Transcripts
You're listening to the Membership Geeks podcast, bringing you
Speaker:proven, practical tips and advice from the leading experts on
Speaker:growing a successful membership business. What's
Speaker:up, everyone? Welcome to another episode of the Membership
Speaker:Geeks podcast, the number one place to be for proven
Speaker:practical tips and advice on growing a successful,
Speaker:meaningful, profitable membership business. I'm your
Speaker:host. Mike Morrison. One half of the membership. Geeks. Thank you so much for
Speaker:joining me this week. It's always a pleasure to
Speaker:be in your virtual company. If you're a new
Speaker:subscriber, make sure you hit that subscribe button in your podcast app.
Speaker:If you're a long term listener, you know that we love and appreciate
Speaker:each and every second of your attention that you give to
Speaker:us. Thank you for your continued support and hopefully we
Speaker:repair that support with giving you the goods on
Speaker:every episode. Today, we're talking about
Speaker:seven ways to generate FOMO for your
Speaker:membership. Now, you probably already know what formal
Speaker:is, but if not, FOMO is one of these newfangled
Speaker:terms, god, just made myself sound so
Speaker:old. It's one of the terms that the youth of today use
Speaker:which basically stands for fear of missing
Speaker:out. That feeling when someone geeks
Speaker:something really cool, really exciting going on that they're not part
Speaker:of, and they get that itch they get that urge,
Speaker:they get that sense that they are missing
Speaker:out. And so for your membership, because
Speaker:it's a community, because it's a crowd, it's an
Speaker:assembly of people all working towards fantastic
Speaker:things, there's a great opportunity to generate that kind
Speaker:of FOMO amongst your wider audience who aren't yet
Speaker:members and just give them a little bit
Speaker:of added push to come and do the right thing
Speaker:and become part of your membership. So this is a quick one today, seven
Speaker:ways of generating that formal. The first is to use something that I like
Speaker:to call member first messaging. Think about
Speaker:anytime you write a post or an
Speaker:update on social media that is designed for your
Speaker:broader audience. It's designed to go out to the public, to your
Speaker:nonmembers, to the wider
Speaker:people within your orbit. You almost always
Speaker:write it on the basis that the person reading isn't yet a
Speaker:member. Hey, look at these cool things they're doing in the membership. If you want
Speaker:to be part of it, then head over to this address and
Speaker:join. We write from the perspective
Speaker:that most people reading are not members.
Speaker:Turn that on its head. You want to generate that
Speaker:FOMO. You want to make people really see that actually
Speaker:there's a place where you do your best work. There's a place where people
Speaker:get the best of you and get all these amazing tools and
Speaker:assets and training and features that you poured
Speaker:your brain, your skills, your authority, your expertise,
Speaker:your personality into that place exists. And
Speaker:you know what? You're not actually there yet.
Speaker:You're missing out. And hey, wouldn't it be so easy if you weren't
Speaker:missing out, right? It'd be so much better if you were part of what's going
Speaker:on here. So flip things on their
Speaker:head and use what I call member first messaging. So write those social
Speaker:media posts as though everyone reading it is a
Speaker:member. Because if someone's following you, they're
Speaker:following you because they like your stuff and they want to learn from you. And
Speaker:if those are true, then of course they're members, right?
Speaker:Write with the assumption that nonmembers are in
Speaker:the minority. Put your members first
Speaker:so you would write, if you're promoting an
Speaker:upcoming master class, instead of saying, we got something really
Speaker:exciting happening inside the membership, we're going to be teaching you these great
Speaker:things. Here are all the reasons you should come along and learn. Here's how you
Speaker:can go and join and be part of it. You actually write it of, hey,
Speaker:Academy members, something great coming up for you this month.
Speaker:It's just that tiny little tweak in framing that
Speaker:reference to where they can access it. Hey, if you're an Academy member, this
Speaker:is available right now inside the training library. And then the
Speaker:afterthought are your nonmembers instead of it being the other way around.
