Convincing people to become a member of your program is one thing. Getting them involved and turning them into a fully engaged member is something quite different. In this article, we will dive into the wonderful world of assimilating your members.

How Does It Work?

There are three categories to this process, each of which will be analyzed and explained. We will start by looking at what your members should receive from you at several stages in their membership. Secondly, we will analyze what beliefs they have and what beliefs you want them to have as a member. Finally, we will compare the achievements they’re looking for with the achievements you can provide them with, and discover how you can close the achievement gap. I will repeatedly ask you to apply techniques and ask yourself questions about your own business. Consider how well you’re doing in your membership business and make adjustments as needed.

1) What Do You Want Your Members to Receive?

If you want to encourage your members’ enthusiasm about your program, you should consider sending them gifts at specific moments in their membership. There is basically a step-by-step process that you should go through. The first moments of a new membership are pivotal, so you should make an effort to guide your new members in the right direction and give them the feeling their life has changed because of their membership.

Every member should receive something as soon as they join (preferably within the first hour). After they have paid the fee, you should obviously send them a receipt of their transaction. However, that is not enough in itself. You should also send them a separate e-mail or membership package. No matter what exactly you decide to give them, it should contain an outline of the benefits of your membership program and an explanation of how their membership will bring about a transformation in their life or business. Take a moment to contemplate what you could send them within the first hour.

Next, you want to think about what they should receive in the first 24 hours of their membership. This can be a welcome phone call, an e-mail, or a physical letter. The goal is to transform their experience: you want to transform and assimilate them into your membership program by breaking their habits and assimilating your program into their routines. Again, take a couple of minutes to decide what you could send them in the first 24 hours.

Next, I’d like you to consider what you should send them after the first week. This should be a “wow” gift. Don’t announce it, don’t mention it in your promotion – just take them by surprise and overwhelm them. It can be something small and inexpensive (like a handwritten personalized note with a gift) – just make sure it makes them feel appreciated and special. What will you send them? Take a moment to think about it.

The next step is: what will you send them every month? If you communicate with them on a monthly basis (e.g. with a newsletter or an update), you should always add something extra for new members.

Once you’ve figured that out, I want you to decide what they should receive in the first quarter. It is an opportunity for another wow gift, but you could also send them a survey to engage their membership or another piece of content. Something in your membership business should focus solely on new members. Do you have a quarterly deliverable right now? Whatever you give them, it should further help them recognize the benefit they’re getting from your membership program. If it also makes them feel part of the community of your membership, that’s even better.

Finally, I want you to consider what you’ll give them after the first six months and after the first year. After those periods, you should thank them for being a member and show them they are important to you. Make sure your gift represents the value they are putting into your program. As they have invested their financial resources in your business, you ought to be generous.

I know these are a lot of questions, but figuring out the answers will allow you to assimilate your members in a way that increases your retention rate and improves their experience. Creating an outline of what you want them to receive at every step will also create clarity for both you and your members.

2) What Do You Want Your Members to Believe?

This may sound like a strange question, but brace yourselves. I will ask you two questions that will allow you to make sense of this idea. Here we go!

• What beliefs do your members have before joining your membership program?
• What beliefs do you want your members to have as a result of your membership program?

These two questions illustrate that there is a difference between what your members believe and what you want them to believe. Make it part of your assimilation process to help them become the ideal member by getting rid of their beliefs. Identify their habits or routines and how they differ from your members’ habits or routines – that way you will be able to create a community within your membership. Moreover, this approach will show new members what they can achieve by being a member.

In order to achieve this, you will have to change their mindset. Make them realize they will benefit from their membership. Additionally, you will have to change their internal conversations: show them that their own limiting beliefs were in the way of their success and that your membership will remove those beliefs to prepare them for success. One way of doing that is to provide your members with a set of spoken sayings that they have to repeat. This approach will allow you to change the language your members use, which in turn will change their mindset.

Moreover, it will keep your competition at bay. How? Even though I don’t know your membership business, I assume there will be competition. That competition will sometimes provide better results, mediocre results, or similar results. However, if you change the language you use and the language that your members use, the results of your competition won’t matter so much anymore. After all, by changing their language you can change their beliefs – and that’s something your competition simply can’t do. That’s one of the reasons why changing language and beliefs is so powerful.

So take the time to write down what your members believe when they first join and what you want them to start believing thanks to your membership.

3) What Do You Want Your Members to Achieve?

This question (like the previous one) is two-fold:

• What do you want your members to achieve?
• What do they want to achieve?

Every new member will have different goals and needs. There might be a discrepancy between those goals and what your membership program offers. It is very important for you to be aware of this, so I’d like you to create two lists base on those questions: what goals do you have for your members? What goals do they have for themselves?

A good goal should have five characteristics, which you can remember with the acrostic SMART goals: a goal should be Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-bound. Take the time to figure out if your members’ goals are SMART. Are your goals for them SMART?

If there is an achievement gap between your own goals and theirs, you should identify it. Goals for different members can vary, which is fine, but they should always be SMART. You want every member to realize they achieve things thanks to their membership at some point. That is only possible if they have SMART goals.

When they are making progress and achieving things, it’s your job to point out those achievements and pat them on the back. That way you encourage them to continue their journey with your membership program. Identify the achievement gap and act on it! It’s the only way for you to help your members achieve as a result of their membership and, hence, the only way for you to make them appreciate the effects of their investment.

A Framework for Success

Ensuring that your members are involved and making progress requires some effort on your side as well as theirs. If you don’t provide them with the right framework that makes them feel appreciated and realize what progress they’re making, it will be difficult to keep them invested.

However, by putting the right systems in place, you will be able to guide them in the right direction and make them realize that it is thanks to your program that they are making progress.

Assimilating members focuses on three core questions:

• What do you want your members to receive?
• What do you want your members to believe?
• What do you want your members to achieve?

Those questions will help you create the right framework for your specific membership program. And that, in turn, will help your members achieve better results and convince them of your program’s value. Isn’t that what we all want?