Lessons, Tips and Tricks for Making Money With Interviews

We have a hunch about something and we just started testing it.

Here’s the hypothesis: A list of subscribers that has paid for something is as valuable as a list of prospects that received something for free – that is 100 times as large.

In other words, we think that a list of 100 people who paid for content is as valuable as a free list of 10,000.

Are we right in our assumption? We’re going to find out!

I’ve always said that I would rather have a small, well-trained list than a large list that isn’t so. But there is probably a point where a freebie list will match the profit potential of a smaller list simply because the people willing to buy something are also on that freebie list.

But can we actually make more money from a tiny list where the subscriber has paid $1.99 for the squeeze page content rather than just giving their email address? We think so and we think it’s time to be tested.

So a few days ago we changed the squeeze page for InterviewIncome.com to charge $1.99 for the series of 4 videos that we previously gave away for free in exchange for their email address. We think that not only will we get higher quality email addresses, but that the people who do pay $1.99 will convert to other paid products at a much higher rate than those that paid nothing.

The 4-part video series is one hour in length when combined, and we do give solid information in the series. It’s easily worth $25 or more, but I doubt we could get that kind of spend from a squeeze page. But $1.99 seems more than reasonable for a one-hour class and we’re curious as heck to see if this works.

Old school internet marketers are probably rolling their eyes at this point, and that’s OK. We may be totally wrong on this – that’s what a test is all about.

But there is no denying that when someone pays for something, they give it much higher value – even if it is just a dime.

Our list will grow at a much slower rate, but dollar for dollar we think we can make more money charging for our squeeze page content. We will be growing an instant list of buyers and it also sets the right tone for the list – content is valuable and we are going to charge for it.

What do you think? Are we crazy? Wouldn’t be the first time someone called us that. Let is know in the comments.

creating content, selling content online, subscription pricing squeeze page content

One of the things I like about the aMember membership site software is that it allows us to see when someone has completed the first step of becoming a member or purchasing an information product, but doesn’t complete the entire transaction.

For whatever reason, when a prospective member abandons the process, they stop short of completing the second page and do not put in their credit card or PayPal payment information.

Online stores have worked this problem for many years, figuring out ways to minimize abandoned shopping carts. Our membership sign up forms are the same thing, and we too constantly think about how we can make the process as dead simple as possible.

The first page of our membership form has 6 fields to complete, all required, including first name and last name. Right off the bat some usability experts in internet marketing say that’s a problem. They would argue that you should have one single item on that first step – an email address field. By making that first step just an email, if your prospect abandons the form at anytime after that first page, you can contact them and ask if they need further information or had any problems.

Currently, we can tell if someone stops after the first page, but not if they start completing the first page and stop right there. The experts are absolutely right on this point, however we are somewhat forced to live within the capabilities of aMember. At this time, if someone abandons the process at any time on the first page, I have no way of knowing – and that bothers me – a lot. That’s on our list to work on…

Here is the form as it currently presents:

The first thing we do to minimize abandoned membership forms is to put our phone number front and center at the top. It is vitally important to me that if someone has any trouble or second thoughts at this point that they can pick up the phone and talk to me immediately (assuming it’s not 2:00 am of course.) Putting an email address there is a distant second choice because most people know email isn’t instantaneous. People won’t bother emailing and simply click away.

If someone completes the first page but doesn’t complete the second page, their account is still created in the system, but shows that payment has not been made.

Here is the second page of the form:

Each day, sometimes multiple times per day, I login to our membership system and see how many accounts were created but were abandoned before payment was made. The process can be abandoned by the prospective member for millions of reasons. Anything from, “I thought this was a free service” to credit card declines. On the credit card decline side, that’s a bit easier to tell. After I check incomplete transactions in aMember, I head over to our Authorize.net account to see if that same person’s credit card was declined. Unfortunately I don’t have the same ability in PayPal.

No matter what the reason may be for not completing the transaction, every prospective member who abandons the process gets a personal email from me. aMember also does this automatically 24 hours after the process was abandoned, which is nice if I’m out of touch, but I like to send a more personal email as well.

It’s simple and to the point:

Dear Joe,

I saw that you had started the process of getting a Pass to TraderInterviews.com but didn’t get a chance to finish it.

Hopefully our site didn’t give you trouble but if it did, please let me know and I’d be happy to process your membership manually.

If there was some other information you needed or wanted to know before getting the Pass, feel free to call or email me directly. I answer my own phone all day.

All the best,

Tim

—– —– —– —– —– —–
Tim Bourquin, Co-Founder, TraderInterviews.com
27285 Las Ramblas Ste 235 | Mission Viejo, CA 92691
(office): 1.949.348.2590 x. 15 | (fax): 1.949.348.2851
email: tim@ideasfordownload.com
—– —– —– —– —– —–

I’ve tried different variations of this email – some more salesy and “pitch-like” than others. But I found a simple, no pressure email works best to get a response.

