What to Build Next

In this issue:

• Perspective: Many operators have close access to paying members but still rely on instinct when deciding what to build next
• Insight: The clearest signals usually come from two places: what members repeatedly struggle with and what they repeatedly return to
• Outlook: A membership-first business should become more accurate over time, not simply more profitable.
  

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“A membership should not only generate recurring revenue. It should also eliminate guesswork.”

Your most valuable asset in membership is easy to overlook.

I’m talking about the relationship with people who are already paying attention.

See, members are constantly showing operators where value exists.

They show it through the questions they keep asking. The problems they cannot move past. The sessions they return to and resources they reference.

But this intelligence often remains scattered and hidden across emails, calls, community posts, cancellation surveys, and informal conversations.

And too often, the business just doesn’t learn enough from it.

Let’s dive in.

PERSPECTIVE

Stop Guessing From the Outside

Public audiences are useful - they show you what earns attention.

From what gets clicked to what generates interest.

But paying members reveal something different.

They show you what actually holds up after the initial interest fades.

A popular members-only post may point toward a strong marketing idea.

A problem that paying members raise repeatedly may point toward a stronger product, a better onboarding experience or the next part of the membership worth deepening.

The useful and most actionable signals in membership are usually in plain sight

But too often, operators build from the outside in.

They watch the market, follow audience reactions or spend a lot of time watching what other creators are doing - all of which prove to be unproductive.

So the real goal here is not to let members design the business for you.

It is to stop ignoring the patterns they are already revealing.

INSIGHT

Watch for Friction and Pull

You do not need a complex research system for your membership.

You just need to start with two signals.

1. Repeated friction

What do members continue to struggle with?

(Not every question matters equally.)

But when the same confusion, obstacle, or request appears across multiple conversations, it deserves attention.

Repeated friction may reveal:

• a weak point in onboarding
• unclear offer positioning
• a missing piece of guidance
• an offer members are ready for, but they’re not getting
• something the membership has made unnecessarily difficult

Action: At the end of each month, write down the three member problems you heard more than once.

Do not solve all three.

Choose the one most connected to the core promise of the membership and decide whether to: clarify it, fix it, or build for it.

That’s enough.

2. Repeated pull

What do members keep getting pulled back to?

Look for the parts of the membership that attract attention without being forced.

Is it the call members rarely miss? Is it a topic that creates the strongest discussion? A certain podcast?

That pull is real evidence - maybe the most important evidence you’ll ever have access to.

It may tell you more about the real product than your original benefits list does.

Action: Identify the one part of the membership members return to most reliably - what do they use or interact with most?

Then ask:

What would it look like to give this benefit more weight?

More structure. A clearer or more central role in the membership. A stronger connection to the rest of the experience.

At the end of the day, this becomes about recognizing proven value and building greater conviction.

OUTLOOK

The Business Should Become More Accurate Over Time

One of the strategic advantages of membership is that the customer relationship does not reset after every purchase.

You get to keep learning about what happens with members along the entire journey - specifically, which of your ideas survive contact with real, everyday life.

That should improve the decisions the business makes.

Recurring revenue is valuable. But recurring insight may be what makes a membership-first business more durable.

So here is the question I’ll leave you with this week:

What are your members repeatedly struggling with - and what are they repeatedly being pulled back to?

Your next move may already be sitting inside those two answers.

Think about it.