Online courses (self-paced “home study courses”), virtual events, memberships, certifications, and pay per post
Elementor, EmailDelivered, UltraCart, Ecamm Live, Popup Maker, Wonder Gallery, Vimeo, and Facebook Page Plugin
Automation is so important when you're scaling. WishList Member has built that functionality into this product. That's big. If you can't automate certain things, you can't scale. We could never have as many members as we have now if WishList Member couldn't handle the scale.
– Sabrina
Tristan and Sabrina Truscott have decades of experience in martial arts, performing arts, and meditation — all with a distinct focus on the mind-body-spirit connection. After a crippling back injury in 2000, Tristan found himself unable to teach at his brick-and-mortar dojo. Over the next five years, he racked up thousands of dollars in medical debt, undergoing surgeries and treatments all over the country.
But nothing worked.
With the help of Sabrina, Tristan continued studying qigong healing and a host of other teachings on the power of the subconscious. One day he finally experienced what can only be described as life force healing — and his back pain was gone.
This discovery changed everything, leading to the creation of the Satori Method, “a revolutionary method that ‘energetically’ maps out how to transform your life, body and business” according to their homepage.
But back in the 2005-2006, the path to sharing your expertise online wasn’t easy.
Both Tristan and Sabrina had brick-and-mortar studios with basic websites, but they didn’t have a blueprint for how they were going to share this big vision they had. They just knew they needed to do it.
In 2007, after spending over $10,000 on a glorified online brochure website that didn’t convert, they realized: It was time to start studying online marketing. In 2009, the couple met Tracy Childers, co-founder of WishList Member, at a large online marketing event. By then, Tristan and Sabrina understood the possibilities of an online membership site — but they weren’t familiar with the technology. An offer from Tracy at the conference encouraged them to finally take the leap.
“We've always been teachers and coaches. And when we initially went online, we modeled our membership off the things we had always done offline. We were used to having people in a membership program because of our monthly classes, which we wanted to replicate. Building an online membership program felt like a natural transition for us.” – Tristan
Today, Tristan and Sabrina’s tech stack is impressive. This entrepreneurial couple runs Wishlist Member on a WordPress site built with Elementor, integrating with Ultra Cart, EmailDelivered, and ClickFunnels among other tools. “The fact that Elementor and Ultra Cart seamlessly integrate with WishList Member is awesome,” said Sabrina. At each stage in their growth, Tracy and his team have been there to build needed integrations or consult with Tristan and Sabrina.
WishList Member is a big part of what we do. Tracy and his team basically build integrations for whatever you need. They've always given us a way to connect those dots.
-Tristan
This couple has truly figured out how to use the full power and flexibility of WishList Member to scale their business.
For instance, when a new member joins, they'll get access to a certain 12-week program. As soon as they're done, they'll be moved into a different course or program — a level in WishList Member. For the certifications they offer, Tristan and Sabrina use a hybrid of different WishList Member features.
“We start with content already loaded inside WishList Member. For the certifications, it’s a one and done program. But we can also offer coaching 2-4 times a year. Meanwhile, in the side bar they're being invited to the implementation sessions happening on Facebook Live with us — and receiving other offers too.
“Implementation sessions then get put into WishList Member. When they're done going through that course, WishList Member automatically puts them into an evergreen version of that program. So the new group that starts coming through may be a little more advanced. It's amazing to be able to do that,” said Tristan.
We've tried a couple of other membership tools that were part of packages that we'd invested in. But nothing can compare to WishList Member. I know that there's a lot of cool stuff out there that people have been building over the years. But when it comes to customization, if you use WordPress, you can't touch this.
The fact that Elementor, one of the best page builders you could use, integrates seamlessly with WishList Member is another big win.
We will not move. We're too integrated. And I'm so glad that we are. It's allowed us to do things that we could have never done on those other platforms.
Obviously, I'm super biased, but we've made millions of dollars because of this product.
-Tristan
You don't need a lot of members to make a lot of money. What you need is multiple offers.
-Tristan
“We always averaged in the high 6-figures. In 2018, we hit 7-figures,” said Sabrina. “We got better at making offers. Being more consistent is huge. But WishList Member continued to evolve. You have to remember, they haven't stopped growing.”
“Automation is so important when you're scaling, and they’ve built that functionality into this product. That's a big note. If you can't automate certain things, you can't scale. We could never have as many members as we have now if WishList Member couldn't handle the scale, so I would say they've been part of our journey for sure,” said Sabrina. Today they have 7,075 members.
One of the keys to growing a thriving membership site is having great offers. According to Tristan and Sabrina, creating great offers begins with understanding your customers.
-Tristan
At Satori Method, the team pays attention to two things: knowledge and experience gaps. Where are people getting stuck? What's that single biggest challenge or frustration they’re facing right now?
Tristan and Sabrina use surveys and quizzes to gather that data, listening to what people say in Facebook groups, and noticing how they respond to polls.
It’s about “stacking” value. Tristan and Sabrina believe in going above and beyond, providing what people expect — and then a lot more. This makes their offers and membership a no-brainer investment for their members.
“It's been a cool ride. I love where it's landed. Before having a membership site, we essentially had brick-and-mortar membership sites: our studios. WishList Member has enabled us to do what we grew up doing — but now online. The power of one to many… we could have never done it without this technology,” said Tristan.
“In some ways, what we do today, teaching online, actually feels more intimate. It doesn't make any sense. It’s the friendships our members make. Or when we all show up on Zoom — and you're inside everyone's home — I feel closer to those people than the people who just like show up to my classes, face to face, take the class and leave,” said Sabrina.
-Tristan
Attention spans are short. You never want your course to feel stale, Tristan and Sabrina explained. That’s why they use Facebook Live regularly to engage with their members and followers. But they take Facebook Live one step further: They placed the Facebook Page Plugin in the sidebar of every one of their courses and programs to make sure that even members not using Facebook can participate when they go live.
In our opinion, video is your energy inside your WishList Member + Elementor site. We see a lot of products where people don't use video. If site owners would just put a video on the landing page of the product, they would connect with people. We would highly encourage anyone using WishList Member to start using videos in their products. It'll make a huge difference.
– Sabrina
When Tristan and Sabrina’s members began quitting Facebook, they looked for opportunities to parallel the experience within WishList Member. Now they use a Mac software called Ecamm Live to live stream their classes.
After a live training session, they immediately take the HD version of their class and load a copy into Vimeo. From there, they insert it into the academy within WishList Member to sell or give away continuity access.
As their business grew over the years, Tristan and Sabrina have managed to find many new ways to help their members. The secret is to continue asking what challenges members are facing — and then deciding if you have the resources or knowledge to solve those additional problems.
Today, Tristan and Sabrina continue to go live almost every day from their home in Austin, Texas, live streaming courses outside when the weather permits. You can find them at satorimethod.com.
The number of membership sites, courses and online communities activated with WishList Member™ since 2008 and it grows every day.
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