Nicole built a membership site using Joomla components without being a developer. She chose Joomla over WordPress because switching systems would take too much time. The key components she used were Membership Pro for memberships, Stripe for payments, EasyBlog for content display, and AcyMailing for email newsletters. Building the site revealed disconnects between what non-developers need and what is provided in documentation and functionality of Joomla components. Overall, it was a learning experience that improved her Joomla and business skills.

1. GermanWithNicole.com
How I Built a Membership Site
Using Joomla Components
and without being a developer.

2. © GermanWithNicole.com
1. Joomla + Nicole – a short history
2. Why create a membership site? + Business Model + Expert spotlight
3. To Joomla or to WordPress? A short answer to a short question.
4. Components I used in my site
5. You don’t know what you don’t know. + Expert spotlight
6. Disconnects between Joomla/Joomla developers & users like me
7. The best things I learned on this 9-month adventure.
Questions? – ask them in between or at the end.
How I Built a Membership Site with Joomla Components with my limited Joomla capabilities.

3. 1.Joomla + Nicole – a short history
First introduction to Joomla
NotesontheRoad.com – now in WordPress. ☹
Swapped a recording for a website – Axel
Joomla Bamboo template with nicolewarner.com
Outgrew Axel - on my own.
2009-2010
c. 2012
© GermanWithNicole.com
c. 2012 Started re-building nicolewarner.com with Arrowthemes template
2013 Began german.nicolewarner.com (used a tutoring site)
2014 Bought GermanWithNicole.com – viel, viel besser.
Got another Arrowthemes template

4. First Joomla Day!2017
2019 „That sounds crazy, I think I‘ll do it.“
2018 Began attending JUGCN User Group regularly.
Joomla + Nicole – a short history

5. 2. Why Build a Membership Site?
© GermanWithNicole.com
Blog Clients Other Work Membership
batch creation private lessons interpreting batch creation
1:many – for $0 1:1 time for money 1:1 time for money 1:many
“sending out ships”
+ recurring (monthly)
- can be volatile
- unpredictable
recurring
(monthly /yearly)
$0
+ prevents me from
being dependent on one
economy
- unpredictable
• downsell clients
• win back former clients
• potential client base
• future classes
+ evergreen
+ even time-
sensitive posts still
get hits à sign-
ups
long-term relationships
6 mos. – 4+ yrs. average
2.5 years
- unpredictable
+ evergreen content
+ new content, interest
+ works 24/7

6. 2. Why Build a Membership Site? (continued)
© GermanWithNicole.com
Work smarter,
not harder
Provide a
higher-quality
product/service
Add value
for clients
• Private lessons are awesome, but are time for money
• Create new, high-quality activities for them
• A place for additional resources (use twice)
• A back-up for me when I‘m on vacation/ill/etc.
• Batch creation is genius
• Scale/reach more people
• Evergreen content + new content 3 weeks/month
• Many free resources for learning German
• confusing
• overwhelming
• irregular / people have to go hunting
• made by people who aren‘t qualified German instructors
• too much social media positioning, not enough learning

7. 2. Why Build a Membership Site? (continued)
© GermanWithNicole.com
Members Monthly Total Monthly Stripe Fixed Costs Taxes 30% Savings 10%
Owners
Comp 60%
50 $25 $1,250 ($37.50) ($40.00) $1,173 ($351.75) ($117.25) $704
100 $25 $2,500 ($75.00) ($40.00) $2,385 ($715.50) ($238.50) $1,431
150 $25 $3,750 ($112.50) ($40.00) $3,598 ($1,079.25) ($359.75) $2,159
200 $25 $5,000 ($150.00) ($40.00) $4,810 ($1,443.00) ($481.00) $2,886
250 $25 $6,250 ($187.50) ($40.00) $6,023 ($1,806.75) ($602.25) $3,614
300 $25 $7,500 ($225.00) ($40.00) $7,235 ($2,170.50) ($723.50) $4,341
350 $25 $8,750 ($262.50) ($40.00) $8,448 ($2,534.25) ($844.75) $5,069
400 $25 $10,000 ($300.00) ($40.00) $9,660 ($2,898.00) ($966.00) $5,796
450 $25 $11,250 ($337.50) ($40.00) $10,873 ($3,261.75) ($1,087.25) $6,524
500 $25 $12,500 ($375.00) ($40.00) $12,085 ($3,625.50) ($1,208.50) $7,251
Business Model by the numbers (monthly)

