Why Do People Join Membership Sites

Receiving phone calls and emails is something I handle every day of every week. Individuals write to me often on the advice of programs they join, or from finding me in the search engines. They come to me for clarification on how to market and advertise online.

In many instances, the caller has actually joined a program that is designed to address the very questions they are asking me. I can't help but think, "What's wrong with this picture?"

A program - membership or otherwise - must have a few fundamentals to be considered legitimate online. It must give you something in return for you giving someone money. It's that simple. There must be an equitable exchange - information, software, products - something that says you are getting value for your money.

When you discover a likely program online, it is important to ask yourself the following questions:

1. What is the program selling you for your money?

2. Other than promoting that program to others will it also show you how to make money online for any business?

I can tell you what happens, because the picture is painted ever so clearly to me by my mail companions and phone callers - they do not know what they joined!

Sad but true. Somehow, somewhere along the lines of reading an action packed and powerful sales letter, the hunter forgot what he or she was hunting for - direction to help him or her build their own business online.

I've only begun to scratch the surface here. The problem is further complicated because after parting with the money to join the membership site (or purchase the product, ebook, what have you), the buyer skips over all the fine points of what it is and jumps right into trying to tell others.

When you elect to sell to others, ethically shouldn't you know what it is in the first place?

They skip the details.

My advise is simple and even easy to follow. When you join any membership site or buy any product online re-read the sales page. If you can lift out the "here's how to make money" part, and still have lots of valuable reasons for joining remaining that's the program for you!

Do yourself a favor. When exploring all the great membership sites and products, software and services available online remember your first objective. If it was to find out how to build a business, then use that membership (assuming they really do have the goods) to educate yourself and build your own thing online.

In a nutshell, you join programs and memberships, even those whose sole purpose appears to be making money just for spreading the word about it because you are smart enough to know that morally you have an obligation to find out what it is you will be telling others about. If you can't explain in a simple email or phone call what it is you've joined, you are not ready to share it with others. You can't sell what you don't know.

Educate yourself before you sell.