Teach you step by step to build a user membership system!

Now membership has become the main means of monetization for most Internet platforms, so many friends are worried about how to build a membership system. This article will comprehensively/hands-on explain the rules for building a membership system from [3] aspects.

This article will solve the three major problems you will encounter. At the same time, I also hope to discuss with my friends what points are worth paying attention to when doing this.

1. How to build a membership system?

It is subdivided into: what is a membership, what is the most appropriate membership benefit, and membership needs to be built from several aspects, mainly in combination with product features.

2. How to get users to purchase membership?

Users' behavior of purchasing membership can be divided into two types according to the strength of their purchasing needs. If the user himself wants to purchase a membership, my products can meet his needs; if the user himself does not have a strong demand for purchasing a membership, I can help him place an order and pay through product atmosphere creation and activities. The first type of users often have existing needs. When the membership price changes during certain activities, it is extremely tempting to them and they are easier to convert. They are not the focus of this research. The main focus is on how to convert users who do not have strong needs for membership.

• A: Create and guide the product atmosphere, such as organizing the Members' Day and using the festival atmosphere to influence users who have not converted, guiding them to follow the crowd and place orders.
• B: Increase the leakage of member benefits and enhance the attractiveness of the benefits themselves to users
• C: Provide good product conversion guidance at every point related to member benefits. For example, if the member price has a strong advantage when purchasing goods, you should check the option. If users purchase together with the membership, they can enjoy the member price for this order.

3. How can users purchase my membership again? How can I increase the member repurchase rate and recall lost members?

Churn in the product can be divided into two aspects: [users have been lost] [users are still active, but no longer purchase membership products]. The first type of users is not the focus of this research. The main analysis is how to reach the second type of users through product means and how to recall them after reaching them.

1. How to build a membership system?

If you want to understand how to build a membership system, you need to understand what membership is and what the existing commonly used membership systems are. Only when you know what it is and why you need to do it can you take action. If the product itself determines that we do not need a membership system, then saving development resources or using them where they are needed most is what we should consider.

1. What are membership and membership benefits?

Members refer to a group of users who have demand for product use and whose demand intensity exceeds a certain threshold and has been verified through effective means and whose depth is worth exploring in depth. This is the product of full competition in the market economy, and the product of continuous segmentation and re-segmentation of market supply derived from personalized needs. —From Baidu Encyclopedia

For the platform, the membership product must be able to improve one or more aspects such as user stickiness/user order frequency/average order value/user honor, etc.

Member benefits must be linked to the core business of the product, and for users must be able to improve one or more aspects of the mainstream business, such as convenience, ease of use, experience (richness of functions, vanity, operating costs of functions), and degree of discount.

2. Common membership models and usage scenarios

The membership system is very complex, and common memberships can be summarized into the following categories:

• Registered member: (basically no threshold except basic user information): commonly seen in offline physical stores, the main purpose is to obtain real user information and contact channels, establish a closer relationship with users, and push product/activity information to users more conveniently through this relationship;
• Savings membership : Commonly seen in offline physical stores/e-commerce platforms, the main purpose is to increase the frequency of user consumption or the average order value, and increase user spending power. Savings membership is often accompanied by consumption discounts to guide users to complete savings behavior;
• Limited-time membership : Pay a certain fee to use relevant membership rights before a certain time point, such as common video website membership, fitness card, 88 Tmall membership, wps membership version, etc., which can be used within a certain period of time to improve the user experience. The purpose of this type of membership is to improve the user experience. After the expiration, it will be downgraded to an ordinary user and cannot enjoy the relevant rights and experience, thereby guiding users to continue to use the relevant rights and interests after the expiration renewal;
• Honorary members : Membership is obtained based on user behavior. Common indicators include usage behavior/payment behavior/consumption amount. For example, continuous renewal of Weibo membership will have membership levels. For example, continuous running can get relevant membership badges. When the amount of luxury goods consumption reaches a certain level, relevant discounts or holiday gifts can be obtained. The purpose is to meet the user's need to show off and thus expand the product's influence;
• Joint membership : The two platforms have a high degree of overlap in their audience users, so they can often jointly design joint memberships, such as the Meituan-Tencent joint membership and the joint membership of Ele.me + more than 20 chain stores. A quarterly membership costs only 9.9 yuan. The purpose is to spread the conversion costs. Because member conversion often also requires acquisition costs, platform collaboration can share the costs, thereby giving users a lower purchase price and increasing conversion rates.

The membership types used by common product types are summarized as follows:

3. How to decide what to use as membership benefits and thresholds?

The rights and interests mentioned here refer to the content that users can obtain by becoming members, while the threshold refers to what users need to pay in order to become members.

