This month is our 8th year business anniversary and we're celebrating with a series called Into the SQSP Metaverse: 33 Portals Through Web Design And Entrepreneurship. This is Portal #2.

Ward and Ryan were running a small but successful Squarespace design and development agency, 320NY. They had a steady flow of clients, but a recurring issue kept cropping up - their clients were desperate for membership functionality on their Squarespace sites.

"We were software developers. We knew how to build things," Ward recalls. "So, we did a little research."

They headed to the Squarespace Q&A forum, where they found a post about adding membership functionality to Squarespace, which had received tens of thousands of views. The demand was clear.

Ward and Ryan saw an opportunity. They began developing a product, MemberSpace, that would allow Squarespace users to add membership functionality to their sites.

The transition from agency to product business was not without its challenges. "Building sites for people doing support requires a lot of time," Ward says. "But with software, you can help a lot more people with the same amount of time."

MemberSpace was an instant success. The product was profitable, and the team of nine full-time employees began to grow. The founders had a relentless focus on supporting their customers and community, which earned them a reputation for world-class support.

The founders also made a commitment to fair long-term pricing. "We all know the story by now," Ward says. "A platform that creators and entrepreneurs rely on raises a giant pile of venture capital, tries to grow too fast, and eventually is forced to massively hike prices to their customers’ dismay or implode. MemberSpace is optimizing their company to never do that to their customers."

Despite the success of MemberSpace, the founders are not resting on their laurels. They have made a strategic decision to extend their technology beyond Squarespace.

They've cleverly built their technology in a way that is decoupled from the underlying content management system (CMS). This means they can extend their services to basically any other web platform out there.

With this expansion, MemberSpace is not just about Squarespace anymore. They are now empowering entrepreneurs across all platforms to build their membership businesses seamlessly. This commitment to their customers, coupled with their fair pricing and world-class support, continues to drive their growth and success. For Ward, Ryan, and their team, the journey is just beginning.

As for their own plans, the founders intend to stay focused on building a profitable, sustainable company. "We're optimizing for retention," Ward says. "We want every customer that walks through the door to stay with us forever."

For Ward, the key was always to start small, to learn from real customers who are actively using the product, and to be agile in their approach. With this mindset, they built a thriving business that caters to entrepreneurs and businesses seeking a powerful, user-friendly membership solution on the Squarespace platform.

Through their creativity and adaptability, the 320NY team successfully transformed their software development expertise into a flourishing subscription-based business. Their story serves as a beacon of inspiration for Saas entrepreneurs navigating their own journey in the SQSP Metaverse.

Listen to Ward’s story here.