I’ve been working lately with a colleague on plans for a membership site and finding that there are some interesting challenges involved, so I was more open that I might have been when my partner Suzie encouraged me to listen to a recorded version of Yaro Starak’s Membership Site Masterplan Report (affiliate link).

I was not disappointed. Far from it.

I was very impressed and learned a lot. And having listened to the audio version, I knew I had to download, print out and read the whole 72 page report. Which I did – and was even more impressed.

Certainly I was quite well disposed in advance to learn from Yaro on the subject of subscription-funded membership sites. From having watched his steady but nevertheless amazing progress over the years as an Internet entrepreneur, having observed how others spoke of him and having met him in real life (we actually co-hosted a panel at a conference once), I know that the guy is real, with a good sense of humor, not a boaster or a booster, and has a genuine interest in helping other people succeed and create the lifestyle they want.

The report is actually quite challenging, especially if you read between the lines. Yaro makes no secret of the fact that if any of us want to create the sort of six figure income which he has created for himself and which he shows is possible with a well planned, well executed membership site, we are going to have to work our tails off for a while. But not forever.

I am sure I would learn more from Yaro’s coaching course and probably have more accelerated success that way, but even from the report I feel I can now confidently go about developing and implementing a successful membership site.

As far as I could see, just about all the key areas are covered, including marketing, the technology to use, advice on pricing, how to use psychological triggers to influence decision-making (and do that ethically, so you can sleep at night) and lots of great advice on the pre-launch and launch phases.

There is even advice on how to set up and manage your site so that you can get the best price if and when the time comes when you want to sell it.

The one area I would like to have seen something included was that of keyword research: perhaps too big a subject to tackle in the space of what is already a very full (and free) document, but at least some words to alert people to the value of keyword research and where to get more information about that.

That said, it is an excellent report and was well worth the time I spent reading it. And drawing on the report’s content and other research I’ve been doing I’ve now done a spreadsheet with a checklist of all the key issues and tasks involved, from go to whoa. That was an exercise well worth doing, especially as it helped show up the things I hadn’t previously been taking into account.

The link again.

Do you know of other resources (especially free ones) for people planning or managing subscription-based membership sites?

It seems I’m not the only one who has been feeling less than comfortable about the options for promoting products and services online.

Hence the subject heading for this post, asking whether “ethical Internet marketing” is an oxymoron.

I am passionate about how the Internet especially now with the power of social media (but even long, long ago before even the Web! but that’s another story) helps us create and enhance wonderful relationships and link up with various communities of interest. I love the generosity and sharing I experience every day. Trouble is, all that relationship building does not of itself generate a lot of income. Which is ok if you have a well paid job or very rich and indulgent other parties – spouses, parents, etc – who cover your expenses. But not so ok if you would like to complement your love of being online with a nice, steady income stream.

But of course there are all those courses you can do to make money online.

The trouble with that option is that, if you are not one of those people who are born able to sell ice to people living in the frozen north, or if you baulk at telling lies and tricking people and don’t regard that as “just business”, you may have found a few of the lessons you’ve paid for not so easy, or practically impossible, to put into practice.

Now I hasten to say there is no question in my mind that there are actually quite a lot of very ethical, decent people who have become financially successful online and who are teaching how to make money online ethically.

But there is also no question in my mind that it is not easy for people new to the scene (or even, sometimes, for some of us who have been around for a while) to spot the difference, to be able to tell who is ethical, truly social and truly interested in providing quality service and products from the, shall we say, less ethically challenged players.

A new option: Third Tribe

So what if there was a community where you mingle and learn, with structured courses and useful resources, and forums to compare notes, a place where you could start to feel some confidence about doing business online and still be able to look family and friends in the eye and tell them proudly how you have managed to buy that new house, or take that long-planned holiday cruise?

Well, it’s early days, but from where I sit, The Third Tribe looks like the genuine article, and may even prove to be in due course the veritable bee’s knees and the cat’s pajamas.

The Third Tribe’s tag line is: Internet Marketing Strategies That Work – (Without Being Obnoxious) .

There are good people involved, some of whom I know and have met, including the legendary Problogger, Darren Rowse, also Chris Brogan the social media wiz, and Brian Clark of Copyblogger fame (I haven’t actually spoken with Brian but I did introduce a panel he was on at BlogWorld Expo in 2008, so I think that counts as having “met”, sort of – the point is, he is real).