8. Members Yearly Stripe Fixed Costs Taxes 30% Savings 10%
Owners
Comp 60%
50 $15,000 ($450.00) ($480.00) $14,070 ($4,221.00) ($1,407.00) $8,442
100 $30,000 ($900.00) ($480.00) $28,620 ($8,586.00) ($2,862.00) $17,172
150 $45,000 ($1,350.00) ($480.00) $43,170 ($12,951.00) ($4,317.00) $25,902
200 $60,000 ($1,800.00) ($480.00) $57,720 ($17,316.00) ($5,772.00) $34,632
250 $75,000 ($2,250.00) ($480.00) $72,270 ($21,681.00) ($7,227.00) $43,362
300 $90,000 ($2,700.00) ($480.00) $86,820 ($26,046.00) ($8,682.00) $52,092
350 $105,000 ($3,150.00) ($480.00) $101,370 ($30,411.00) ($10,137.00) $60,822
400 $120,000 ($3,600.00) ($480.00) $115,920 ($34,776.00) ($11,592.00) $69,552
450 $135,000 ($4,050.00) ($480.00) $130,470 ($39,141.00) ($13,047.00) $78,282
500 $150,000 ($4,500.00) ($480.00) $145,020 ($43,506.00) ($14,502.00) $87,012
Business model by the numbers (yearly)
2. Why Build a Membership Site? (continued)

9. https://www.membershipacademy.com?aff=GermanWithNicole
Expert Spotlight: Membership Academy
MembershipAcademy.com and TheMembershipGuys.com

10. 3. “to Joomla” or “to Wordpress”?
A question you have to ask yourself when you visit MembershipAcademy.com…
• A complete change of system
• Re-do site or create another domain
• Weighing the options, I looked at:
• extra time to switch
• components I would need
• problems others were having
• abilities/advantages
Conclusion:
• too much time
• not a good idea to go away from my URL
• the grass isn‘t always greener
• still need a membership component
• still need a payment plug-in or shopping cart
• still need a bunch of components
• still need some help setting things up
• still have problems

11. Components Used:
1st landing page: SP Page Builder
Membership Component: Membership Pro
Payment Plugin: Stripe
Content Display: EasyBlog
Comments: Komento
Forms: ConvertForms
Document Manager: eDocman
Email Newsletters: AcyMailing
Graphics & Headers: Adobe Spark

12. 1st landing page: SP Page Builder
Let’s take a look…
2nd landing page: Joomla core
Let’s take a look…

13. Membership Component: MembershipPro
Pros Cons
Known system, I already use
Events Booking
Really complicated.
Lots of features Emails & Messages default
doesn’t auto-populate, have to
track your own email texts.
Sign Up via URL (not public
plan)
No coupon from back-end
(clients have to sign up for their
own free plan, I can’t issue it)
Good response time on tickets Took me a long time to set up,
configure, and re-configure

14. Content Display: EasyBlog
Pros Cons
Known entity, I used to use it,
was easy to get used to again
Really complicated.
Lots of features Took me a long time to set up,
configure, and re-configure
Many different layouts No preferred documents
manager
Good response time on tickets Customizations (export post to
template) rather high-priced

15. Document Manager: eDocman
Pros Cons
Known system, I already use
Events Booking and
MembershipPro
Really complicated.
Lots of features Took me a long time to set up,
configure, and re-configure
Good response time on tickets Display in my template is
suboptimal.

