E33: Ryan Carruthers

Richard Hill:
Hi, and welcome to another episode of eComOne, and today's guest is Ryan Carruthers. How are you doing, Ryan?
Ryan Carruthers:
I'm very well. Thank you, Richard. Thank you for having me back.
Richard Hill:
No problem at all. For those that have been paying attention, Ryan has already been on the podcast, episode five, pre-lockdown, which seems almost a lifetime ago. Episode five, we're now on episode ... This will be episode 33. What's the maths? 28?
Richard Hill:
28 episodes ago, which is pretty much more than half a year ago, which is crazy. It seems like two minutes ago, we were like, "All right, let's do a podcast." Here we are, 33 episodes in, and Ryan's come back. Obviously, pre-lockdown, we talked about a lot of different things focused around the digital marketing side of eCommerce, and the marketing. We really had a good chat about email marketing, and there's quite a lot of things from that podcast we've implemented in our business.
Richard Hill:
What I've got Ryan back for is to talk about membership sites. Now, Ryan runs a business called The Membership Mastery, which we didn't really talk about really in the previous podcast. I thought us getting back, it's a really hot topic right now, membership sites.
Richard Hill:
I think first of all Ryan, just tell us about Membership Mastery. Tell us where it came from, and the background, and what it's all about.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah. It came from the fact that, like we were speaking on the previous episode, I love digital marketing, and I've been doing that for years in my own business, helping out friends and different bibs and bobs. That was all based around membership websites. I built my first online business by complete accident, I didn't even know it was a membership. People just paid me every single month.
Ryan Carruthers:
Then I've got a really obsessive personality, so I've got to go down that rabbit hole, and I've got to find out everything about it. Like everything about it. Basically, I just learned more, and more, and more about memberships over the years. Then people started asking me, "What can I do in my membership? Is this a membership?" Etc., etc. I just realized I absolutely love it.
Ryan Carruthers:
For me, I'm really, really entrepreneurial, I've done loads of different things. I sold makeup, window cleaning, property development, loads of different bits. Being able to help people with their membership really scratches that entrepreneurial itch for me, because it's like, "You've got one about teaching kids homework. You've got one about coffee. You've got one about this." It allows me to help people build, launch, and scale their membership really.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, yeah. You've come from that background of having your own membership, almost sort of like you say, sort of stumbled into it, but then many, many, many years later now teaching people and helping people how to run their own membership sites. Now, I think when people think about membership sites, there's so many different kinds of memberships out there.
Richard Hill:
I think there's not many months go by when I'll look up my monthly bank statement, as we still get a printed bank statement come through, I'm one of the old school. It's like, "Oh, oh, still paying for that one, am I? Still paying for that one." Now TV, the entertainment packet, 14.99 that we signed up for pre-lockdown, to keep the kids happy while we were at home for a long, long time. I'm still paying for that one, still paying for that one.
Richard Hill:
There's a lot of different types of membership businesses out there, that no doubt everybody listening too, will be signed up to various different types of membership. How can an eCommerce business use memberships and membership sites within their business? How can they bolt that on? What advice would you have for specifically eCom businesses and membership sites?
Ryan Carruthers:
I think it's a really good bolt on for your business. Especially because a lot of people want to use social media, for example, for engagement. They want to build that relationship, deepen that relationship with their customer. But actually, they're just a customer there. If you use a membership site or a community, then the relationship changes. People are more loyal to your brand.
Ryan Carruthers:
You can also get a lot more data from them and a lot more information. For example, in an eCom business, one of the guys that I've been working with recently sells coffee. Now, I've been telling him for ages to build a community, whether that's like a free community or a paid community, it really, really doesn't matter. It's still a membership business, and a build community around that.
Ryan Carruthers:
We did some research into this, and went into various Facebook groups, etc. There's one Facebook group, for example, we have $100,000 people in it.
Richard Hill:
Wow.
Ryan Carruthers:
This is a really active, engaged community. They have 300 people every morning pop a picture of their mug, having their morning coffee. If you have a coffee business for an eCom, and you're like, "Okay, well how do you harness that?" If you have a community, and then you do just a few smarter things in this group, you make it a Monday morning coffee frack, so you build and harness that relationship. You can start to talk to your customers, your members, about various other things, "What else goes with your coffee?"
Ryan Carruthers:
Then if you're thinking about doing another product, you've already got a community to ask. If you're going, "We sell this strain of coffee. I wonder what else we can sell?" Well, it's a bit of a stab in the dark sometimes. Is it going work out, buy a smaller amount of it, and then try and sell that? If you've got community bolted on, as well as an email list, you've got all the data you're ever going to need.
Richard Hill:
If you've not got a community though ... That completely resonates with me, but I know the type of character say I am, for example, harnessing ... Is harnessing the right word? But working with a community and engaging with the community, and spending time on that community is very timely, isn't it?
Richard Hill:
For those that are listening and thinking, "Shit, I can't be bothered with that," I can imagine and I know in reality the time it would take to spend. Obviously, speaking to you outside of this, the type of time you spend with your community. For those that are a little bit like, "What's he saying?" We've got to nurture this community and encourage them.