As to the general body of members starting to gather to this tribe,  I am already amazed and frankly somewhat in awe, seeing from the forums the range and depth of business and Internet-related experience of members. This is looking like a seriously interesting place to be able to hang out and have good, productive and enjoyable conversation, as well as learning from the courses and using other resources to be provided.

For the first week, which we are half way through, so until Feb 5th, there is an offer for Charter membership at $27 a month, with a 100% refund of the first month fee if you are not satisfied.

There is no affiliate program so there is no link here to earn me any financial benefit. (Update: an affiliate program was introduced after this post was written – it still won’t benefit me as I’m not part of the community now.)

I just believe this new community could make a huge difference, especially to people working solo or in couples from home and not sure whom to believe and whom to trust in the sometimes confusing world of online marketing. Here’s the (no affiliate) link: Third Tribe.

If you decide to give it a whirl, I hope you will comment here, however the experience turns out for you.

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• It includes 100s of direct links to free useful resources people can use to increase their site’s profitablity.
• It reveals how to find tremendous support online and offers a very helpful community
• It lists the BEST social networksks to use and shows HOW to build the most profit-generating profiles.
• It showcases HOW to structure your site’s categories to help generate free traffic. This is something I wish I knew when I set up my first blog- I keep meaning to restructure my categories over at Abundance Highway.

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Thanks for reading

Suzie

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I do make a little money from affiliate links and a couple of services I used to pay for each month are now covered in advance – and will be for as long as the people who signed up for them via my links continue to be customers of those services.

But we’re not talking serious income. And definitely not in the millionaire league.

There are, however, some people who can talk very serious income from affiliate marketing – as in “millionaire” and even “multi-millionaire” income – as evidenced by a very interesting blog post by my friend, SEO wizard Stephan Spencer.

In A Conference for Self-Made Internet Millionaires Stephan – a thoughtful, analytical guy who is in my experience not given to exaggerated utterances – writes glowingly of a conference at which he spoke earlier this year, where a number of participants were, he reports, Internet millionaires.

The Elite Retreat is organized by Jeremy Schoemaker – a.k.a. Shoemoney – who I can’t actually say I’ve *met*, but I was *that* close to him in a group of people chatting at the first BlogWorld Expo in 2007 and he seemed a very happy chap: Stephan says Shoemoney is a multi-millionaire, so even though money isn’t everything I guess that helps.

The next event is in New York in October and the speaker lineup (including one of my heroes Gary Vaynerchuk and also Stephan Spencer himself) looks very impressive. At $5,000 a pop it ain’t a cheap outing, but Stephan reckons that this “truly remarkable” event is worth the money. If you are inclined to be skeptical of praise for an event at which the praiser is to speak, I reiterate that Stephan is a very considered guy and no smoke-blower. But the information on the event website seems to bear out Stephan’s depiction of the quality of the presenters and style of event.

A couple of things which, in the value for money stakes, impressed me in Stephan’s account were:

• cap of 35 attendees, with apparently the opportunity to get some one-on-one time with presenters
• an alumni system with weekly phone calls – a mastermind group

They look to me like elements of a good value proposition. Personally, I still don’t know if affiliate marketing is an area I want to put a lot of energy into and if I were to consider going to an event like this I’d surely get more value from having put in some hard yards in the field than just going as a virtual newbie. Those who run the event may disagree.

But for someone who has already learnt at least the basics and is looking for a turbo charge in the company of some high achievers, this event sounds like it’s worth some due diligence.

By the way, the event is described on the website as “very exclusive” and “by invitation only”.

I have to say that, as I was about to save this post, I went to the event website to check a couple of details and noticed a few items there which gave me pause, and which would surely be in the organizers’ interest to clear up:

• on the About page there are two different figures for the cap on attendee numbers – 50 and 35 (some old copy not completely updated?)
• the Contact page (I was going to let them know about the previous point) produces an Uh oh! “404 page not found” type page
• the statement is made on the About page that “We will only have ONE retreat each year” (emphasis and caps original); as there was an Elite Retreat 2009 in San Francisco in February this year I assume that is – in corporate speak – a “forward-looking statement”, but it is potentially confusing, wouldn’t you say?

Nevertheless, the Elite Retreat still looks like a very interesting proposition for someone looking for a quality event in this field.

I’d love to hear from anyone who has attended or presented at one of these events or is thinking of attending the one in New York later in the year.