16. Email Newsletters: AcyMailing
Pros Cons
Fantastic component I’m waiting to upgrade to v6 (full
features)
Setting up campaigns is really
easy
Campaigns can’t be shut off, can
only be turned on.
(manual shut off for sign-up
bonus email + eBook)
Good documentation and use of
forum for assistance
Must calculate timing for
campaign sequences

17. Email Newsletters: AcyMailing
Klub welcome sequence:

18. Graphics & Headers: Adobe Spark
$99/year saves me hours every month.
Let’s take a look…

19. Cost break-down
Component
Price
Yearly
Price
Monthly
Membership Pro 40.00$ 3.33$
Stripe Plug-in 25.00$ 2.08$
Easyblog 80.00$ 6.67$
Komento Pro 35.00$ 2.92$
ConvertForms 34.00$ 2.83$
eDocman 35.00$ 2.92$
Adobe Spark 99.00$ 8.25$
Site hosting (1/2) 50.00$ 4.17$
Acymailing (1/2) 50.00$ 4.17$
448.00$ 37.33$
Also built in to the monthly & yearly numbers: Joomla Project Donation
Without Joomla, who knows where my website and business might be.

20. 5. You don’t know what you don’t know.
Problems I ran into:
• Many extensions don’t function the way I thought they would.
• There is a fairly serious disconnect between what I need to be able
to do and what I want to do with my site.
• I can’t code. This means there are certain things I can’t fix on my
own. This is a bit of a hindrance for me.
• There is a very serious disconnect between marketing and
membership terms and how to implement these things in Joomla.
• Unhelpful or outdated documentation (link) and external blog posts.
What do I need to do // what’s it called in Joomla // search for it // decide
which resource is the most reputable // check the date // figure out what in
the world is going on // make more coffee // repeat.

21. 5. Expert spotlight
SD to the rescue!
SD came in this summer and has since helped me:
• reorganize the menus for the Klub and Client areas
• tweak the newsletters
• taught me how to properly use anchors in Joomla articles
• helped me troubleshoot a serious ACL issue in eDocman
• fixed the tables I ended up using on the second Klub landing page
• updated the URL structure
• fixed the profile sync issue I had with MembershipPro
• keep my sanity during the launch of an entirely new business

22. 6. Disconnects…
Caveat: I don’t know anything yet about the development of
Joomla 4. This Klub build kept me busy for the last 9 months (and
I moved, too).
1. The world of internet marketing is huge and moving very
quickly, and mainly they are using WordPress.
1. Amy Porterfield
2. Membership Academy
3. ProBlogger
2. Documentation is usually OK, but implementation takes a lot of
technical know-how. This is a serious barrier to entry.
3. Developer to developer is one thing, developer to consumer is
another, developer to consumer to end-user is another.

23. 6. Disconnects…
How to tackle these disconnects:
1. Figure out how an end user would use your component, then build it
backwards from there.
Learning goal à Warm-up/intro à Activity 1 à Activity 2 à
achievement
2. Connect the dots for self-maintainers like me and the thousands of
membership site owners. Documentation is good, demonstration is even
better.
“Help me to do it myself.” (Montessori)
3. Cross-market your documentation and knowledge with the Joomla
documentation. (Also: cleaning out is not only good for your closet, but also
your Joomla blog.)

24. 7. The best parts have been…
1. Learning more than I possibly imagined I would and that at a
deeper level.
Membership sites, marketing, blogging, work flows, simplifying,
condensing, batching
2. Increasing my confidence in working with Joomla.
3. Pay for expert advice. Thanks again to SD. ☺

25. Eure Fragen
Welche Fragen habt ihr? What questions do you have??
© GermanWithNicole.com

26. Danke!
Herzlichen Dank für‘s Zuhören.
Thanks so much for listening.
GermanWithNicole.com
Nicole Warner, Owner and Instructor • (715) 602-0339 • Nicole@germanwithnicole.com