How To Start Your Membership

Membership is not a feature you set up once and forget. It is a commitment to your most dedicated fans, and the artists who treat it that way are the ones who see it grow. This playbook is here to help you think about what that looks like in practice.

What Membership Actually Is

At its core, Membership gives fans a reason to pay you every month in exchange for access to something they cannot get anywhere else. It is not a tip jar. It is not a merch store. It is a recurring relationship between you and the people who care most about what you make.

The value of that relationship compounds over time. A fan who has been a member for six months is more invested in your success than someone who streamed your song once. They are your real base. Membership is how you build and sustain it.

How to Set Up Your Membership

Step 1: Go to Membership in your dashboard Select Membership from the left sidebar. If you are starting fresh, you will see an empty state. Click the three-dot menu or go into Edit to get started.

Step 2: Fill in your membership details Give your membership a title, write a short description that tells fans what they are joining, set your minimum monthly price, and upload your cover art. Cover art should be a square image, minimum 3000 x 3000px. Once everything looks good, hit Save Changes.

Step 3: Create your first Collection A Collection is how you organize your exclusive content. Think of it like a folder with a theme. From your membership page, click Create Collection, give it a title, add a description, upload cover art, and click Compose Collection to move into it.

Step 4: Add content to your Collection Inside your collection, click Create Post and choose your content type: Videos, Gallery, Files, Events, or Music. Each type has its own upload flow. Give your content a title, describe what fans are getting, upload your file, and fill in the Additional Content Preview card so fans can see what they are unlocking before they subscribe. Click Continue to move to Step 2 of 2, then save.

Step 5: Publish Once you have at least one collection with content added, the Publish Membership button becomes active. Click it to make your membership live. From there you can share your membership link directly from the dashboard.

What You Can Offer

Membership on EVEN lets you organize exclusive content into Collections, and within each collection you can share five types of content: videos, gallery photos, downloadable files, events, and music. That range matters because great membership content does not have to be polished. Some of the most effective membership content is the opposite.

Videos work for studio sessions, vlogs, commentary, behind-the-scenes footage from a shoot, or even a casual check-in from your phone. Fans pay for proximity, not production value.

Gallery is where you share photos that live nowhere else. Outtakes, rehearsal shots, early artwork, tour moments. Think of it as a private photo roll for your members.

Files are underrated. Stems, chord charts, session notes, lyric breakdowns, wallpapers. If you make something that a dedicated fan would want to hold onto, a file drop is the move.

Events let you give members early RSVP access or invite-only access to something, whether that is virtual or in person. An acoustic show, a listening session, a Q&A. It does not have to be big. It has to feel exclusive.

Music is where you put the tracks that are not on streaming. Demos, alternate versions, b-sides, instrumentals, rough cuts. If you have a vault, your members should have access to it.

What Makes a Strong Membership

The artists who build successful memberships share a few things in common.

They are specific about what they are offering. "Join my membership for exclusive content" does not convert. "Every month you get early access to new music, a behind-the-scenes video from the studio, and photos from the road" does. Be concrete when you describe what fans are signing up for.

They show up consistently. Fans who pay monthly expect to see activity monthly. That does not mean you need to post every day. It means they should never go four weeks without hearing from you through their membership. One piece of meaningful content per week is more than enough. Even a short video from your phone counts.

They treat the price as a floor, not a ceiling. EVEN lets fans pay more than the minimum if they want to. Some will. The ones who do are telling you something. Acknowledge them. A membership that feels personal earns more than one that feels automated.

They use the preview card. Every piece of content you upload has an "Additional Content Preview card" that shows fans what they will unlock before they commit. A good preview creates desire. A vague or missing preview kills it. Write a line that makes someone feel like they are missing out if they are not a member.

Pricing

Start simple. A minimum price around $5 to $10 per month is accessible enough for fans who are on the fence and still meaningful enough to feel like a real commitment. You can always adjust as your membership grows. The goal in the beginning is members, not maximum revenue per member.

Consistency Is the Product

This is worth saying directly: the content you put in your membership is less important than how reliably you show up. Fans cancel memberships when they feel forgotten. They stay when they feel like they are part of something ongoing.

You do not need to overpromise. You need to be consistent. Pick a cadence you can actually maintain and stick to it. A membership with one reliable drop per week will retain fans longer than one with three drops in the first week and nothing for a month after.

The artists who get the most out of Membership treat it like a practice, not a launch.

Getting Your First Members

Before you post publicly, reach out personally. Text the people in your life who have always supported your music and tell them directly that you launched something for your real fans. Give them the link. Explain what they get. Most of them will join.

Then share your membership link everywhere you would share a release link: your bio, your stories, your DMs, your email list. Treat the launch like a release. Make some noise about it, then keep making noise about it month after month as your content builds up.

The catalog effect is real. A membership that has been active for six months with consistent content is a much easier sell than one that launched last week. Every piece of content you add is a reason for a new fan to subscribe.