Richard Hill:
I think what you're saying there is the community become the content creators in their posting, and they work with themselves to build that community and to add the content. It sounds like quite a lot of work. I don't mean to sound defeatist, but what would you say to that?
Ryan Carruthers:
I'd say no, to be honest. That's the thing with membership sites and all those kind of things online, a lot of people think it's a lot of work, because they see people talking about it and making it out like it's a lot more work than it actually can be.
Richard Hill:
Yup.
Ryan Carruthers:
It's all done on your rules. If you run a community, then you just base it around your rules. When you buy something, you know what's happening with that something initially. As long as you set that parameter from the start, it really doesn't matter. You might already have a lot of the content to go inside a community.
Ryan Carruthers:
For example, if you sell makeup, that's an absolutely great business to be involved in, to put a community alongside or content alongside. You might be selling lipstick, lip gloss, etc. You might be creating content to do tutorials on that anyway, as part of your blogs, etc., etc., etc. Just put them inside of a community.
Ryan Carruthers:
A lot of the time, people don't realize they've already got all of the content they're ever going to need. They just need to be a bit more strategic with how they put that in. Then you can spend about half an hour every week just creating these posts that you're going to put out into the community. Then even if you use something like Facebook groups, they've got a scheduling tool for free. You could just put all of your scheduled posts in at various different times, and Facebook will do the rest.
Richard Hill:
Spend a certain amount of time preparing for the week, like for social media, using the tools that are available. We haven't really talked about monetizing. We're starting to create this community, we're getting engagement in this community. We've got a lot of likeminded people that are into the things that we sell in this community. But then ultimately, we want to try and monetize that community. What would be some first steps, or some advice you would give there?
Ryan Carruthers:
I would start engaging with your customer and find out what their pain point is, what their problem is, and what they want more of. That's very simple, depending on the product you're doing. You could ask questions around ... If it's makeup, for example, "Hey guys, what other products are you using?" Then you can show them examples of your product, other products you're selling, or a different way of using your product.
Ryan Carruthers:
It might be, "What do you struggle with when doing X?" Then you replace X with something relevant to your niche. That might fall into any sort of different type of community, or every different type of business. If you're making coffee, selling coffee, "What's your favourite type of coffee and why?" Make it about them, put the emphasis on them, ask questions to your community, find out their pain points, and then give them a product that solves that pain. It's very, very simple.
Richard Hill:
An eCommerce store listening in, they sell coffee, let's take that example. They sell coffee, they've got a traditional ... Well, not traditional. They've got a Shopify store, or a Magento store, they're listening to this podcast. They think, "Do you know what? Actually that's a cracking idea. Let's build a membership site. Let's build a membership area, or an additional product where we're paying $12.99 for the coffee of the month or the coffee of the quarter, or whatever." There are different options there, I'm guessing.
Richard Hill:
Where's a good place to get started with the technology? Are there any good templates, software’s out there you would recommend, that can work side by side with the different eCommerce platforms? What would you say to that? I think that technical piece is usually the hurdle. I know a lot of people listening in will have their own development people, but a lot of people will be doing it themselves. Think, "That sounds great," but that learning curve of the technology hurdle can be, as we know, a bit of a blocker.
Richard Hill:
We're selling coffee. I'm thinking of a coffee brand now that we work with. They're very well known for coffee. They sell through stores, coffee shops, USA, and they also have an eCommerce, a newer strand to their business. But if they want to add a subscription, which I actually know they do, and there is discussion around it, where could we start with the technology stack? How would that look?
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, definitely. I think it's a real big point for a lot of people, struggling with tech. It's the big thing that a lot of people procrastinate with. If you've already got a Shopify store, you're already there. You can just start a new project on that Shopify store.
Ryan Carruthers:
Like you say for coffee, that is a great subscription based business, because you can add other coffees into the mix. People can buy a box of coffee, so they might get two of their favourites, and try a third one that they didn't know.
Ryan Carruthers:
Look at what you've already got. If you're using WordPress, there's loads of plug-ins to help you with that. If you really don't know what forum to use, start with a Facebook group, it's free. It works really, really well. There's no learning curve for anybody to use Facebook, because people are already on it. You don't have to take them off a platform to a platform that you've created or whatever. If they're used to using your Shopify store, they're already used to that user experience, so to bolt on another product-
Richard Hill:
We add a product where ... We've obviously got to make sure that we've got a subscription able with our payment provider. I think that's sometimes a blocker, isn't it? There's usually a separate ... I think most businesses now when they set up, they've got that option. You're asked, "Are you doing a subscription?" "Yes." "Right." You pay an extra monthly fee to enable that subscription facility with your payment provider. It's been a little while since I've been involved with that. I think that's how it still works.
Richard Hill:
We're creating our product, which will be your coffee of the month pack for XYZ, and then various options, depending on what you want to do there. But with the side of that, we've got this Facebook group, which is the community where we're posting. The Friday Morning Brew Club, or whatever we want to make it, what we want to call it. Then you've got that community aspect in there.
Richard Hill:
I can sort of envision it now where there's people unpacking their monthly delivery of their Friday Morning Brew Pack, "Oh, I got the Columbian Red," or whatever. There's someone, "Oh yeah, I've tried that. It's about an eight out of 10 on the strength."
