Your first sale probably won't (and shouldn't) be your membership

There are better ways to introduce your subscribers to you than your membership. If you're having trouble converting paid subscribers, you might be looking in the wrong place.

This article originally appeared on How to Write for a Living.

Hi,

Every writer wants to make gobs of money on their membership. They all want 100 or 1,000+ eager readers paying them monthly to read their beautiful words the day they launch their membership.

I’ve never met a writer who didn’t want to wake up on the first of the month with a guaranteed $5k in their bank account. It’s a lovely, wonderful dream.

Unfortunately, the reality is that subscriptions are the hardest game in town, and getting harder with every passing month. People are extremely wary about committing to something long term even if it’s cheaper than just buying it outright.

Companies aren’t making it any easier by changing the rules to the game, deleting things from behind their paywall, and leaving people devastated that they don’t have access to what they signed up for at the outset.

The unfortunate truth is that whether you’re a new writer or just new to a reader, you’re going to have a lot of trouble convinci…