Transcripts
Well, hello there. Welcome to this episode of the Memberoni Geeks
Speaker:podcast. I'm your host Mike Morrison 1 half of the membership geeks
Speaker:Today, we're talking all about member retention,
Speaker:very, very, very important topic as those of you who've
Speaker:been listening to the show for a while. will know. If you are a long
Speaker:term listener, I love and appreciate each and every second of
Speaker:attention that you give to us. I really, really, really am
Speaker:grateful for every positive comment, every review,
Speaker:every second. that you spent listening to the
Speaker:show is so so valued. So thank you very much.
Speaker:If you just found us or you've listened to an episode or 2,
Speaker:make sure that you hit the subscribe button in your podcast app to
Speaker:ensure that you do not miss a single
Speaker:installment of the number one show for proven
Speaker:practical tips and advice on growing his successful membership
Speaker:business and key to growing a successful
Speaker:online membership business is getting member retention
Speaker:right. So today, very quick episode, I just wanna go
Speaker:through some do's and don'ts of member retention.
Speaker:So let's start with the do. Do make member retention a
Speaker:priority. Memberoni are a retention
Speaker:business. It's not about the members you get. It's about the
Speaker:members you keep. You do not want a leaky bucket
Speaker:where you're putting all this time and energy, marketing your
Speaker:membership so you can pour in all this water bringing all of these
Speaker:members at the top, but the bucket never fails
Speaker:because there's so many gaps, there's so many holes and it's leaking
Speaker:all over the place. That's what happens if you do
Speaker:not make member retention a priority. So that's the first due
Speaker:make retention a priority, but don't hide
Speaker:the cancellation button. So don't make
Speaker:it difficult for people to leave your membership, but that's what they've
Speaker:decided to do. I like to say make the decision to
Speaker:leave difficult, but the process easy
Speaker:because someone leaving your membership doesn't have to be
Speaker:the end. Memberoni will often leave and then
Speaker:come back and then leave and then come back. Sometimes they just need a break.
Speaker:Sometimes there's stuff going on in the world in their personal life. and they need
Speaker:to take a little breather, they need to take time to implement what they've learned.
Speaker:If you make the process of leaving difficult, they're never gonna
Speaker:come back, and they're not gonna speak positively about you to anyone that they
Speaker:know who might be thinking of joining. Your retention strategy
Speaker:needs to be more sophisticated than simply hiding the cancellation
Speaker:button, so definitely don't do that. But do
Speaker:take care of new member onboarding. Retention
Speaker:starts day 1 minute 1. The second that someone joins your
Speaker:membership the clock is ticking and first impressions count.
Speaker:So you need to make sure that you have a solid onboarding
Speaker:strategy in place for taking care of new members
Speaker:that will have them logging in, consuming content, participating in your
Speaker:community, all things that will make it more likely that we'll get value
Speaker:from your membership And if they're getting value, they're gonna stick around.
Speaker:So do take care of new member onboarding. Don't take it
Speaker:for granted that someone not cancelling means someone is
Speaker:happy. Again, you have that that phrase squeaky
Speaker:wheels get the most grease, which means that we tend to pay the most
Speaker:attention to the people who are complaining, the people who are making a lot
Speaker:of noise about the fact that they're not happy. And in doing that, we
Speaker:can overlook that people were not hearing from and just
Speaker:assume that if we haven't heard from someone, if no one's
Speaker:raised an objection or shown any behavior or signs that they might
Speaker:look to leave, that they're perfectly happy and they're gonna be with us.
Speaker:Because otherwise, They'd be telling us they weren't happy.
Speaker:Right? But, actually, you do get a big chunk of your member
Speaker:base who remain members because of inertia. They remain
Speaker:members because of frankly laziness, or
Speaker:it's just not been a priority to them to cancel. They were going to
Speaker:cancel, but then this month's payments come out. Okay. I'll I'll make
Speaker:a mental note. I'll cancel next time. Like, it happens. We don't like
Speaker:to believe that it happens, but it happens. So don't take over granted
Speaker:that someone not cancelling and someone not making a lot of
Speaker:noise about the fact they wanna cancel means that they're happy means
Speaker:their content means they're gonna stick around forever. So we need to make sure that
Speaker:we're engaging the people we don't hear from and that we're not taking anything
Speaker:for granted. So don't take things for granted.