Ryan Carruthers:
Exactly.
Richard Hill:
I'm a budding coffee, I wouldn't say aficionado, but I'm getting there. I really like it.
Ryan Carruthers:
Same. That's the thing with these products, you buy these products because you love them, and the taste of coffee, and it makes you feel good. Your passionate about that product, and it's the same with a lot of other products.
Ryan Carruthers:
Especially in eCom, makeup for example, increases your status effectively. It makes you look prettier. It makes you feel more confident. That's the reason why people buy that product, so enhance more of that. You build a deeper relationship with your customer, you find out more about them, and then you get more data, and you understand them more, and you can help them better.
Richard Hill:
We had a lady on the podcast about three episodes ago, Tia. Her business is exactly ... It's a makeup subscription business, where you pay a monthly fee, and then she has special deals every now and then. They're like one-offs and there's only so many of them. Quite a small entry point. It's low in the teens, 17, 18 pounds, maybe a little bit less maybe. Then she has a 50 quid pack, a 100 quid pack, every now and then, where she's got deals with different manufacturers.
Richard Hill:
She's done very specific deals with very specific manufacturers. It's win/win, because they're getting their product, manufacturers are getting their products out to her thousands of subscribers. She's packing and shipping a lot of orders every month. She's getting gifted quite a lot of products at the same time. She isn't actually paying for a lot of the stock. She's actually charging, I believe, the manufacturers. They have a marketing budget, so they're able to get their product in front of thousands of their target audience.
Richard Hill:
She's got a target audience paying for a pack. That's a very clever side to membership, where she's actually getting paid for something she's getting for free, and she's getting paid from both sides, which is pretty cool.
Ryan Carruthers:
You're paying for an experience there. It's like anything in life.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, going back to that original piece, she's built that community, that the manufacturers want to penetrate in effect and get their products into. She's doing very, very discounted ... I don't know exactly the numbers from memory, but they're getting like 70 pounds of the makeup for 15 quid or whatever it is each month.
Ryan Carruthers:
Amazing. There's so much value there.
Richard Hill:
Everyone's winning.
Ryan Carruthers:
You find that a lot of the times, these big companies are watching these communities, because they want to buy them, because they want eyes. If they're already spending money in that community to get traffic, if they're putting ads on there, etc., then they'll buy it.
Ryan Carruthers:
There's a golf forum online that's just a membership community, that the Golf Channel, NBC in America bought, because they were spending so much money to put display ads on that page, and driving traffic from there to their own website. It just made more sense to buy it. Then they have this ready made community.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, yeah. It's huge. It's a bit like ... What's the app that everyone has to track their calories? The name escapes me at the moment.
Ryan Carruthers:
Oh yeah, MyFitnessPal.
Richard Hill:
MyFitnessPal.
Ryan Carruthers:
Apple bought for like 475 million.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, yeah. They bought a community that way, of millions of people.
Ryan Carruthers:
But you can do that on a smaller scale. You can pick Facebook groups up for like $100 pounds. A lot of the time, they're being built from somebody just for pure love of a product, or of an industry, of an interest. They've just gone, "I really like makeup," so they want to find other people. You can buy a group for 100 pounds. A lot of the time, those people don't make any money from the groups. You can just monetize it by doing some of the things we said, putting themes, days inside of that group, Makeup Monday, or Tutorial Tuesday, or Wednesday Wins, whatever it may be.
Richard Hill:
That's a great idea, that, Ryan. I really like that. Is there a way to find these groups maybe, that are maybe looking to sell, or opportunities as an eCom store? I'm an eCom store selling makeup, how would I find groups that have maybe got a lot of members, and possibly looking to sell?
Ryan Carruthers:
I would go to Facebook, and I would type in the names of the type of product you're doing, and then go to the Groups section, and see what kind of groups come up. Then start to look at the size of those groups, and start to look at the engagement in those groups. If it's got 10,000 people in that group, are they getting a couple of hundred comments on threads? What would you do differently? That's how I'd identify the groups initially. Otherwise, you don't want to buy a dead group, because then you've got to revive it.
Ryan Carruthers:
Then you can go to the members section on that group, find the admin, and just add them as a friend, or send them a direct conversation. Just say, "Hey guys, I'm looking to purchase groups. I wonder if you'd be interested in selling." A lot of the time you'd be amazed on how much they actually want for these groups, because they don't-
Richard Hill:
Yeah, it's something they created on a whim maybe, six months ago, that they spit balled. I see.
Ryan Carruthers:
Because they don't have an eCom store, or they don't have a product to sell, or they don't like selling, which is another key thing. People hate asking for money. They don't actually attribute a value to the group, and it's actually become a bit of a hassle for them now. You're giving them a way out.
Ryan Carruthers:
We scaled a photography group very, very quickly by doing that. I think I spent less than 1,000 pounds. I ended up with about 10 or 15 groups. There were 100,000 people in these groups per pound.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, that's crazy, isn't it? Crazy, crazy.
Ryan Carruthers:
It's a lot of money.