The thresholds can be divided into two types for analysis: honorary members and other members. Honorary members often require users to perform certain specific behaviors or certain behavioral indicators must reach a certain value, while the entry thresholds for most other members are monetary.

Common membership benefits are generally designed and optimized around two dimensions: user experience (ease of use) and sense of honor;

Sense of Honor: It is often seen and displayed in honorary members or in conjunction with other memberships, such as common membership level logos and honorary members linked to user behavior. Its main purpose is to satisfy the user's vanity.

User experience (ease of use): Common in limited-time memberships, where users pay in order to get a better user experience within a certain period of time.

Here are some examples:

For example, an e-commerce website needs to customize membership indicators, and the membership types are honorary members + limited-time members + savings members.

(1) Honorary Member

Threshold: The threshold must be related to the user's specific behavior or indicator. At the same time, the behavior must be a characteristic behavior or indicator that the platform hopes the user to complete, such as purchase behavior. The purchase behavior can be divided into [purchase frequency/accumulated purchase amount]. From these two directions, two honorary membership dimensions can be defined, which can be divided into 5 levels (the difficulty needs to be increased step by step when formulating the membership level);

Order achievements: 1 order (LV1-first meeting) - 10 orders (LV2-familiarity) - 30 orders (LV3-trust) - 100 orders (LV4-habit) - 1000 orders (LV5-cowhide)

Consumption Achievement: 999 yuan (LV1-money can buy happiness) 2999 yuan (LV2-can earn, spend and support the family) -9999 (LV3-a thousand gold will be returned after it is spent) -19999 (LV4-if you don't buy the right one, you will buy the expensive one) -59999 (LV5-the complete body of Thousand-hand Guanyin)

Secondary segmentation can be performed based on the user's purchase categories and purchase timelines, and more honorary members can be distinguished.

Rights and interests: The most important thing is to gain a sense of honor. Users can obtain relevant medal cards or logos, which they can share or show off. At the same time, it increases user experience rights and interests, such as vouchers/discount coupons/physical goods, etc.

Illustration: Screenshot of Taobao achievements + JD achievements

(2) Limited-time membership

Threshold: Except for honorary members, limited-time members are basically paid in cash. Limited-time members can have different amount thresholds based on the user's purchase period;

Such as 1 month membership/1 quarter membership/1 year membership/lifetime membership

Rights and interests: Rights and interests need to be linked to the core behaviors of users, such as payment behavior/purchase behavior/product use behavior. Each payment behavior has a fixed discount, each purchase behavior has a reduced shipping fee, and the right to use free products, etc.

Illustration: Taobao membership 88 membership, Hema membership card

(3) Savings members

Threshold: The threshold is the amount limit. Different savings amounts have different amount thresholds.

Such as 300/500/2000/50000 etc.

Rights and interests: There are two types of rights and interests related to sense of honor and user experience. Different savings amounts can obtain different logos. When the savings reaches a certain amount, relevant identity treatment (special discounts or services) or badges can be obtained to satisfy the user's vanity. For example, different preferential behaviors can be enjoyed every time a payment is made through a savings card.

Picture: JD.com gift card

When users choose their benefits, they must combine them with mainstream business and be able to promote the completion or completion frequency of users' mainstream business. For example, for content, it is necessary to increase the frequency of content consumption and the time spent browsing content.

2. How to guide users to purchase membership

1. Equity leakage

The main purpose of leaking benefits is to establish a membership discount image for users, make it clear that the membership discount amount is large, strengthen the psychological impression for users who have not purchased membership, and create habitual memory. Related work can be completed in the following aspects.

A: VIP user identity symbol

• VIP special mark
• icon/VIP+level/VIP special interaction+special effects
• VIP limited skin
• VIP limited purchase/VIP weighting/VIP optimized display

B: VIP price discount display

• Add VIP discount price on product details page
• Products only available to VIPs. Ordinary users can buy one of the discounted products. VIPs are not limited to the number of products they can buy.
• VIP Free Purchase

C: Special added value

• VIP customer service upgrade/VIP priority processing/VIP queue-free/VIP physical card

2. Create an activity atmosphere

The activity atmosphere is created mainly to guide users from two directions: users who are already members and users who are non-members;

The user is already a member: Member activities help increase internal stickiness of members. The creation of a member day on a specific date helps increase the conversion rate of goods on a specific date and gives users motivation to buy;

The user is a non-member: the activity price and activity popularity lead users to place orders impulsively, and the herd mentality further increases users' recognition of their membership status, thereby investing costs to carry out related behaviors.

