Paid membership

[Mark Avey]

Anyone had any thoughts on the potential loss of organic traffic with paid membership?

By definition, the site (or at least sections of it) won't be publicly visible. That means to search engines as well as humans.

Will the cost of membership make up for the potential loss in traffic?

Interested in getting some thoughts.

[Andrew Avella]

don't hold your breath

[seymor54]

in that case perhaps you will write a detailed ARTICLE on how you have achieved this using the TOOLS that Ning provides us, which after 2 nearly 3 years of trying I havent been able to achieve - other than as Ning says slap a PayPal Donation onto your site!!!!

Open and Private sites, using Moderation controls etc etc - the only way to do it is to make ALL members MODERATORS - then you can limit their access to certain features. If you have Members you have NO CONTROLS

so interested in how you have achieved this with so much ease...  as I am sure many other CREATORS will be. 

[Teriann Shrum]

Lots of apples and oranges here in this thread. NOT ONE POST HERE has bothered to state WHAT they are planning on "HIDING" behind a paid membership so that other Creators here, who already have this fully operating inside their networks can jump in to help. If you don't have the parts to "LOOK AT" or "READ ABOUT" how can anyone help?

• WHAT IS IT THAT YOU ARE TRYING TO KEEP FROM REGULAR MEMBERS?
• IS IT A PRODUCT YOU ARE SELLING?
• IS IT A SERVICE YOU ARE SELLING?
• WHAT PARAMETERS ARE YOU NEEDING?

PEOPLE... you're making this harder than it needs to be. It's NOT NING's responsibility to carry you 100% in business. They have provided one of the most appealing platforms for you at a NOMINAL COST compared to other firms out there. NOT ONE OTHER SITE OFFERING the near same features is compatible with the strident steps this corporation has dared to make in a short time frame.

• YES! YOU HAVE TO SPEND MONEY TO MAKE MONEY.
• YES! YOU HAVE TO SPEND MONEY THAT ISN'T NECESSARILY RETURNED TO YOU 100%
• YES! YOUR FEES PAID TO NING ARE A TAX DEDUCTION IF YOU ARE A BONAFIDE BUSINESS.
• YES! THERE ARE LIMITATIONS... BUT LIMITATIONS ARE NOT A STOPPING POINT!

You must:

• ASK QUESTIONS: Ask the right questions and the Creators here who have been in the DOT.COM industry for many years will jump in to help. We aren't mind readers!
• REMAIN PATIENT: Growth in a DOT.COM takes TIME. It's not an overnight success. It's a birthing process with loads of LABOR pains.
• STUDY: Study the sites here at NING and the Creators who developed them to find answers. Their successes whether LARGE or SMALL ARE THE ANSWERS you seek! DON'T SIMPLY LOOK AT MEMBERSHIP NUMBERS to determine the success of the network. We have over 92,000 customers.. but less than 2000 inside the network AND ITS GROWING! We're happy with those numbers!

PAID MEMBERSHIP AND ALL IT ENTAILS IS DETERMINED BY THE PLAN YOU HAVE READY TO IMPLEMENT.

• DOES YOUR PLAN FIT THE CURRENT SET UP NING IS OFFERING?
• IF SO, HAVE YOU CLEARLY BULLET POINTED THE PROPER QUESTIONS YOU NEED TO ASK INSIDE THIS THREAD?
• DOES YOUR PLAN LEAVE ROOM FOR GROWTH?
• IS YOUR PLAN SOMETHING FEASIBLE IN TODAY'S ECONOMY THAT WOULD "TWEEK" THE CURIOSITY OF A POTENTIAL MEMBER/CUSTOMER INTO BUYING A MEMBERSHIP?
• HAVE YOU DETERMINED YOUR DEMOGRAPHICS?

We're all here to help... It's just going to take quite a bit of clarity for us to give you the right answers.

[Eric Suesz]

FYI, people. We have announced the Paid Access feature. Check it out here. Since this discussion is a bit old, I may close it out, but let us know if you have any questions in the new discussion.