Richard Hill:
I think I'm convinced. For the guys listening in, I've had a membership site for quite some time. My businesses outside of eComOne, are membership sites ultimately, or membership businesses. Slightly different to what we're saying, but subscription businesses. At Agency, 95% of our revenue is subscription. It's a beautiful thing I think. I generally think we know where ... I know in the next 30 days, the next 60 days, what we're going to bill pretty much, to the nearest couple of thousand pounds. It gives you a lot of security. You can forecast a bit more than maybe a traditional business.
Richard Hill:
In terms of getting people to join and ultimately selling, like everything, selling your membership, and getting people to sign up for the membership, what's some of the best ways to communicate a value of a membership to potential customers and getting them to sign up?
Richard Hill:
Then also, it's a double question, best way to get people to sign up, and the best way to get them to stay? You're just on that treadmill, aren't you? Of trying, which is quite ... That's the opposite of security. That's almost like just massive sleepless nights. You want your clients to stay.
Ryan Carruthers:
How do you get them to sign up? Initially, you've got to give them something of value. What can you give them of value? Think about the pricing of your membership or of your subscription. If you say the coffee box, for example, and you're going to charge 15 pounds a month, switch that question up and go, "What can I give people that is worth 15 pounds a month or more?"
Richard Hill:
More, yeah.
Ryan Carruthers:
Then you put that in the box, and then look at your profit margins. Does it work for your business? Does it work for your business model? Yes, now you've got the value there. You know what you're giving them, and you know that the value is there. Then you just communicate that, in the same way that you'd communicate with a product.
Ryan Carruthers:
If you are going to do that, and you do go down the membership route, and you do sell a community aspect, one of the things that has worked really, really well for me over the years is not just to talk about the benefits, it's to put some dimension around that. The benefit you get for coffees a month, or whatever it may be.
Ryan Carruthers:
You get every coffee you've ever dreamt of in this box. Put a dimension around that. Tell me how that's going to feel for me in the morning. How would it feel when you wake up in the morning and you smell a coffee, and you can actually pick out the toffee flavours in that coffee? Talk to me, increase my status, make me feel good. Put some dimension around that. Otherwise, you're just going, "You're going to get four bags of coffee that'll last you a week."
Richard Hill:
Yeah, yeah. That's where copywriting comes in too. That's where really understanding the ... As you said, right at the beginning you're doing the research around the potential customers and the customers, what's on their mind, their pain points. Coming back to, we did an unbelievable episode a couple of episodes ago on copywriting, from a very famous copywriter, which I definitely recommend.
Richard Hill:
We're stacking the value, so we're saying, "It's 15 pounds for this pack, but you're getting this, this, this, this, this." That goes a bit back to that cosmetic example, where maybe we're giving them 50 pounds worth. Obviously, it depends on the type of business.
Ryan Carruthers:
You can do that as well. You can tell them that they're getting 50 pounds of makeup for 15 pounds a month, and then just put after it how much per day that is. When you break it down per day, that's one of the secrets of membership. It's like, "What? 50 quid, I get 50 pounds worth of makeup, and it's costing me 15 pounds? All right, cool." Then you break that down per day, "That's like 34, 35P a day."
Richard Hill:
You see, or I've seen a lot of physical product memberships. I know we've signed up for quite a few during lockdown as a family. We seem to be mentioning gin quite a lot on our last few podcasts. But gin subscription my wife signed up for. I think what they did, and I think a lot of membership sites do this, your first month is half price. Then you're going to get to choose whether you want it monthly, bimonthly, quarterly, and so forth. What are your thoughts on doing that? Doing a deal at the front end to get people through and signed up, what are your thoughts on that?
Ryan Carruthers:
I love it. I think it's great, because it gives people a taste of it. The way I prefer to actually do that is to give them a sequence. I prefer to, when they sign up, or give you their email address, or they see it, or they give you their information, they see the initial product. To offer them it at the full price, and then to try and give them a different way of getting the same product. It might be that they'll get half of the product for half of the money. You might get four gins or a 4X, "Okay, they haven't bought that. We'll give them two gins for half of it." They're still buying it, it's still the exact same thing for you, you just put two gins in a box instead of four, and then they become a customer. I like to try and do it that way, instead of breaking even on the first product.
Richard Hill:
Okay. It's a different way of looking at it, by just doing it at maybe a smaller offer.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah.
Richard Hill:
Then going to a bigger offer month two, month three.
Ryan Carruthers:
Definitely. Then from there what you need to do is retain them.
Richard Hill:
That was exactly what I was just going to jump in and say that's the first bit.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, I could see it on your face. Then retention is all about keeping them happy and communicating with them. Finding out what they're liking about that. If you're sending gin out to somebody, what's in this gin pack? Is it a book as well about the gins, or those kind of things? Send me some extra gin recipes, and then ask me how I'm getting on with those. Then ask me to maybe post a picture in the community.
Richard Hill:
That's interesting you say that, because that is so true. When Rachel, who's my wife, Rachel, when she gets the gin, obviously we know we're going to get a premium gin. It's like, "Ooh, a premium gin." But it's not just about that. It's like all the little bits that are surprises in the box.
Ryan Carruthers:
Exactly.