Speaker:do ensure that you have a failed payment process.
Speaker:Failed payments account for a lot of churn. It's
Speaker:called involuntary churn. someone leaving your
Speaker:membership when they might not have intended to because their
Speaker:credit card payment, their PayPal subscription. However, they pay you for some
Speaker:reason, has failed, and they don't address it
Speaker:in time, and therefore, their subscription ends.
Speaker:And their access and their membership ends as well. Make
Speaker:sure you've got a failed payment process in place. Memberoni
Speaker:hemorrhage members who otherwise would have stuck around
Speaker:because if you don't have the payment process, fill payment process in
Speaker:place, you're relying on members spotting the
Speaker:problem and taking action and they're not always going to do that or not always
Speaker:gonna be aware that they need to do that. So you need to have a
Speaker:solid fail payment process in place. Do you ensure you
Speaker:do that? Don't assume that when someone leaves They're gone
Speaker:forever. I mentioned this before. Over at membershipacademy.com,
Speaker:25% of people who cancel come back to us
Speaker:within 12 months. We talk about the
Speaker:member life Callie, and the member life cycle is a
Speaker:continuous process. Someone leaving
Speaker:is not the end of the story. We've got people who joined when we launched
Speaker:in 2015 where members for a year or 2 Then they
Speaker:left, they were gone for 6 months or so. They came back for 6 months,
Speaker:then they were gone for a year, and then they came back and they've been
Speaker:members ever since. Don't assume
Speaker:that when someone leaves, that's the end of the story and they're gone forever. You
Speaker:need to be making efforts to win people back And Callie by
Speaker:recognizing that you can win these people back and a lot of time when
Speaker:people leave, they do so for temporary reasons.
Speaker:When you understand that, it changes your perspective,
Speaker:totally changes it, and that can be applied to how
Speaker:You deal with cancellations, both in terms of the actual process, but
Speaker:also in terms of the mental game of not taking
Speaker:cancellations personally. but also it
Speaker:reinforces just how effective it can be to have
Speaker:follow-up campaigns with people who used to be members We call these win back
Speaker:campaigns, and they can often be some of the most effective promo
Speaker:campaigns that you can do. So don't assume when someone leaves that they're gone
Speaker:forever. do, however, collect feedback from your outgoing
Speaker:members. Even if someone is leaving and you'll never see them again, if you
Speaker:can find out why they're going, what could have been
Speaker:improved, why they joined in the first place, all of this kind of
Speaker:data can be so useful across so many
Speaker:different areas. This feedback can help you improve your
Speaker:membership offering, improve how your market, 0 in on what
Speaker:you should be focusing more on in the member experience and
Speaker:the sales process, maybe identify problems that, you know,
Speaker:you're not gonna salvage this member, but actually if you address this you could stop
Speaker:other people from leaving for the same reasons. You need that feedback,
Speaker:not just to make improvements, not just to know what you're doing right, maybe what
Speaker:you're doing wrong, what the obstacles to people sticking around
Speaker:are, but also to better inform those win back
Speaker:campaigns that I talked about. If you know that people are leaving
Speaker:because it's too expensive, then your win
Speaker:back campaigns might include some sort of financial based incentive,
Speaker:like, you know, a a a trial or 50% off the
Speaker:1st 3 months back or something like that. If you know a lot of
Speaker:people are leaving because they're overwhelmed because there's too much content, then your win
Speaker:back campaign shouldn't be talking about all this amazing new content
Speaker:you've added. since they left. Right? So make sure you collect that
Speaker:feedback from outgoing members, but don't punish members for
Speaker:leaving. This is what I talked about before changing your attitudes, changing
Speaker:your perspective on cancellations. When you realize
Speaker:that someone leaving isn't the end of their journey,
Speaker:then that nullifies any reasoning you might
Speaker:have for making things difficult for them to leave
Speaker:or punishing them when they do leave. I've seen memberships where they're riding
Speaker:in their terms of conditions, that if you leave, you're not allowed to rejoin
Speaker:this membership. That's insane. Why would you
Speaker:do that? Think about some of the things that have happened in the world recently.
