Launching a membership product of that caliber can be difficult without the correct membership platform to help you manage repetitive tasks such as following up with users, granting access to your site, processing orders and publishing content. All these time-consuming tasks can and should be handled automatically by a membership platform. By automating these tasks, you can be assured that your customers are getting what they need when they need it — giving you more time to focus on perfecting your actual product instead of dealing with busywork.
To help you visualize the potential your subscription site has, we’ve outlined the automation features you should be looking for and utilizing in a membership platform.
Product setup
You put a lot of time and marketing effort into attracting new members so it’s important that, once they’re ready to sign up, you don’t lose them with a complex and non-user-friendly experience. You can use automation features to streamline your registration tasks to make onboarding your new customers flawless and automatic.
Automated subscription payments
When people sign up for your membership site, they’re committing to paying you for the duration of their membership. To avoid any frustration in the recurring billing process, you can use automation to make sure each person is charged on the correct billing date, to send customers an email when their credit card is about to expire so they have an opportunity to adjust it, and to email customers if their card was declined for any reason.
By automating these billing processes using simple rules and settings in your membership platform, you won’t need to manually assess declined payments each month, send emails to the customers, or deal with payment systems.
Login delivery
You can welcome new customers automatically to impress them from the start and get them up and running quickly.
You don’t have to manually grant access to your site or deal with sensitive login information. An integrated membership and marketing automation platform like Ontraport allows you to create unique login credentials for each new customer and automatically email them with that information.
Product upsells
While your customers are in the process of purchasing your subscription package, you can also use automation to offer upsells and cross-sells that increase the total value of the sale.
An upsell is when you offer an upgraded version of a product that someone is either in the process of buying or has already bought. These offers could include access to exclusive pages on your membership site, a higher package level or other auxiliary products.
To get more value from your existing members, you can easily segment them into specific groups so that you can follow up with automated emails that offer content and services unique to their interests.
Customer engagement
Keeping your customers engaged and excited about your subscription product is key — that’s how you keep a steady flow of recurring revenue. Offering a remarkable user experience that extends well beyond their first login is a whole lot easier to maintain if you have automation set up to cater to your customers’ needs at every step.
Membership level setup
Many membership sites provide resources that help members accomplish a certain goal. A fitness blog, for instance, may offer three membership levels: basic, standard and advanced. Basic members might have access to local networking, a newsletter, event discounts and limited free online training courses. Standard members might have access to all the basic benefits plus one-on-one training with a coach, personalized meal plans, and a broader selection of valuable training courses. Advanced members might get all of the above plus stand-alone products included in their membership.
Setting such a membership hierarchy is quick and easy. Simply designate which content and products are accessible to each membership level, and customers will only see what they’ve paid to see.
Account recovery
When customers lose their password, they want the ability to immediately reset it and get rolling again. To make that happen, your account credential recovery process should be quick and automated.
A membership platform like Ontraport allows you to create a simple password reminder campaign where customers enter their email into an online form and then receive an email with instructions to reset their password. The best part is, you don’t have to deal with emails from frustrated or impatient customers; everything is done through the campaign.
Milestone acknowledgment
Automation allows you to reward your customers and make their experience with your subscription product more engaging.
You can easily track which of your site pages a member has visited, allowing you to monitor their progress. Say your customer finishes one of your online courses. Rather than just sending him or her to the next course, you can gamify the process and acknowledge their accomplishments with personalized (yet automated) emails or SMS text messages.
Customer center
To empower your members to answer their own questions surrounding your product, you can create a customer center using your membership platform. For example, members can log in and view invoices, review their purchase history, update their credit card details, and change their login information. This not only gives your users the flexibility and the resources they want on-demand, but it frees up your customer support team’s time.