About 30% of the people who get the email respond. I’m surprised a bit, I guess, that more people don’t respond, but everyone has their own reason and perhaps they just decided it wasn’t for them and don’t want to have the conversation. Of those that do reply, about 10% actually then join after all. I wish it was more, but it’s still enough to make the extra effort to reach out to them.

If you have ways you minimize membership form abandonment, I’d love to hear about them.

membership site software, subscription pricing membership sign up form

In a previous video series we produced (How to Start a Membership Site: Part 1 and Part 2), we outlined our sales funnel and how we sold memberships by offering a special discount to potential subscribers.

We’ve done a bunch of tests and tweaks to that overall idea over the past year and we’ve settled on a sales funnel system that is working really well and driving daily sign ups for our membership sites. I’ll use our flagship membership site, Trader Interviews, as our example for today.

Our membership pricing for Trader Interviews is as follows:

- $39 per month: this membership only includes the four most recent interviews and all new interviews going forward for as long as they are a member
- $399 per year: this membership includes the entire “vault library” which is every interview we’ve ever done plus all new interviews added to the site for the coming year
- $999 for Lifetime: this membership includes our entire “vault library” and access to the site for life.

The Lifetime Membership is our most popular membership because in the online trading industry it is less expensive than many trading courses (which can range from $2,500 – $5,000) and offers the member access forever. Many people have said they simply didn’t want to have to worry about being rushed to listen to all the interviews and didn’t want to have to worry about a recurring membership.

But this industry is also very fickle. Lots of people come in and out quickly because either a neighbor told them “trading stocks is easy” or some crazy infomercial told them they could make “$42,455 in 7 days with this system!” – neither of which is true. So we get quite a few $39 monthly memberships who stay, on average, about 6 months (which is a long time in that industry, believe it or not).

Doing the math, you can see that $39 x 6 = $234. Obviously if we can make the Annual or Lifetime membership more attractive to a prospective member, that’s better for us. It’s also better for the member, because trading takes time to learn, like anything else.

Initially we started offering periodic “1/2 price” sales of the Lifetime Membership to our list and on the site. For a few days every other month we lowered the price to $499 for a Lifetime Membership. The response was great because it now made the Lifetime Membership very attractive when compared to the Annual membership which was just $100 less. But the downside would be that longtime list subscribers got used to seeing a sale happen every other month, and therefore would often wait two months to sign up. The sign ups during the sale were great, but dropped off considerably in between.

Also, new list subscribers wouldn’t be offered our Annual Membership at the discounted price for up to two months. That’s not ideal either, because a very excited new subscriber’s interest level may have waned by that time.

So we set up a system whereby every new email subscriber was offered a discounted price for a very short time. We started a sale countdown clock the moment they got their first email that ended in 5 days. Some people took the offer for the discounted Lifetime Membership, but many did not. We just weren’t giving them enough time to decide if they like the service. Why would they sign up for a Lifetime Membership when they just walked in the door? We were rushing them to make a decision and it didn’t work.

After months of testing, we realized that our “sweet spot” for signing up for a Lifetime Membership was after two weeks of getting our follow-up emails. After two weeks, email subscribers were either ready to make a decision or were probably never going to join our service. Perhaps it wasn’t for them – and that’s OK – we could monetize them down the road with affiliate offers to other trading services that would be a better fit for them.

Over the past few months we’ve improved the system and found what we think is the ideal method. It isn’t perfect and I’m sure we’ll continue to make small tweaks, but this is how to we do it:

When someone joins our email list, they come into our Aweber follow-up sequence. They get a free interview (one of our best) plus some bonus material so we can show them right up front how great the content is. Then over the next two weeks we email them almost daily with pure content. Videos, articles, and podcasts that are just great educational pieces. It looks like this:

We may allude to the membership options in these emails, but it is very subtle. The idea is to just blow them away with the quality of the content we offer.

After two weeks, Follow-up email #10 says (in so many words), “We hope you’ve enjoyed all the trading videos, audio interviews and articles we’ve sent. If you liked those, you’re going to love what members get here at the site.” It’s a full-blown sales pitch for membership.

When they click on that link, it starts a custom countdown clock that gives them a 1/2 price sale for a Lifetime Membership that expires in 4 days. It’s a true sale – if they miss it there’s no going back. The price goes back up to $999 and they are out of luck. You have to keep that integrity if people are going to believe that a sale really is a sale. Don’t go down that slimy route of automatically refreshing countdown clocks and fake sales. People are wise to that these days.

Here’s what ours looks like:

The next two emails after that are also pure sales pitches. We want to really drive home the benefits of joining and remind them that the sale is ending soon. Remember, we’ve given them two weeks of freebies and great content. If they get upset because after that 3 emails in a row are pitching them membership, they’re never going to join anyway and so if they unsubscribe that’s perfectly fine with us. In fact we’d rather they do so – I’d rather not waste their time and vice-versa.