Speaker:So you're not saying something really exciting, here's a reason to join. If you're
Speaker:already a member, log in and get it. Now you're saying, members,
Speaker:this is something amazing that's happening for you this month. Here's
Speaker:where you get it. And if you're not a member, hey, you're missing out. What
Speaker:are you doing? Come along. Right? That little change
Speaker:can generate FOMO. Use that in your social
Speaker:media posts. You can use it in your emails. Anything
Speaker:that you're publishing. Write with the assumption that the people reading are
Speaker:members. And just that change in
Speaker:perspective, it just automatically creates that formal
Speaker:because you're literally writing it in the frame of,
Speaker:actually, a lot of people reading this are missing out because they're not part of
Speaker:the group I'm writing this for. Right? So when you're announcing
Speaker:upcoming content schedules, which again, if you've got a lot of
Speaker:real time content being added, new stuff going in the membership every month, new stuff
Speaker:being released, live calls, again, it's not written as, here are some
Speaker:great things you should join for this month. It's written,
Speaker:hey, members, here's what you've got to look forward to. Here's how
Speaker:you access it. If you're not already a member, this is how you
Speaker:come and join. So that's one way. Use member first messaging. Second way is to
Speaker:use insider language and identity.
Speaker:You don't want to overdo this. You don't want to
Speaker:make your community seem inaccessible because there's too many in jokes or
Speaker:whatever, but little phrases,
Speaker:little terminology, little hashtags or whatever that
Speaker:are used typically by people inside your membership. If you can get
Speaker:that going, if there are references, if there's language being used
Speaker:by people on the inside, incorporate that into the stuff you're putting
Speaker:out. Publicly. And if you can come up with a term
Speaker:through which to identify your members that
Speaker:isn't just members, then again, use that.
Speaker:In the academy, we use the term membershipers. With Chris
Speaker:Ducker's, it was very easypreneurs
Speaker:back when screw the nine to five was a thing. I don't think they've got
Speaker:the membership anymore. But they called them scrupies, right?
Speaker:Anything where you can give people their
Speaker:own term, you can create an identity
Speaker:for someone who was part of that collective. Utilize that
Speaker:language within the broader messaging that you put out
Speaker:there. Again, it very much paints that picture of there
Speaker:is this club, there are people, this is
Speaker:their name, and these little cool things that they're saying to each other
Speaker:that you don't know what they are, that just
Speaker:reinforces you are literally missing out on this. And
Speaker:we're not rubbing that in people's faces. Again, you don't want to overdo it. You
Speaker:don't want all your messaging can be so filled with insider references
Speaker:and so much obscure stuff that it puts people off. But just
Speaker:these little touches really
Speaker:demonstrate the fact that there is a gated
Speaker:group of people. But the good news is it's actually really easy
Speaker:to come in and be part of this crowd. All you do is go over
Speaker:to membershipacademy.com and sign up and become a membershiper,
Speaker:right? So insider language and identity that
Speaker:rolls into the third way of generating FOMO, which kind of goes hand in
Speaker:hand with this swag merchandise, branded
Speaker:stuff. T shirts, baseball caps,
Speaker:notebooks. The kind of thing people might wear and have selfies
Speaker:taken. The kind of thing people might have on their desk or
Speaker:in their background when they're taking pictures and sharing them on social.
Speaker:If you can get branded swag out there with your logo, your name,
Speaker:the insider languages, the identity
Speaker:that your members call each other. If you have this sort of stuff out there
Speaker:in the wild, again, that's going to get spread out on social media,
Speaker:it's going to be something which creates that kind of
Speaker:FOMO and it's going to be good for the brand. So
Speaker:branded merch and swag is the third way of generating that formal for
Speaker:your membership. Fourth way is with in person member meetups.
Speaker:Obviously, most of you who are running memberships, it's all
Speaker:online. Like, we specialize in online membership. However, if you
Speaker:ever have the opportunity to put together real life
Speaker:in person meetups, please jump on that, because
Speaker:they can be so incredible for a number of reasons. It's always
Speaker:great to be able to meet your members, to actually put these people in a
Speaker:room, see the connections that happen, see the conversations, and
Speaker:it's all like minded people. You've already brought
Speaker:your people together online. If you can replicate that in the real world, even
Speaker:if it's just ten people from your membership having dinner together, it's
Speaker:fantastic, fantastic thing. We always try and do it anytime we're at business.