Richard Hill:
"Oh, we've got these special caramel flavoured gin infused peanuts." It's like, "Ooh, and we've got the frozen half ..." Whatever it is.
Ryan Carruthers:
Or blow your head off.
Richard Hill:
Exactly, exactly. All the bits that go in the gin, all the dried fruit that goes in.
Ryan Carruthers:
You harness that power. Now you've got a Facebook community, and you've just sent a gin box, even if you've got 10 people in there, how excited are you going to be to post, "Oh my God, did you get your gin box? Did you get your gin box yet? Did you get this freebie in it?" "Yeah, I did." "Oh my God, how good was that?"
Ryan Carruthers:
Now I'm chatting to people. Now, if I don't know you, for example, and we're in this community and we're chatting, it's like I'm sat on the sofa with my gin. The next time that box comes, "I better post in that group, because Richard, he's also posting in the group." "Sarah," that's my wife, "Have you seen what Richard posted?" "Oh man, maybe we should get that one." Etc., etc. Retention is all about just giving so much more value, and just asking the customer.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, and it's quite simple when we say it out loud, but I think so many firms in all natures sort of forget this piece. It's so important. In our industry, in my industry, we're selling a subscription, digital, ultimately behind the podcast. We have two agencies where we are selling a subscription fee to manage our SEO, to manage our paid ads, Facebook ads, Google ads.
Richard Hill:
Ultimately, we have to offer ... Do a good job, is the main thing, and make sure they're getting the value. If people don't stay with us, and then we're not here anymore, we're just permanently chasing new business. I think that's where a lot of people, definitely in my industry, make that mistake. It's all about sales. Well, that's just a very tiresome model.
Ryan Carruthers:
Agreed.
Richard Hill:
Where you're just burning out trying to sell all the time. Whereas you need to be investing your time into retaining, and ultimately making sure customers are happy, and they become long-term ambassadors for your brand. Will buy more of your products ultimately, and services. They might come on and buy one gin pack, or in my instance, Facebook ads management, you impress them three, four months down the line, "Did you know we now also have got a cider pack?" In my instance, "We've now got a ..."
Richard Hill:
Actually, we're doing this with Google Shopping, and we've made Facebook ads as well. Obviously, they're likely to go, and then do go, "Yes, that's fine."
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, if you show them the results as well, show them how easy the results have been, they'll stay around with you. For your clients that come in and go, "I want to do a little bit on Facebook ads," and then you guys absolutely wow them and then they're going, "Whoa. God, eComOne are doing really, really good things for me. Like ridiculous. I'm actually making more money now. I'm getting more orders. I can't handle that. That's crazy, my business is flying." Then you come in and go, "Hey, this is how well you've done."
Richard Hill:
It's honestly relatively easy to have that conversation, because you're not starting from scratch. It goes back to that ... I don't know what the official stat is, but it's usually to try and win a new bit of business is one thing, but to obviously sell to an existing customer, it's about five, six times easier. That's a made up number, but it's along those lines, isn't it? As we know, if you've got somebody happy with the service, they're going to keep coming back, aren't they?
Ryan Carruthers:
Time and time again.
Richard Hill:
Retention, guys, for those that are already doing it, look at your retention strategy. Look at what you're doing. Look at that community aspect. Look at what you're giving them extra, surprising them with those extra bits. That community feel, encourage them to engage in your community.
Richard Hill:
Those that are just starting out, where could you start? You could start with a smaller value, a smaller value transaction, but ideally being able to stack the value of what they're getting. It might be a 15 pounds ... I think the amount of things that have come out of lockdown in subscription ... I've only signed up for a few, but I've been so close to signing up to the Sock Of The Month Club. I'm a bit of a sock freak. You've seen my crazy socks that I like to wear, bright purples, and things like that. I thought, "Do you know what? 12.99?" I thought, "It's maybe a little bit much for having one every ... I'll end up with, in three years’ time, I'll need a wardrobe for my socks."
Ryan Carruthers:
Loads of socks.
Richard Hill:
Different other clothing bits. Yeah, I think the alcohol side of things has really flown. There's a local company that are coming to see us. I think tomorrow or the day after. A cocktail business. A lot of gin brands, I think we've got three gin brands that we're speaking to at the moment, that we're looking at working with. A lot of these brands and a lot of the subscription sites have come out a lot now. A lot more people sat at home, obviously are working from home or at home.
Ryan Carruthers:
It's a convenience as well, isn't it?
Richard Hill:
It's just so convenient, isn't it? I think just knowing that every month or whatever, every other month ... I think that's the thing as well, it doesn't have to be a monthly subscription.
Ryan Carruthers:
Nope.
Richard Hill:
You can choose. I think they're giving their consumer that choice of whether they want to ... Monthly, it's like, "Oh, 50 quid every month for a bottle of gin? That's too much." It's a lot.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, because they're not going to drink it.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, which every three months, "15, 16, 17 quid a month?"
Ryan Carruthers:
That's part of your retention strategy as well. It goes back to that, like giving them the offer and how can you differentiate that offer? Well, if they're going to cancel, why don't we just reduce that offer? We still keep them as a customer, but they just have less of the product, it comes less for them. You can do that with like razors. How often do you shave? "I need them every six weeks, every eight weeks, etc."
