So you want to monetise your Facebook group? Well, first you need a strategy.

Firstly, a great reason for a group is, a Facebook group is a great way to manage client’s questions. Many people will have the same questions and when you address those questions in the group the question is answered for many.

You can either have a free group or a monetized group. We will discuss the pros and cons of each.

How I run my monetized group is to charge a monthly fee of AUD97 – and for that, I give my clients what they want; accountability, support, Q&A, up-to-date info, training videos that they can access at any time…. This is my desirable offer.   For me, the group takes 4.3 hours of my time per month – If I have 10 people on the group that is AUD970 – AUD225 per hour. So, it is worth it for me.

I do qualify people before I sell them into the group

If they are too far behind they will not ask questions that will add value for the rest of the group so I advise them to start with a beginners course first before joining the group.   If they have bought my online program they get 8 weeks on the group included in the program cost. If they cannot afford my program but they are not quite ready then I will down-sell them into the program. I qualify each client on merit and then decide what is best for them and their budget.

This works for me, if it didn’t I wouldn’t do it.

A lot of people do things a little backwards when it comes to groups. They start the group and get a whole bunch of people to join and then try to sell to them. It does not work so well that way unless you have gotten them all into the group under the correct pretences in the first place.

The most important thing that I learned from free Facebook groups is that they take a lot of time to monitor and run and a lot of people expect everything for free. Be careful of giving away your valuable experience and expertise and making nothing out of it – you are not running a charity. You are in business to put food on the table, not give away what you should be making money out of. If you start a group with the plan that you are going to start to monetize it when you have lots of followers you will end up learning a lesson. You have been giving your expertise away for so long the moment you start to charge for it you will quickly see that most of them were only there for a freebie and have no intention of ever digging in their pockets. It is easier to start a new group than it is to try and revive a dead group. But remember, if you are going to monetize your groups there needs to be value in your content and it needs to be managed correctly. People are paying you for something and you need to deliver.

Groups have another benefit if managed correctly. You can use the POPULAR TOPICS section to sort and ‘file’ your content so that members can easily find the info they are looking for. I.e., #blogs.