Speaker:Conferences where we know that there'll be a cross section between
Speaker:people going to the conference and people who are in our membership. We try and
Speaker:arrange a member meetup. Sometimes it's more formal than others,
Speaker:but often it's just hey, meet at this time at
Speaker:this bar and we'll grab drinks. But if you can
Speaker:do those kind of member meetups, again, the stuff that comes out
Speaker:of it, the photos, the Instagram stories, the
Speaker:posts on all the different social channels,
Speaker:the friendships and connections that can actually go beyond this
Speaker:one meetup. And again, people are like, oh hey, how did
Speaker:you two meet? We met at the member meetup for membership
Speaker:academy, those kind of things. Again, you're literally creating
Speaker:something that people are missing out on and it's something that will
Speaker:get shared. There'll be photos taken of it, it'll go on social
Speaker:channels and it'll go outside of just your
Speaker:own broadcast area. It's not just you posting pictures,
Speaker:although of course you want to post pictures, you want to post stories, you want
Speaker:to post videos and updates. But if other people are doing it as
Speaker:well, man, that's really going to make people feel they're missing out.
Speaker:Another way of generating FOMO is showing people behind the scenes for
Speaker:anything that you're doing in real time. So
Speaker:if you're doing live Q, as or live webinars or Master
Speaker:classes for your membership, get on Instagram
Speaker:stories. Record part of the process, record part of the content
Speaker:creation process. Take pictures of your unfinished
Speaker:slides or the scribbles in your
Speaker:notepad. Pop a little overlay on the text.
Speaker:Brainstorming for upcoming member
Speaker:workshop on this topic. Again, that's going to have so much
Speaker:more of an impact because it's real, it's human, and also
Speaker:for the live events, it's showing that if you take a
Speaker:little picture just before you go live of you sitting there with the
Speaker:lighting in front of the camera ready to go live on this awesome
Speaker:thing. It's happening, it's now. I could be
Speaker:there, I could so be there. How many times have you seen people
Speaker:at a concert or something like that? I wish I was
Speaker:there. So showing people the behind the scenes is a really, really
Speaker:good way of it not feeling salesy because
Speaker:this isn't meant to be salesy. It's just cultivating that
Speaker:presence, cultivating that awareness that there are awesome
Speaker:things happening and awesome things available that I could
Speaker:be a part of very easily, but I'm not.
Speaker:6th way of generating that formal is encouraging members
Speaker:to post stories during live sessions. So particularly
Speaker:for Q and A's for Master classes, webinars, stuff like
Speaker:that, encouraging members to post a story
Speaker:on their social channels showing that they're watching. Now
Speaker:I've seen Zoom calls where everyone
Speaker:essentially takes a selfie at the same time with the zoom
Speaker:screen up behind them and they all share it to social media with
Speaker:a certain hashtag. You can do that really easily.
Speaker:Incorporating stuff like that again. It's doing that
Speaker:dual purpose thing of it's showing people like a
Speaker:feature, a thing that is happening, part of what they will
Speaker:get if they pay to join. But it's also showing,
Speaker:hey, there's people there that are in on something that I'm not.
Speaker:And they're having fun because they're taking a picture. So it must be good, right?