Richard Hill:
Yeah, yeah.
Ryan Carruthers:
It's still a customer and it's still paying you money.
Richard Hill:
It's true, yeah, yeah. You're getting treated differently. Some people shave every day, some people shave, like me, not every day.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, some people's beards grow faster, and you're just going with the customer, meeting them where they are.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, okay. We've got the membership. We've decided on what we're selling. We talked about retention. Ultimately, some people are going to want to cancel. They're going to go in, they're going to go and find the cancellation method within the backend of the website. Is there any strategies and tactics that you would say will help slow that process down? Stop them clicking the cancel? I know there's various things I've come across, and we're aware of. What are some of the things that you've seen, and you've implemented with your clients and your membership at Membership Mastery, to help retain and stop them cancelling?
Ryan Carruthers:
Firstly, it starts with your onboarding sequence. We both love the story brand. He always says, "If you confuse, you'll lose." It's so true. When they actually become a customer, this is where it now starts. Do not confuse them. Tell them exactly what they're going to get. Tell them exactly what you want them to do. I mean as simple as, "Step one, do this. Step two, do this. Step three, do this." Take all the guesswork out of it.
Ryan Carruthers:
Then I don't actually hide the cancel button. I let it happen. I'm like, "If you're going to cancel, you're going to cancel." I do everything at the front end I can to make it easy and seamless, want to take all of that confusion out. Then they see the cancel button. If they click the cancel button, that's when the sequencing starts for me to reach out and get feedback for them.
Ryan Carruthers:
I think I saw a stat last week that over 40% of membership sites don't get any information or feedback from their cancelled members. It's like why would you not do that? This is where then I go, I focus more on why they cancelled. Once you know why they're cancelling, you reach out for feedback, ask them why they're cancelling, what didn't they like about the product.
Ryan Carruthers:
Three little questions that work really, really well is, "If I took something away, what would you miss the least? What would you miss the most? What do you want to see more of?" If you tweak them for why they cancelled, that'll give you so much information about that.
Ryan Carruthers:
Even if you get one on the line, because you've all sent emails out to people, and you've got a massive, massive email back and forth. Oh my God, that's huge. That person is a chatter. They want to talk. They want to tell you about your product. Get on the phone with them. I guarantee if you spend five, 10, 15 minutes on the phone with them, they'll give you everything that's wrong about your business, from the perspective of your customer. Then all you do is you go through that feedback, record that, get it typed up, or whatever. Whatever's going to work for you, find out where the plug is, and where the hole is in that business, so you can stop it.
Richard Hill:
Listening, finding out what the reasons are, and then working them with the existing members, to try and obviously plug those holes.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah.
Richard Hill:
One thing I thought was always quite smart, Audible for example, Amazon's Audible. You pay 7.99, I'm paying, or 6.99 a month. You get so many credits to buy and download your audiobooks. I've had that probably six years or so. Every now and then, I log in and go, "I've got nine credits. What's that about? Why I am I still paying for that?" I'll go in to cancel. Then I go in to cancel, but there's an option to say, "Would you like to pause your membership instead of cancel?" It says, "How long do you want to pause for?" I mean it's been a while since I've actually done it, but I think the option was to pause for say three months. I go, "Do you know what? I'll do that."
Richard Hill:
Obviously, what that's doing is it's still retaining me. I've just paused my three months of payments. Then I go again for the next year and a half. Then I go, "Whoa, I've got 15 credits." Then I end up, obviously do eventually use the credits. I always thought that was really smart.
Richard Hill:
It's retained me. I think it was twice I've gone to Audible to cancel, or definitely to stop it for now. I haven't stop stopped, I've just paused. I've always thought that was quite smooth.
Ryan Carruthers:
That goes back to what we were saying a few minutes ago, about how you reduce your offer for your customer. Like with the razors, you stretch the distances between when they get them. Do you want them every six months, etc.?
Ryan Carruthers:
Amazon is the ultimate subscription business. It's the ultimate subscription business. Everybody pays for Prime, and you can pause that and do whatever. That is just another really, really good way of retaining your members. Think about how you can reduce the service that they get, they can either pause that or they can get less of the service, "I'm going to take out this, this, and this." You can have that option. You don't have to totally detach yourself.
Richard Hill:
Sock Of The Quarter rather than Sock Of The Month Club.
Ryan Carruthers:
That's the kind of thing these guys are doing.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, it just makes sense, doesn't it?
Ryan Carruthers:
You've always got your product.
Richard Hill:
Everyone really has a bit of a clean out every now and then with their finances, or they should do. I know some less than others. It's like, "Oh, we haven't used that. Cancel, cancel, cancel. Hang on." If all the pause options are in there, I know I would pause more stuff than cancel stuff.
Richard Hill:
I think if you've got an existing business, it's a great little ... Well, many, many takeaways there. Look at that retention strategy. Look at that cancellation process. If you're maybe selling 100 new people a month in your membership, but you're losing 80 a month, it's like, "Whoa, hang on." Plug the 80, if you can get 80 down to 60, 50, 40, 30, it's transformational.
