02 Why Start a Membership Site

People are willing to pay for online content. In fact, the "Online Publishers Association" said that pay-for content is emerging as a hot revenue model. Business content, personals/match making, and entertainment are the hottest niches. But even smaller niches, like DVD authoring, sports coaching, marketing services, and dieting are producing profits.

You can sell subscriptions for online content with your own membership site? Selling online content by way of a password protected website has become big business. Not only is it fast to set up, but the start-up and running costs are minimal. Work from home entrepreneurs and big businesses alike are tapping into this new-found revenue source.

Less than nine percent of online users currently pay for online content. This means the market is wide open for the savvy entrepreneur. Paying for content in 2004 was more than 5 times what it was in 2005. That’s a whopping 500% growth! Those who capture the market first in their niche will have the obvious advantage and it’s an international market, so anyone can play.

One of the great things about starting a membership site is you can take your hobby, specialized knowledge or profession and turn it into a profitable business. Your challenge will be finding exclusive content. You can start it part time but it will likely develop into a full time business.

Planning for and setting your site up for auto-responders, automated sign-ups, credit card processing, automated cancellations, etc is all part of a successful membership website. Starting and running a membership site can be a lot of fun and very exciting, however you need to know what’s involved in setting one up, and then managing it effectively.

This whole process can seem a bit daunting. However, as complex as this seems, many companies offer a low cost, easy-to-use software solution. This makes it possible for almost anyone to start and market a membership site at a very low cost.