Speaker:So encouraging members actually incorporating it into the content, into the
Speaker:format of some of the things that you do, having a hashtag, doing it in
Speaker:a fun way, it doesn't have to be the selfie thing. It can just
Speaker:be, okay, everyone take a
Speaker:picture of their view right now of their desk
Speaker:or where they're watching this webinar from and post it out
Speaker:on social. With this hashtag. You can incentivize it with a contest or something
Speaker:like that as well. So encouraging members to post those stories,
Speaker:it gets your brand, it gets what's going on outside of
Speaker:just your network, which obviously AIDS Discoverability, but also it's going to
Speaker:create that formal too. And then the final way is something
Speaker:that is a way of generating formal for your existing
Speaker:members. So it's not just about building this
Speaker:desire and this, oh no, I'm going to miss out if I don't join
Speaker:amongst nonmembers. You need to generate this for
Speaker:existing members too, because every month
Speaker:there is a potential off ramp. If you're billing people
Speaker:monthly every month, that member could go,
Speaker:every month could be their last month. You want
Speaker:to make the decision to leave difficult. You don't want
Speaker:to make the process difficult. Don't make the process of
Speaker:leaving difficult, make the decision to leave difficult.
Speaker:And a big way that you can do that is showing people what they'll miss
Speaker:out on next month or two or three months or
Speaker:next week or tomorrow. Every time it might cross their
Speaker:mind of, should I stick around? Should I take a little
Speaker:break? We want to make it a really
Speaker:difficult decision because they'll know
Speaker:if I leave, I'm going to miss out on so much. And the way you
Speaker:do this is doing something we call signposting future value.
Speaker:So that's always be talking about what's coming up. Make sure
Speaker:that in your content library, any content you're working on
Speaker:is in there with a coming soon banner. Ideally with a
Speaker:date, either a specific date or a month or even just coming soon
Speaker:if you don't know when it'll be. So people can actually
Speaker:see what is coming up, what is yet to be tapped
Speaker:into, and what they would miss out on if they leave. Make sure you're promoting
Speaker:ahead of time what is happening over the next month. So
Speaker:release a schedule of new content or live
Speaker:calls every single month so that
Speaker:people know what's ahead. And they'll know if I cancel
Speaker:today, I'm not going to be able to come to that live webinar with that
Speaker:expert that I love or that topic that I love. If I leave
Speaker:this month, I'm going to miss out on this brand new feature, this brand new
Speaker:course that's coming next month. Signposting that
Speaker:future value, showing people what they will
Speaker:potentially lose if they decide to leave today and making that prominent.
Speaker:You don't want to emphasize this over the stuff they have access
Speaker:to now, but make sure it's in the mix. Make sure
Speaker:no one ever has to wonder, okay,
Speaker:so what will I get next month? What
Speaker:would I lose if I left today? So signposting that future
Speaker:value, and you can put this out on social media as well as part of
Speaker:your Member First messaging by announcing upcoming content schedules,
Speaker:upcoming content releases, showing people behind the scenes of content you're working on.
Speaker:Your members will see that too, and they'll see that you're working on this amazing
Speaker:course. They're going to want to stick around for that as well. Mention it in
Speaker:your emails. Have a Coming Soon section on your dashboard.
Speaker:So those are seven ways to generate FOMO for your membership. Not just for
Speaker:people who aren't members, but also for people who are members, too. Use Member
Speaker:first messaging to totally flip the script on the
Speaker:social posts and the messages you're putting out there into the wider world.
Speaker:Cultivate insider language and identity for the
Speaker:people who are inside your membership. Again, that really, really demonstrates
Speaker:that there's this really awesome place, this cool little club that you could be
Speaker:part of too. If you can use that in branded merch,
Speaker:that's even better. That's your third way. And actually people coming
Speaker:to your member meetups, which is the fourth way. Get them to wear the branded
Speaker:merch. Or use that as the opportunity to hand out those
Speaker:ball caps, hand out those branded pens and notebooks. Show
Speaker:people behind the scenes for live events and content creation. And when you're doing
Speaker:live stuff, encourage members to post stories on social media
Speaker:during those lives. And always be sure to be signposting
Speaker:future value in your membership for your existing members, too.
Speaker:All of these things will help to generate FOMO, which will drive more
Speaker:members and also keep those members sticking around for
Speaker:months and years to come. Hopefully, you found today's episode useful. Hopefully you've
Speaker:got a little bit of inspiration for how you can generate FOMO for your
Speaker:membership. I'll be back again very soon with another installment of the Membership Geeks