How I Validate a Skool Community Before I Build It

Elise Hodge

Sep 15 • Elise's Announcements

Here's the pattern I see over and over.

Someone sets up a Skool community they're genuinely excited about. So they start filling it...

The classroom.

The modules.

The videos.

Making it really good before anyone sees it.

And that makes complete sense — you want it to be worth paying for.

But months go by. Sometimes a year.

Hundreds of hours in, still not paid, and still not knowing the one thing that would make all of it easier:

Does anyone actually want this?

I don't fill the classroom first.

I test the community first in 72 hours, for about $50 — and I only build it out once I know people want in.

Fun fact: this is exactly what I did with Skool Copy Hub.

The idea crystallised, I sat down, built the About page and cover image, turned on ads — and had my first member within the hour. Still sitting at my desk. 😅

I'm walking you through the whole process tomorrow LIVE: https://www.skool.com/skool-copy-hub-6921/calendar?eid=fa21bef87a52422b8fdb5c8f9878ca39

Here's what I'm covering, step by step:

👉 How to find or sharpen your community idea — the three categories Skool communities actually work in

👉 Writing your About page so the message is specific enough to convert cold traffic (this is where most people lose, and messaging is what I've spent 10 years doing)

👉 How to build ten different cover image angles and test all ten at once

👉 What to put inside so a brand-new member trusts it's real — welcome post, Start Here tile, calendar event — without building a single module

👉 Pricing to validate: what to charge and why the free trial stays on

👉 The exact 72-hour test — the setup, the daily budget, and the one thing you must not do while it's running

👉 How to read your result and decide: is there a pulse or not?

👉 What to do the moment you've got one — including which cover image becomes your permanent one

And I'm setting up a brand-new Skool community live at the end — start to finish — so you can watch every step happen in real time. :)

Then you can take the process and:

✅ Test an idea you've been sitting on for months, this week

✅ Find out which of your messages people actually respond to before you commit to one

✅ Get your first ten paying members without filling the classroom first

It's happening live tomorrow at 9:30am AEST.

Deets here: https://www.skool.com/skool-copy-hub-6921/calendar?eid=fa21bef87a52422b8fdb5c8f9878ca39

(YES, there'll be a replay available here for 48hrs, if you can't make it live!)

BUT the workbook and all the Claude prompts I use to do this will ONLY be available inside Membership School.

Plus, the replay (beyond 48hrs)

You can get access to EVERYTHING with the FREE 7-Day Trial of Membership School.

You'll walk away with:

🎁 The Validate Your Membership Idea Workbook — work through the whole process step by step

🎁 The Claude Prompt Pack — the prompt that interviews you to find your idea, plus prompts for your About page, your ten message angles, and your launch emails and posts

🎁 The full slide deck

Plus everything else that's waiting inside Membership School:

✅ The 7-Day Get Paid Challenge — your first payment before you build

✅ Full workshop: idea → validated offer → live membership → first 10 members

✅ New live workshops every month (this is one of them)

✅ 50+ Claude prompts for your offer, sales page & emails

✅ Sales page & email templates I've used to launch my own memberships

✅ Daily coaching — I answer every post

✅ 200+ coaches, creators and digital sellers building alongside you

Click HERE and join us inside Membership School →

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How I Validate a Skool Community Before I Build It