Richard Hill:
It's something we very much focused on in our business. Many, many years ago, it was a massive part of our agency. Now we won't take a client on a monthly basis, unless we genuinely think we can help them, genuinely think we can retain them, which basically means we've got to be able to help them. Because all you're doing is just churning clients or churning membership customers on the subscriptions. I think we're in a quite fortunate position.
Richard Hill:
It just makes for just a nice business, knowing that you're really focused on that retention, focusing on I think the technical churn, and making sure that you know that number, your churn number. If you're only keeping clients for three or four months, why is that? What can we implement at that point? Or not at that point, but prior to that point?
Richard Hill:
That month before, when you know the re-bill is due every month at a certain time. What can trigger 10 days, 14 days, 21 days before that, to educate, to help them? Say, "Hey, I noticed you've not been in the community for a while. Here's a post from Ryan about the coffee of the month thing. He really liked the new infusion of ..." "Oh, a community, I must have missed that." Obviously, they didn't read the welcome email sequence. People don't, do they?
Ryan Carruthers:
People don't. I think there's a hidden benefit of this as well, that you were talking about. As a membership guy and a recurring revenue guy, I see that with your business. I'm in the same coworking space as you. The hidden benefit to all of this is the impact on team. You do a really great job of retaining your clients, because you help them and you get them the results. That flows down to every member of staff you've got. You see them, they're a great bunch of guys to be around and to interact with, because they know that the business is solid and the business is safe. They also get results for their clients, which makes them feel happy. It's just so much better and grander than just selling products and hoping you all-
Richard Hill:
Yeah, totally, totally. It's just a lot nicer business to be around, knowing that you've got a strong business that everyone enjoys being part of.
Ryan Carruthers:
100%.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, great. Okay, well that was amazing. The last couple of questions, I think maybe give us two lesser known strategies around running a membership site. Any little things that you think, "That's a little golden pearl there, that people wouldn't know." Maybe the guys that are listening are already running membership sites, they've been doing it for a little while. What are a couple of things that you think might go, "Oh gee, I didn't think of that," or a couple of little strategies, techniques? Whether that's around the tech stack, retention, winning new business. A couple of little gems maybe we can almost end on.
Ryan Carruthers:
Cool. The first one would be just go into your email list every single month, pick one person, and just ring them. Just get on the phone with them and ring them. I don't care if they're a member or they're not. They will be on your list for a reason. Just pick one and ring them. That was given to me many, many years ago, and it's one of those things that you could overlook, and sometimes I do. I always, always, always get a massive, massive benefit from doing it.
Ryan Carruthers:
Even if it's just 10, 15 minutes. Just ring someone up and go, "Hey, it's Ryan. I was just wondering if I could help you with your membership. I want to ask you a few questions about my membership. I know you've haven't bought," or, "I know you've bought. I just want to give you some value, in exchange for some feedback." That is amazing, and it builds up a really, really good relationship with your potential member. It also feeds back. Everything you do has a purpose, so it feeds back into your membership.
Ryan Carruthers:
What quite often happens is they'll say to me, "I've been meaning to join your membership. I just don't think it does X." You go, "Actually, it does do that." Then they go, "I didn't know that." Then you make a mental note, you haven't communicated it yourselves.
Richard Hill:
That's so common, isn't it? I think. So common.
Ryan Carruthers:
So common.
Richard Hill:
So common, you just don't realize ... They don't realize what they're getting quite often, especially in an information based membership.
Ryan Carruthers:
They haven't got a clue, or they perceive it differently, because nobody sees the world the way you do. That's the first one.
Ryan Carruthers:
Then the second one is find out where the drop off is across the whole sequence. Where are they dropping off and initially purchasing? Are they visiting your website? Yes. Where are they getting to? How much of the information are they absorbing? Where are they coming off the website? Are they getting to the sales page? What on the sales page isn't working? Do you have a video on there? How much are they watching? They're dropping off at two minutes, well we need to change that. Then just do that the whole way through your membership. Then, like you said earlier as well, that's when you can send an email. If you know your drop off is 30 days, that's when people cancel, if you reach out to them 22 days and start interacting with them, getting them excited about the gin that's going to come on Friday-
Richard Hill:
Yeah, making them aware.
Ryan Carruthers:
You're making them aware of it. Just coming back into their sphere. Then that works from every stage. You can work out where the traffic's coming from. Are they clicking on your ad? Yes, the ad is right. Are they going to the sales page, but not buying? Then maybe the offer isn't right. How do I tweak that? You tweak the offer the membership. Are they opening the emails? No, okay.
Richard Hill:
Think like a customer.
Ryan Carruthers:
Think like a customer.
Richard Hill:
What is happening every day almost in that process, and when they don't do something or do something, what's the next thing that they should be doing? Is it clear?
Ryan Carruthers:
That will change your business.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, okay. That's brilliant. Last couple of questions. If you had to choose between Lily and your business, what would be your choice? Now, for those that are listening, tell us about Lily.
Ryan Carruthers:
Lily is my little girl cat that I think I love more than my wife. Sarah knows that as well.
Richard Hill:
We will be tagging your wife up on Facebook.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, do it. She knows. She knows that, that cat ... Yeah. It's quite simple, I'd choose Lily.
