“It depends on what you want,” is a highly unsatisfactory answer for those who have no idea what they want. But, that’s what friends, online boards, and bike shop employees unanimously say when you go shopping for answers to what bike you should buy.

Luckily for you, I’ve just lived through this process and am here to tell you, if you are buying a road bike, you want a carbon fiber bike or no bike at all.

That is, if you have a few “miles” on you already and you care about the comfort of your butt, you want carbon fiber. An important consideration for me and definitely a game-changing decision for my wife.

My wife, Kory, and I had wanted to buy road bikes for several years. All that time, we were reluctant to go to a bike shop because we didn’t know what we wanted. With a sore leg from running too hard, it was time for me to buy a bike so I could exercise without running all the time. That meant Kory needed to buy a bike so we could continue working out together.

Kory is one of the 50 fastest marathon finishers in the state of Florida for her age group. Yet she hadn’t ridden a bicycle since college. And within the world of road bikes, a lot has changed.

Good road bikes range anywhere from $500.00 to $6,000.00 and more. While we are open-minded about doing a triathlon sometime in the future, there are no immediate plans. With that in mind, we asked ourselves, what do we buy that’s not ridiculously expensive but still gives us what we need? Turns out, everyone’s answer is, “It depends on what you want.”

Exasperated, Kory decided to ride several bikes at a bike shop one day. She rode a $750.00 aluminum bike — a very nice model — but I’m not going to repeat what Kory said about how it treated her backside while she rode it. Suffice it to say, it wasn’t comfortable. Then she rode an aluminum bike with carbon fiber forks, priced around $1,200.00. Much better but still punishing.

Then came the carbon fiber model at $2,500.00. That was a DREAM. According to Kory, the bike practically pedaled itself. A great experience. Turns out the carbon fiber bike absorbs vibration and cushions your ride.

Out the door with pedals, helmet, trip computer, discounts, and taxes, more than $3,500.00. That’s a lot to spend, but if you are riding a bike for a couple of hours, you don’t want the result to be two days where your butt hurts so bad you can’t sit down.

For years we didn’t buy a bike because we weren’t sure if we really needed to spend the money on a carbon fiber model. It would have saved us so much time and aggravation if there’d just been someone who’d told us, “You can go cheaper if you want, but the carbon fiber will be a lot more comfortable, and the experience of riding the bike will be more enjoyable. Carbon fiber is worth the extra investment.”

I desperately wanted someone to cut through all the clutter and give me a clear answer. Your members are looking for the same.

The most helpful thing you can do for your new member is to focus him on the single most important task to solve his pressing problem in the fastest way possible.

But what do most people deliver? A box of work! Materials to read, videos to watch, and stuff to listen to. Isn’t that what the member purchased? Yes and no. Your member is looking for the fastest way to solve a problem. Deliver that and save everyone a lot of hassle.

Most membership marketers feel the need to deliver an entire suite of answers to their customers. They want to teach them everything they need to know to completely understand their problem, consider the many possible solutions, choose the best one for them, and implement a plan. How about getting your customer right to “problem solved”?

I recently had the pleasure of meeting with Ted Thomas and his staff for a consulting day. Ted’s product teaches everything you’d need to know about investing in tax liens (Tax liens are investment instruments where you pay someone’s unpaid taxes in exchange for a lien on their property that accumulates interest. They occur where the government will take and sell the property if the taxes go unpaid).

When new members felt overwhelmed and didn’t know how to begin the program, they’d phone Ted’s office. Ted’s crackerjack staff generously helped callers by walking them through the many questions necessary for them to identify which, among the United States’ 3,143 counties, was the best county to buy tax liens. The questions included, “Would you like to invest in tax liens or tax deeds?”, “Where do you live?”, “Where do you vacation?”, “Where do you have family that you like to visit?”, “Is there a place to which you’d like to retire?” All great questions meant to help the member identify which counties to research to buy liens.

We worked for hours to simplify the decisions and the processes. Then Ted said, “Why don’t they just call one of the counties with leftover liens and buy one of those? They can buy anytime, meaning they don’t have to wait until the next auction, and we can give them the step-by-step at that time because it’ll be one county for everybody.” Genius!

We transformed Ted’s membership program into a Success Club focused on helping his members implement the products. The products give members the information, while the membership gives them the tools and short-cuts on how to start and keep succeeding. Now Ted’s member welcome includes step-by-step instructions for members on buying their first lien. This way, Ted’s Success Club can lead members through one county’s tax bureaucracy to buy their first lien. Members get to experience success immediately, and perhaps that’s all many members need. For members who want to move on, the success club includes more tools and resources as members’ needs grow.

Since buying our bikes, I have enjoyed biking with my wife. I wish someone would have helped cut through the choices before and showed me how to get started safely and comfortably. Any bike shop that offered that would have sold two carbon fiber bikes plus accessories years ago.

How can you cut through the myriad of decisions for your new members, provide detailed answers on the single-best way to get started, and help them become successful quickly?

Want to learn more on improving your membership program? Read this special report to discover why your members drop-out and the incredibly easy ways to prevent it.

About Robert Skrob

The problem with subscription membership programs is that members quit, I fix that problem. For more than 20-years I have specialized in direct response marketing for member recruitment, retention and ascension in diverse subscription members environments including non-profit associations, for-profit publishers/coaching, subscriptions and SAAS companies. For an evaluation of your current churn rate and how I can improve it, contact me here. I discover there are often two or three quick wins you can implement within a week to lower churn immediately, let’s talk about your quick wins.