a great tool to utilize for taking your audience behind the scenes, especially using features like Instagram Stories.
2. Make good use of live video
Live video is all the rage these days and with good reason…
It's a great medium to use to convey your personality with your audience…
To really connect with them and allow them to get to know you on a deeper level than is possible through other mediums alone, such as writing.
It’s also a great way to respond to questions and feedback in real time and really tune into what your audience is interested in and which of your messages are hitting home.
Using Facebook Live, YouTube Live and other video options in your pre-launch can be a great way to build buzz and excitement for your launch…
Whilst also developing a deeper relationship with your audience and making them feel involved in your success.
You can also run live Q&A sessions throughout your launch itself, and use these as a way to increase desire…
For example, you could go live as you open the doors to your membership and give a shout out to those people join your new site and mention initial feedback that you’ve received, as well as offering special bonuses for those who are watching live.
Capitalizing on live video can go a long way to really ramping up the buzz and excitement around your launch.
3. Utilize launch Giveaways & Competitions
Everybody loves the chance to win something!
If you want to get your site shared far and wide then a competition or giveaway can be a great option for you…
Especially if you make sharing part of the giveaway or competition itself, so it could be a condition of entry.
Your competition could be as simple as sharing to win the chance of a free lifetime membership.
Or you could go all out and have a selection of different prizes.
Whilst the easiest competition or giveaway is one which is based on actions like signing up to your email list and sharing on social media, you could also create a more interactive competition that really gets your audience involved, such as a photo contest or a video competition.
One thing I would recommend is that you make sure the prizes are something that's relevant to your membership, it's topic and your industry of expertise.
Otherwise you'll attract a lot of people who aren't right for your membership.
4. Having an affiliate program
If you’ve spent any time at all in the online business world you’ve probably seen some big name launches that rely entirely on affiliate promotion…
Or affiliate armies as I call them who do a lot of marketing for a product.
There’s no doubting that having a group of people spreading the word about your membership with their own audience (especially if their audience is large) can do wonders for a launch…
Especially if you don’t yet have much of an audience of your own.
How successful you are using affiliate marketing for your membership though will depend on how likely their audience is to actually want what you’re offering…
So do consider that when choosing your affiliates and ensure that they are the right fit, rather than just accepting anyone and everyone.
You’ll obviously also need to give up a percentage of your launch income as well if using this approach…
But if that's a percentage of income you wouldn’t have received otherwise then it's definitely worth it!
When using affiliates for your launch it's important that you provide them with all the information, graphics and shareables that they need to really promote your membership effectively…
Don't just give them an affiliate link and leave them to it.
You want your affiliates to be well equipped and excited about what you're offering too!
If you can master this approach then you can create a huge buzz for your membership launch…
And drive sales for when you open the doors.
5. Guest posting & podcasting guesting
If you haven’t yet got a substantial audience of your own then guest posting or doing guest interviews on podcasts can be a great way of increasing your reach and your email list.
In fact, it’s a great thing to do even if you do already have a good sized audience of your own!
The more people you can reach during your membership launch the more successful it will be…
And utilising other people’s audiences to spread the word is a great way to build that momentum during launch.
Whilst using affiliates will also put your membership in front of a wider audience, the beauty of guesting on other people’s blogs or podcasts is that people get to know you, your message, your experience and why you’ve created this membership and why it might help them.
If you can arrange it, having a number of interviews and posts go out in the pre-launch and early launch stages can really up the ante for your launch.
6. Free Challenges
Online challenges are becoming more and more popular.
Whether it’s ‘5 days to train your cat’ or ‘30 days to build your membership’…
A free email challenge can be a great way of growing your email list and your audience quickly.
It can also help you attract new members…
This is an approach we used ourselves during our launch!
Your audience…
Challenges are also a good way of demonstrating your area of expertise…
And ensuring that the people signing up are those that would actually be is a good fit for your membership…
Typically they're delivered via daily emails for the length of the challenge…
But increasingly you may find Facebook Groups and Facebook Live being used as well.
You can really be creative here and choose any format that will appeal to your audience.
We’ve found it works well to time the end of your challenge, whether it’s 5 days or 30, with the start of your launch…
This is when people are still excited by your challenge and want to carry on and learn more…
So it’s perfect timing and your challenge subscribers will often be your first members!
If you're part of our Membership Academy community, you can access our ‘Foolproof Challenge Framework' workshop which gives you all the materials and information you need to attract new members to your site using a challenge.
These are some of our favourite ways of generating interest both before and during the launch of your membership…
You’re probably not going to want to use all of these options for your launch..
That might be a bit of overkill…
Instead, I’d recommend choosing the 2 or 3 that are best suited to you…
To your topic, the size of your audience…
And what best connects with people within your industry…
And go all in!
The beauty with a membership site is that you can try some tactics now and others later down the line in future promotions…
They don't have to be used purely for your launch.
So if you're in the process of building up towards your launch and are starting to think about how to get eyeballs on your new website…
Hopefully some of the tactics I've shared will help you generate that buzz, interest and desire to make your launch a successful one.
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