Richard Hill:
Lily every time. Lily every time.
Ryan Carruthers:
100% I'd choose that little cat, it's just her little face.
Richard Hill:
Okay. How long have you actually been doing membership science for? Have you got a feel for it?
Ryan Carruthers:
21, so 11 years.
Richard Hill:
11 years. In membership years, it's a bit like cat years.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah, it is. A long time.
Richard Hill:
In digital marketing years, it's like 20 years I guess, or more.
Ryan Carruthers:
Yeah.
Richard Hill:
Obviously, learned a lot, seen a lot, tried every tech stack. I know we've had a lot of conversations outside the podcast about every tool. Whether it's landing pay software, whether it's multi-responders, whether it's Facebook ads, and all the tech behind it all.
Richard Hill:
Obviously, you learned a lot, and no doubt failed a lot, as we all do, because it's all about failing quick and moving through. There's a whole podcast there about that I guess as well. Obviously, you learned a lot. What would be a bit of advice you'd give yourself looking back over the last 10 years, if you were to go back about 10, 11 years, what bit of advice would you give to your younger self as you're coming through this next 10 years? If that makes sense.
Ryan Carruthers:
Gosh, what would I say to 21 year old Ryan? God, there's a lot I could say to him. Yeah, keeping it on the memberships, I would say get into the mind of your customer. Use the language that they use. Don't just put stuff out there. If you're going to write a post or you're going to explain about a new product, don't just write it like you would. Finish it, and then read that out loud. I mean we're all guilty of wanting to put stuff out there, but read it out loud. Look at the wording that you're using. Is that the kind of wording that your customers use?
Ryan Carruthers:
For some people, it will be, because they are their customer. That's why they have their eComm business or their membership business. But if you're in a slightly different industry and isn't, then look at that language that you're using, and really, really think about that. Language is so, so powerful, and you can ... Just the differences between male and female, ages as well, you have to use different languages, different tones. I'd tell him that first.
Ryan Carruthers:
Then I'd also tell him to be patient. It genuinely is a long-term game. It's like the whole tortoise and the hare. The reason the tortoise caught the hare up is because he didn't try and overtake it. He waited for the opportune moment. He kept him in his sights, and that's all you need to do. Just keep where you're going in your sights, keep plodding along, and every single week you'll get better and better. You will get better relationships.
Richard Hill:
Keep pushing.
Ryan Carruthers:
Keep pushing.
Richard Hill:
Focus on copy, copywriting. I think that's quite a thread through a lot of our podcasts. I think naturally, when you interview experts and successful people, we definitely see a lot of threads, as we expect. It's been brilliant for me, through this process, 33 episodes in.
Richard Hill:
Copywriting is something that, in the mind of ... We talked about story brand, brand story. I think investing time as a business owner into that side of your business ... I have to hold my hand up and be a little bit guilty there. I think it's one of the skills that I know I need to improve on.
Richard Hill:
I've surrounded myself with experts in various fields, and I've got a couple of amazing copywriters that work with us and copy experts that work with us. It's something that I always come to and think, "Richard, Richard, you really need to sharpen the old sword on that one." I just know how powerful it is. It's good to hear it again from yourself, knowing that obviously you represent literally hundreds of thousands of members of various membership sites, either your own membership sites or your Membership Mastery clients.
Richard Hill:
Final question, book recommendation? We always end with a book recommendation, Ryan. What's it going to be this time around?
Ryan Carruthers:
What's it going to be this time around? I gave a few different ones last time, didn't I?
Richard Hill:
Six months has passed.
Ryan Carruthers:
Six months has passed. One that I've read in the last six months was by Elizabeth Gilbert, called Big Magic. This book was incredible. She wrote Eat, Pray, Love. That sounds like a rom com book, and blah, blah, blah. But this is more about ideas and how they find a suitor. The book is beautifully, beautifully written. Richard, it's great if you are in this world, because you can understand the copy, and that's one of the things that I think people can get better at copy, to read good copy and try and break it down.
Ryan Carruthers:
She goes into this whole ideas are looking for a person. You have flows, and just going with them. This book is absolutely beautiful. I'd recommend that, Eat, Pray, Love. That's probably one of the better books I've read.
Richard Hill:
Yeah, that's a definite new on me. That's one we'll tag it all up on the show notes. Thank you, Ryan. Now, the guys that are listening in that want to find out more about Ryan and The Membership Mastery, what's the best place to reach out to you?
Ryan Carruthers:
If they just go to the membershipmastery.com, they'll find everything that they need on there. There's loads of freebies on there as well, that can get you going and get you started. All of my contact details are on there as well.
Richard Hill:
Okay. Well Ryan, thank you very much. The first guest to return to eComOne. Let's see if maybe we can make a third time before we hit 100 episodes. We'll see where we are with memberships. I know I said it's a huge part of the eCom industry and of the digital marketing industry. I think it's a hugely hot topic. I hope that you guys that are listening are taking a lot of notes, and more importantly will take action on some of the things that Ryan has gone through there. Thanks once again, Ryan. We'll see you again soon.
Ryan Carruthers:
Thank you for having me.
Richard Hill:
Thank you.