Membership Site Plan

My client wants a membership site with a mechanism for accepting recurring payments.  No domain name or web hosting.

(1) Domain Name

To get a domain name (or web address) you have to go to a domain name registrar. A company like GoDaddy.com registers and manage domains.  I use GoDaddy.com…currently only $9.99 for new .COM for one year; multiple years and domain name transfers are less.  GoDaddy provides a many “free extras” with every domain name registered.

(2) Web Host

GoDaddy has web hosting available for an extra fee, but I use Bluehost.com. Bluehost offers unlimited space, unlimited transfers, and unlimited domains on one account starting at $6.95/month.  Plus, Bluehost provides 24/7 USA based technical support.

(3) 

Word Press is a state-of-the-art publishing platform. The Word Press platform is an Open Source project, which means there are hundreds of people all over the world working on it. (More than most commercial platforms.) It also means that it is free. I’ll install Word Press on your hosting  account.*

(4) Membership Site Plugin

I’ve evaluated several membership plugins and Wish List is the best deal for the money. Wish List is built for Word Press and has many features including unlimited membership levels, flexible membership options, and shopping cart integration. See the entire list of features at http://member.wishlistproducts.com/.  $97 for a single-site license, $297 for a multi-site license.

WishList Member

(5) Shopping Cart

Good news! PayPal now offers a recurrent payment option for subscriptions so you will not necessarily need a shopping cart program and a merchant account. To read more about it…

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_subscr-intro-outside
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_wp-standard-overview-outside

(6) Autoresponder Program

The autoresponder program I use and recommend  is Mail Chimp.  Mail Chimp will help you to build and manage your list, design HTML email campaigns, send emails with confidence, and track and analyze email marketing…all from your free Mail Chimp account. And Mail Chimp’s “Forever Free” plan allows you to store up to 500 subscribers and sebd up to 3,000 emails a month for no charge. It’s a great way for professionals just starting out to maximize their marketing budget!