Speaker:Right now, there's a cost of living crisis. 2020, there was a
Speaker:global pandemic that was unprecedented in the modern
Speaker:age. Are you really going to
Speaker:ban people from ever rejoining if they left on those
Speaker:two occasions? And if not, why would you do it
Speaker:any other time? Most of the time when people leave, it's for a
Speaker:temporary reason. They're too busy right now finances are a little tight.
Speaker:The timing just isn't right. They've got other things they need to prioritize or
Speaker:focus on. They've learned so much in their time here that they
Speaker:needs to go and implement and so they're taking a break. All of these are
Speaker:things that can change. But if you burn your
Speaker:bridges, they're never coming back. And
Speaker:probably it's gonna do more damage to your reputation when they
Speaker:tell their friends, their peers, and their associate
Speaker:you know, yeah, don't join that place because
Speaker:I went. I loved that membership. It was great, but then when I tried to
Speaker:leave, all hell broke loose. Don't punish members for leaving.
Speaker:That's just dumb. That's retention by fear, and that's not the
Speaker:way to do things. On the flip side, do embrace the power
Speaker:of community. Community is such such an important
Speaker:part of online Memberoni. both in terms of having a literal community
Speaker:hub, like a forum or a Facebook group, but just the general sense
Speaker:of belonging. of feeling like they've found their people,
Speaker:their crew, their family, feeling like they're part of something,
Speaker:not just a number, not just an individual,
Speaker:embrace the power of community. It's a cliched,
Speaker:overused phrase, but members come for the content this day for the
Speaker:community. that's a turn of phrase that's been around for decades,
Speaker:but it's persevered because it's true. Make sure you're embracing that
Speaker:community. Make sure you're showing up make sure you're not neglecting it.
Speaker:You're not overlooking it. And don't ignore
Speaker:longer term renewals. So most
Speaker:memberships, you'll have monthly billing, but quite often, you'll also
Speaker:have annual billing plans. Now We
Speaker:can say for granted that if someone's on a a recurring annual
Speaker:subscription, that by the time the subscription comes for renewal,
Speaker:unless they've canceled, it's just gonna renew. They're gonna be happy. But with
Speaker:longer term renewals, people often forget. They forget how much
Speaker:they're paying. They forget when the renewal date's going to be. And
Speaker:so they can be taken by surprise. They might not have the money in their
Speaker:account right now. They might have intended to cancel or think that they canceled
Speaker:or they might have thought it was a one time payment. So much time can
Speaker:pass with annual billing that it's leaving it to chance. if
Speaker:you just assume everything's fine.
Speaker:With long term renewals, you need to have a little reminder
Speaker:campaign that goes out before that renewal date. It's
Speaker:overkill on monthly memberships, but if you're selling a quarterly
Speaker:membership, if you're selling an annual membership, you need to have a
Speaker:little renewal notice campaign that
Speaker:lets people know the renewals coming up, what to do about it, and Callie it's
Speaker:an opportunity to resell them on the benefits of staying a member
Speaker:too. So don't ignore those longer term renewals.
Speaker:So let's recap those. Do make retention a priority.
Speaker:Don't hide the cancel button and make cancellation difficult.
Speaker:do take care of new member onboarding. Don't take it for
Speaker:granted that not counseling means someone is happy. do
Speaker:ensure that you have a failed payment process. Don't assume that when someone
Speaker:leaves, they're gone forever. Do collect feedback from outgoing
Speaker:members. don't punish members for leaving. Do
Speaker:embrace the power of community and don't ignore longer term
Speaker:renewals. and a little final do and don't. Do
Speaker:join Memberoni academy.com, and don't
Speaker:forget that as an academy member, stage 7 of our membership
Speaker:roadmap lays out the specific member retention strategy to
Speaker:use and also provides resources and tools to help you
Speaker:implement it into your membership business to ensure that
Speaker:all of these best practices I've talked about in today's episode are
Speaker:instilled into your membership and you're in the best
Speaker:possible position to retain as many members as possible because
Speaker:Say it again. Memberships are a retention
Speaker:business. That's it for today. Hope you found today's episode
Speaker:useful. I'll be back again soon with another installment of the membership Geeks