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This article is part of a series, based on the ebook 'Top 21 marketing channels for membership sites', written by The Subscription Coach Amanda Northcutt.

 The entire collection is available as an ebook

The Big 6 social channels: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, LinkedIn. Select one or two channels where your target viewers are and with whom you enjoy interacting. Participate on those channels 5 every day of the week. 80% of what you post should be useful as well as entertaining to your followers, and only 20% being promotional. So, 1 out of 5 social media actions ought to have the quality of "salesy," that's it. No more, no less.

Social strategy must tie into the content marketing plan. If, for instance, there is a theme for the month or theme within the membership you have, your content marketing (remember you need an unpaid or. paid content strategy to achieve this) should be aligned with the monthly theme. It's not surprising that your social media strategy will promote and tie in with the content that you are releasing for free each month. Do not reinvent your wheel. Improve your content marketing and social strategy by piggybacking on what you're doing behind the paywall for your members who are paying.

Facebook is the best option in terms of paid advertisements for the majority of websites that are members, as it has 2.3 billion people using the site and unlimited possibilities for customization, however it's not necessarily the best place for your free activities on social media unless you've got Established Facebook Group.

I won't take a deep look at the pros and cons of every medium since that's beyond the boundaries of this document. We do recommend Instagram, Pinterest, and/or YouTube when your group's activities revolve around an emphasis on visuals, and both Twitter and LinkedIn for memberships that are B2B (business to business). Utilizing a scheduler for social media, like Buffer or Edgar which can assist you to organize your social media shares as well as ease the burden of being present on the social media platform each day. However that you must be on the platform often and engage with those who are interested, but it's probably not a good idea to add regular social interactions in addition to the other tasks you have to do as a membership site owner.

Your once-weekly promotional, more salesy, and engaging on social media must contain a call-to-action (CTA) that is the same as the steps your followers on each platform might be willing to complete in order to join your group. It could be an exciting contest, taking a quiz, registration for a webinar accessing your website, or landing page and downloading your lead magnet.

When you require an email address to send the content you've created, that piece of content serves as what's called lead magnet. It is an item of high relevance and value that you offer to your potential customer as a reward for an email address. If someone enters their email address will immediately receive the promised content by email, and also be included in your email list. Don't allow them to join your list for periodic newsletter emails or something similar. Make sure you have a method put in place to turn this new lead to an active member on your website! You achieve this by preloading an lead nurturing email sequence, which will automatically go off when the person downloads the lead magnet. And yes, this is tedious work, however, this is by far the most efficient set-and forget selling tool you have available. Make it a habit to check your nurture sequence at least every six months.

Your primary goal for all of your CTAs on social media CTAs is to get an email address from a potential customer so that they start receiving your automated nurture emails. Like all marketing efforts, social engagement is required to be deliberate, contextually appropriate, and measurable. If you don't have accurate information regarding click-throughs conversions, shares, likes and retweets as well as lead captures and more., you might be wasting your time. Do you have it?

For more information about Facebook Live, grab the Hubspot Ultimate Guide here.

Organic influencer marketing

Partnering with those who have the interest of a significant mass of your target audience is the fastest path to growth for a membership website. It is possible to do the process yourself instead of trying to pay for it.

For the purposes of membership sites, the term "influencer" is someone who has amassed a large, loyal, and engaged following online because they are the expert in their field, or just super funny/interesting/etc. and people like to be around their company. Engaged is the most important metric to look for when searching for influential people within your industry. Certain influencers have hundreds of thousands or more followers, but it doesn't matter for those who overwhelmingly ignore and are disengaged from the influencer.

We've all seen cases of influencer marketing paid for where celebrities are contracted to act as spokespersons for a certain brand. Bootstrappers and entrepreneurs have taken that concept and used it in specific niche markets.

Chances are that there are influencers in your industry. What author has published the book on your topic for membership? Who hosts conferences for the people you want to reach? Which are the best 3 blogs, podcasts, YouTube websites that your customers pay attention to? Those are your influencers. It is important to recognize them, locate, and begin to be helpful to these people. Here's how to be the best you can to ensure that over time, you'll build authentic relationships with those who influence you to work toward mutually beneficial, collaborative projects.

Providing value to your industry's influencers through being nice and useful is the most effective way to get on their notice. The primary goal of this channel of marketing is to first establish genuine relations (to become friends, be a friend) with the influencers you're targeting. Then, in time, work towards creating mutually beneficial ways to reach each other's audiences. Make sure to treat these relationships with child gloves. Be cautious, thoughtful, and mindful the fact that they often have the ability to influence purchasing decisions of their followers. It is important to have this working in your favor, not against you.

It is easy to become a more helpful person by consistently doing things like: engaging with them on social media (retweets and likes, or comments and so on. ) and reviewing the book(s) at Amazon and leaving a positive review of their podcast on iTunes and leaving regular valuable comments on blog articles, sharing their content with your audience and tagging them on various social channels by sending a simple thank-you etc. Put these types of events in your schedule as a regular event to ensure your influencer marketing strategy is organic and on track.

If you email or send an initial appeal on social media platforms to announce yourself, you should include a quote from an influencer from a blog post, podcast interview, or the most recent appearance on stage with an thoughtful comments from you about the way their guidance or expertise helped you or ask an additional question. This will show that you've done research and aren't coming in out of thin air with a goal to achieve.

Then say you've been a time-long fan and admirer of their works (because that's what you've followed them and helping them for quite a long time you know? ), you've posted their material to your followers on multiple occasions, and that you're also in the same industry and think it would be beneficial to establish a connection. In the next step, ask them you to connect them with anyone in your network that might benefit the other (great when you've got individuals you're certain they're not already acquaintances with). Make sure you don't solicit anything from them in your first contact. If they are positive proceed slowly but steadily and keep providing an opportunity to the person. Work at their pace however do not be afraid to inquire for collaborations as it makes sense.

As your relationship develops the relationship should naturally to share each other's content when relevant, be on each other's podcasts and cross-promote services. bundle services for special offers and explore different creative collaborations to share audience information.

If your natural influencer efforts aren't working or you're short in time, don't worry and try sponsored influencer marketing instead!

Influencer marketing paid for

Similar to natural influencer marketing first you'll be able to recognize the influencers within your field, however you can speed up the entire process by reaching out to the influencers about advertising possibilities.

Some recognized influencers could possess a media kit sorts on their website in the event that they've been paid to do influencer marketing with other companies in the past. If you're not certain you've paid them for collaborations or exposure to their followers previously, you might need check first if they would even consider it. Regardless, you're better off if you've followed the relationship-building steps outlined in the previous section on organic influencer marketing so you're on their radar before you make that inquiry.

Opportunities for paid influencers might include: sending a paid mailer to their email subscribers, a sponsored blog post, a guest spot on their podcast and paying them to become an invited participant on a webinar and/or paying them to do an interview or to give a talk at your next event or conference, or anything else which is appropriate for your space.

Borrowing someone else's audience is the fastest and often most cost-effective way to grow. Be aware of the influence that marketing can have on your marketing and acquisition strategy.