How to Plan Membership Content That Keeps Members Engaged

Robert: I have sort of a, 800 pound elephant in the room, kind of, question.

I'm putting together a membership now, planning on launching the end of this month, somewhere in a couple of weeks there. and I understand the idea of developing the content and the progression in the membership of providing information, providing sort of the quick wins, helping people develop and get that transformation they're looking for.

But I also realize that, and maybe it's because I'm thinking about this from a course perspective, that eventually you get to a point where there's sort of, an end. To what you have. And you have to start thinking about, well, what's the next thing gonna be? how does this continue if you're gonna continue it?

And I realize that in some topic areas there's a finite end, right? you're gonna get to a certain point where it ends. So my question is really about, does anyone have any particularly good techniques that they use for developing that ongoing content and planning that progression of topics for their membership?

I can think of some myself, but I'm just, I'm curious what other people have found that seems to work. aside from polling the members and you know, dealing with the feedback. 'cause I would, I would certainly be doing that,

Paul: yeah, Julia.

Julia: so I would chime in and just. Maybe challenge your thinking a little bit, that it has to be a bunch of new content because people don't necessarily always need more content.

They need ways to implement the content that you already have. They need community, things like that. And so some of the memberships that I am in are not releasing like the monthly masterclass type of thing anymore. What they're doing is saying, Hey, there's this masterclass from last year. Watch this as like pre-homework type of thing, and then come to this live session and we're going to get that done together live type of thing.

So that helps members in that they're actually accomplishing the thing, they're getting the transformation that you're promising and it takes the burden off of you to have to constantly be creating new content and kind of just grasping it. What's the next thing I can teach them? Let me give them more, more, more.

So in some ways that just like the reinforcement aspect of it and the implementation and reinforcement aspect. Okay. Okay. Good.

Julia: Yeah. And o obviously that depends on how much content you're giving them upfront type of thing. I mean, if you only have like three lessons, you know, maybe you do actually need more content.

But, just food for thought.

Paul: Look like Tom had his hand raised.

Guest 4: Yeah. Hey, hopefully this will be helpful, but just like all of us are at different places in the membership, Process. a friend of mine, I've been in his group for three years, and he has a diagram, the customer journey, so to speak.

And it is kind of, it's almost circular. It's like three, like a Venn diagram or something. And so there's people in the group who just start, they're total beginners. It's like, again, I'm in the PR space, so there's some people I've worked with who've never done a media interview, you know, that kind of thing.

Never worked on a press release, and so I help them, but then there are people with more experience. I have not yet launched my group. I certainly intend to soon, but I, I feel comfortable that it's okay for people to be in different places because as you go around that circular diagram of your customer journey, suddenly because they've been with you for three months, six months, a year, they're in a different place.

I would think that you have new things to offer those people as they work their way around the, the diagram for the second time. So that's just a thought for you.

I appreciate that. And I have that in mind.

I have that sort of like progression and journey through the, the pedagogy and their experience level and what they're capable of doing. So you're right, there's gonna be multiple trips that they go through that as they're acquiring new stuff. And I'm working in a market, where there is a lot of fluctuation.

I, I, I'm in the AI market just in case

Guest 4: that, that, that tends to change from time to time. Yeah.

Maybe by tomorrow. So

Guest 4: I don't think you're gonna have any trouble at all. There you go.

Yeah.

Paul: No, thank, thank you. Thank you both. Okay. Anything that you wanna add?

Melissa: No, I love that.

And, and, and if it's ai, like there're definitely, there's always gonna be something new. I think. I think it's a matter of, like you said, the surveying the members and seeing how the members experience, that's what's gonna drive a lot of your content. but one of those things, like you have the things that you know, that you're gonna be focusing in on, but I wouldn't, I wouldn't stress so much, so much that you're not gonna have content to provide because the members are truly gonna be the ones that are driving the content for you.

and you'll find too with members that. It is the tactical, practical things that they're interested in. But there might be some things like that you might need to dive into things that are more motivational, more mindset, that you could do entire topics on, kind of, offshoots of the main content in a sense.

Like you have like your main core pillar, content pieces, but then there's other things that are gonna come up like Julius said, the implementation. That's huge. That's something that we do,with our students and our,people on our coaching programs. a lot of it has to do with implementation.

We have the core things that we teach, but it's like, how do I put this into action? So I don't think you're gonna have any problem with, the content. And a lot of times too, I think this is for all of us. We need to get used to just, we're gonna be repeating a lot of the same things over and over again.

And to be okay with that too, so. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Paul: Thank you. No, I appreciate it.

just give a couple thoughts with that as well. I'd say, people definitely want to feel like they're making progress in, achieving that transformation and the reality for all of us, no matter what industry, what niche, whatever it is, transformation is not linear.

There's not a start and end point to any transformation with anything in life. There's always setbacks. There's always something new. There's a new challenge. There's new opportunities, and it doesn't matter what the marketplace is. You can say health, you can say relationships. Okay? You tell me that every relationship goes from zero to 10 and everybody ends up at 10 with every relationship you had in your entire life, or your health went from zero to 10, and you're just perfect, like for the rest of your life.

It's like, just take anything, anything in life. Even if you were a master guitar player 10 years ago, but you hadn't picked it up in five years, you're not at 10 anymore. You know what I, it's like, it doesn't matter what it is. So transformation is, is never linear. when we've shown our journey has always been that circle that Tom was talking about.

Mostly we have done infinity symbols, you know, 'cause we want people to know, like, you know, refinement and mastery never ends, never ends. You're always refining, you're always, you know, going back. And isn't it interesting for all of us that the advanced stuff, like the things that people really need and the quote unquote advanced stuff, is actually the foundational stuff.

The first principle stuff. The stuff that everybody always skips over. 'cause they want the cool, shiny object in all of our industries and all of our things. Everybody wants the magic bullet, the quick answer, all those things. And the irony is, transformation happens on the stuff that's all the way at the beginning.

And everybody wants to skip over that stuff all the time. Mm-hmm. so what it then comes into is, yes, hook them in because people want the transformation, they want the outcome to achieve. And when they're in your world, it's a constant feedback loop. It's people reassessing. So even within our programs, and Melissa was saying, we, every quarter Melissa does a, a call, it's

Melissa: actually a strategic planning session.

Okay.

Paul: So we have a dashboard where people rate and self assess like assets that they have in their marketing and sales, because some in the moment right now, you might think like you're outta green. Like you have it all put together, and then six months from now, something just changed with SEO or Facebook ads or, or again, AI or something.

And you thought you were on top of it, but you kind of been outta the loop and now you're making it a yellow or a red, you know? So it's like, it's a constant like reassessment. So that you know what your next 90 days is gonna do. So you, if you make people believe that there is an end point, then they will go find another solution at the end of your, they're gonna go to a mastermind or to a next level thing and leave your world thinking that they can get the advanced thing somewhere else.

So you just need to look at like, okay, people that get to that stage, what messaging are you giving them for them to get into mastery, into refinement, and to go back and loop through those things again and again. Mm-hmm. That's a really good point. Thank you.

Melissa: Awesome. Thanks so much.