Setting Up a Money Making Membership Website - Step by Step Guide (Part 1)

In my previous post 'The Pros and Cons of Starting a Paid Membership site to Make Money Online', I have written a number of advantages and drawbacks of starting a membership business to help you decide whether membership business is right for you.

In this blog post, you will find details about the steps you need to take in order to get your membership website up and running. Setting up a membership website is much like setting up a general website with just a few of additions.

Step 1: Choose a Theme or Topic for Your Membership Site
You need to decide a specific topic or subject that your membership site will be focusing on. You should make sure that there will be a target group of people interested on the topic use started.

Step 2: Choose a Domain Name and Web Hosting Package for Your Website
Your domain name will be the name for your membership site. It is best to keep your domain name not more than 20 letters. It should be easy to remember and describe the objective of your site.

Once you have decided what domain name to use, you may go to a web hosting site to register a domain name and purchase a web hosting package to publish your membership site on the Internet. Godaddy.com and Bluehost.com are two of the reliable web host you can use.

Step 3: Get a Membership Management Script
You need to install a membership management script on your web server to get your membership site up. Here are two sites offer membership management script:

http://www.amember.com - The package is $179.95

http://www.launchformulamarketing.com - The package costs $297.00

There are cheaper membership scripts you can find on the Internet. Just go to Google and do some searches.

Step 4: Set up a Help Desk on Your Membership Site
This step is optional. You can choose not to include a helpdesk option but it will make your members more easier to communicate with you. If you do want a help desk, this site, http://www.perldesk.com will help you setting up one.

Step 5: Add Content to Your Site
Content is the key the success for all types of membership sites except those that are offering a service. There are several ways of getting content for your membership site. You can write them by yourself if you have good writing skill or you may hire some freelance writers to create content for you. You can also think about including audio and video content to make your site more interesting. But whatever content you are adding, make sure they are relevant to the topic of your site.

Step 6: Set Up a Payment Processor
If you are running a free membership site, you can skip this step. But if you plan to charge a fee to anyone want to become a member of your site, then you are going to need to set up a payment processor to accept payment. Two of the good payment services you can use are Paypal.com and Clickbank.com.

To continue reading part 2 of this article, please click here.