This system has worked marvelously and Lifetime Memberships outsell all others by about 3 to 1. Every new subscriber gets an opportunity to join at a discounted price and we don’t have to continually put the site on sale manually every few months. This all happens automatically (thanks to Emile’s programming).

The question now becomes, do we offer a second chance to non-members once or twice per year? We may consider doing that, but for now, we want prospective members to know that they have basically one chance to join at 1/2 price. It creates the urgency we know all buyers need to make a decision but ensures that every new subscriber gets pitched at just the right time within the sales process when they are still excited and have learned enough about you to know whether the service is to their liking.

Offer it too soon and prospective members won’t feel like they know about you to make a decision. Offer it too late (after 30 days on your list, for example) and they may get used to all the free stuff you give them and decide they are happy with just the freebies.

This post is already long enough and there are a lot of nuances I could discuss but you’d be here all weekend reading. Let me know if you have any questions in the comments!

email marketing, membership pricing, subscription pricing selling lifetime memberships

Over the past few months we’ve been testing various ways to sell individual pieces of content vs. making everything available only to members.

Several times a week we receive emails from people who want to download individual interviews rather than become members. Initially we simply said it wasn’t possible, hoping the content would be valuable enough to them to become regular members of the site. Some did, but many did not and we left money on the table.

My concern has always been that if we offered individual pieces of content for sale, our membership revenue would decline. That didn’t happen. Actually our membership revenue on a monthly basis increased AND we opened a new revenue stream by allowing the purchase of individual interviews.

Our monthly membership is $39 per month and we priced the individual interviews at $25 each. For people who wanted a single interview, it was a good solution. And for people who wanted more than one, it was a natural next step to become a member and save money.

We did, however, see a small decline in Annual Pass and Lifetime Memberships. It appears that having the ability to download new individual interviews increased sales of the monthly memberships but decreased the longer term memberships.

So, we made the decision about a week ago to make only older interview available for individual purchase for about 50% of the website visitors. Bingo! For those people that did not have the ability to buy the newer interviews and only had them available for older interviews, Lifetime Memberships popped back up to normal. (The older interviews in the archives are only available to longer-term members.)

It seems that having individual pieces of content available for sale only in the archives made the price of the longer-term membership more attractive when compared to how much it would cost to get the same content individually. In fact it makes the Lifetime Membership seem downright cheap.

I think we’ve finally settled on the balance of membership vs. individual sales that creates the greatest amount of revenue and offers the best choices for the site visitors and members. The conclusion has been to make individual pieces of content available for sale in whatever membership category you want to sell the most of. That’s counter-intuitive. I would have expected the opposite – but that’s not what the data showed. Since monthly members don’t have access to the archives (they only get access to the latest content), the expense of downloading the archives individually makes the higher-priced memberships more valuable. We sold more of them because of this.

The one downside to all of this – we may have tested everything too quickly. We did get a few emails from people who wondered what the heck we would offer next and asking if they should wait until we were done to purchase their membership. Not a lot, but enough to make us realize that we’d better keep the site as is for a while.

membership pricing, selling content online, subscription pricing membership content, selling online content

I want to update you on our latest experiment of selling individual pieces of content outside of the membership and subscription products we offer.

(Side note: I would have done so earlier, but I’ve been traveling to tradeshows and meetings over the past 8 days and didn’t get a chance to post. That’s something I need to work on, by the way. I have a tough time getting focused enough when I travel to write good blog posts. If you’ve found ways to write posts while on the road that are as high-quality as the ones you write from home or office, I’d love to hear them.)

Anyway, the experiment has gone well and we’ve decided to continue offering individual interviews for sale along with the subscription products.

The interesting thing has been that even though it’s less expensive to become a member than buying just two individual interviews, we’ve had quite a few visitors buy two and three interviews without becoming members. Interviews are $25 each and a monthly membership that includes all the new interviews is $39.

It seems that some folks have such an aversion to a subscription that they’d rather just pay more and not deal with having to cancel a recurring payment. That seems odd to me, because we make it so easy to cancel online. After logging in, it is just two clicks.

I was so curious I emailed three of the buyers and asked them about their decision. Only one replied, and he said he just didn’t feel like taking the time to signup and wanted the instant gratification of using PayPal to buy the content he wanted without having to fill out another form. Fair enough.

But it’s a good lesson to us all. Don’t make the buying decision for your customer. Even though YOU may think one way is better than another, let the buyer decide. I personally don’t think our one-year pass, priced at $399, is the best value, when a Lifetime Pass is just $100 more ($499). But many folks do take the one-year option for their own reasons, I’m sure.

For people who have been playing the pricing and option game forever, this isn’t new. In the comments of the previous post, Matt Petrowsky reminded me that a book we’ve read and refer to often, Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions contains a lot of this information. (The link is to the revised and expanded edition out on May 10)

I highly recommend it to anyone selling anything. There are some fascinating studies in it about what makes people choose certain pricing options.

creating content, subscription pricing Predictably Irrational