The main purpose is to create a user conversion peak, guide users to become members, and cultivate the habit of users who have become members to place orders at fixed times. The relevant activities are as follows:

A: Guide new members to convert activities

• Membership Day｜Recharge for one year and get 2 months of membership for free / Recharge on Membership Day and get corresponding price discounts
• Members' Day, half price for all items
• On Member Day, you can place orders at half price if you receive an invitation code from an old user

B: Activities to guide old members to radiate new users or place orders

• Member + secondary card mode, secondary card can obtain corresponding rights and interests
• Transfer and gift of membership rights, such as video websites giving you movies for free;
• All products are half price on member day;
• Members can get more benefits by bringing in new members. For example, if a new member places an order, the old user can get one month's membership benefits.

3. Product conversion guidance

Relevant membership conversion guidance should be provided in all places where VIPs can use VIP benefits. When tangible benefits are presented to users, users are more likely to place orders. For example, when video websites play advertisements, VIPs are prompted to remove advertisements, and when e-commerce companies display member prices on the product details page, clicks will jump to the member purchase page. Provide good guidance on the purchase page to reduce loss in the entire funnel.

A: Member benefits leaked + VIP benefits trial

• VIP content is available for trial reading by ordinary users. If you want to see more exciting content, you can purchase membership.
• VIP price display, if you need to purchase at a different price, jump to the VIP purchase page;
• The VIP functions of tools are available for trial use for 7 days. After 7 days, the rights of related functions will be revoked. If you want to continue using them, you will have to pay

B: Member purchase landing page

1. Display of necessary conversion parameters
2. Display of known/estimated data (e.g. how much the user has saved/estimated how much they can save/how many discounts/benefits they have)
3. Benefits display (case/discounted product display/maximum benefits display)
4. Additional benefits display, entity benefits display
5. How many people have become members?
6. Member reviews, advantages, and solutions to real pain points
7. Key function buttons are enlarged to guide users to perform relevant actions
8. The order button is enlarged and displayed as the main body of the page
9. Determined/positive data is displayed in an amplified form, while fuzzy/uncertain data is displayed in a fuzzy form or not displayed at all

Good case appreciation diagram (Ele.me/WeChat Reading/Meituan):

3. How to retain users and prevent them from leaving, and how to guide them to repurchase memberships

1. Identify members who are about to churn

There is a very good criterion for identifying members who are about to lose: the frequency of consumption of membership benefits has significantly decreased. Taking video websites/e-commerce websites as an example, video websites: whether the frequency and time of user consumption of content has decreased, and whether the proportion of VIP content in user consumption has decreased; e-commerce websites: whether the frequency of users' purchasing behavior has decreased, whether the average order value has decreased, whether the behavior of receiving VIP coupons has decreased, and whether the number of VIP product browsing and orders has decreased significantly. If the above values ​​all drop significantly, the probability of user loss increases.

2. Reach users

The commonly used ways of reaching customers are as follows: advertising (advertising, holiday advertising, promotional advertising - WeChat Moments advertising) / users (users forward and share product information and discount information to other platforms) / notifications (push/text messages)

You can choose the above methods to reach users based on the user information and product features you already have;

3. Recall users/trigger user dissemination

Different recall or guidance communication methods should be used for different user stages

Users who have just purchased membership: Share the membership details page. If 3 people help, you can get another month of membership. Members can receive [5 yuan coupons] every 7 days. Coupons can be used for all products. Existing members can participate in the activities of commenting and exchanging membership. Members can use special costumes or fonts and display in the member area.

The user's membership will soon expire (within 10-20 days): Indicate how much benefits have been used during the membership period, how many benefits can be obtained by renewing again, renewal discounts, remaining membership time extension, member-exclusive benefits and exclusive products are pushed together;

For more recall methods, please refer to the article "How to "recall" your users?" 》

Example:

• Video website: recommend VIP exclusive content;
• Shopping websites: recommend VIP discounted products - since shopping is the mainstream behavior of users, pushing discounted products to users during shopping can help convert users;
• High-frequency, low-order products: When paying for an order, users will be prompted with what discounts they can get by purchasing VIP at a low price. Since payment is frequent, VIP guidance is placed when payment occurs. At the same time, this type of user cares about price factors such as short-term return rate/practicality/discount strength, and the strength of these factors will be amplified when payment occurs. Since the user can directly see the discount of the current order, it will promote user conversion.
• User membership has expired (expired within a fixed period): the rights and interests are still displayed, and a special style is displayed within a fixed time. After the user renews, the membership can be re-lit, and limited-time discounts, SMS/push recalls, and exclusive discounts for repurchases can be pushed based on data;

The full text is over. From how to formulate member-related rights and interests to how to guide users to purchase memberships and guide members to pay twice, this article discusses the construction of the membership system with you in all aspects. I hope it can help you~

Author: Impermanence

Source: Impermanence