I've been talking to a couple of people who have been considering joining our Slack community, and it has become very clear to me that charging (even a small annual fee) for this type of community is not something that is going to work.
It was never about the money. In fact, all the money I made from memberships was just going to be reinvested back into the group. The reason I was charging this small annual fee was also to create a small barrier to entry to discourage people who were just going to join and spam us with their show link or new tool they're building.
Looking forward to seeing if this change makes an actual difference in signups. Part of me thinks it may just be an excuse people were giving to "let me down easy" because they weren't actually interested in joining.
It's all a part of building a business!
If you're interested in joining us, and networking with fellow podcasters who are also looking to improve their craft...