We’ve all been using digital platforms for years - some of us have even been using them since we were a child. There are countless platforms out there that promise unique services. Of course, most fields have their own flagships, like Coursera and Udemy when it comes to online courses and Discord, Facebook, and Telegram when it comes to online communities.
When trying to decide which platform to use for what, people often face the problem of pros and cons being similar - so they can’t decide. Telegram channels are amazing, but they don’t have organization features like Discord. On the other hand, Discord is much harder to learn, whether you want to create your own community or join one. This is a very common issue that people face when they’re trying to find the perfect platform for their ideas.
That’s where Whop comes in. Whop is a social commerce platform that lets anyone create and sell access to a wide range of digital products, from exclusive courses to sports betting tips. Whop also has a marketplace, that people can browse to find the perfect whop for themselves and become a member of it. Speaking of whops, let’s clear up the difference between Whop and a whop:
- Whop is a social commerce platform for selling online
- A whop is your own internet hub that you can create and sell access to all or part of (and it can be free, too).
What is a whop?
You can think of a whop as a modular platform. When you first create a whop, it will be a blank canvas. Now, think of your online hub idea - what does it offer to its members: chat rooms? Forums? Courses? Sports picks? No matter what kind of a hub you want to create, you can do so on your whop. This is done by using what we call “apps.”
To easily understand what apps are, think of them as features. For example, Discord has chat rooms, Coursera has online courses, and Skype has video calls. Those platforms offer all unique features, but with whop, you can gather all those features into a single platform.
Let’s imagine you want to create a coding community where you want newbie and experienced coders to get together, chat, learn, and collaborate. You can make this community a reality by adding the Chat app to your whop, so your members can chat with each other, Courses app, so that you can create elaborate lessons and your members can learn, and the Forums app so that people can post their project ideas and find others who are willing to collaborate.
As you’ve seen so far, a whop can become what you want it to be since you can tailor it with the features that your idea requires. That’s great - but how do you “sell” it? Well, unlike Discord server or Telegram channels, you can create what we call “products” - digital memberships that people can buy (they can be free, too) so that they can access parts or the entirety of your whop. Then, once you’re ready, you can even apply for the Whop Marketplace so that your whop will be listed at Whop.com, and people will be able to find it super easily - boosting your revenue.
Before we get into the details of a whop, apps, and products, let’s look at some examples of hypothetical whops so that you can get a good understanding of them.
Examples of whops
As we mentioned, you can create all kinds of communities on Whop - the only limit is your imagination. Let’s imagine a couple of hypothetical whops, which apps they would use, and the products they could offer:
- Coding Academy: The Coding Academy whop is a place for all developers to gather and improve themselves no matter their knowledge level. You can meet with other developers, exchange feedback, find people to collaborate with, and even take on the Introduction to Python and Introduction to JavaScript courses.
- Apps: The Coding Academy whop utilizes the Courses, Chat, Content, Forums, and Help Desk apps.
- Products: The Coding Academy whop has three products:
Regular Membership, which lets users access all apps except Courses; Python Membership, which lets users access all apps, including the Introduction to Python course; and JavaScript Membership, which lets users access all apps, including the Introduction to JavaScript course.
- Fantasy Writers Guild: The Fantasy Writers Guild whop is the perfect place to improve your fantasy writing skills and socialize with other fantasy writers. It doesn’t matter if you dabble in the world of fantasy writing as a hobby or professionally. The Guild is the perfect inn for you.
- Apps: The Fantasy Writers Guild whop utilizes multiple Chat apps, Files, Content, Links, and Events apps.
- Products: The Fantasy Writers Guild has only a single product called Guild Membership, which is free to obtain. Everyone on the internet can be a part of the Guild for free.
- Naut Sports Picks: The Naut Sports Picks whop is a sports betting community that is run by experienced betters who want to share their knowledge and tips with others. The Naut community focuses on NBA and NFL picks and has an active community where people can discuss their strategies.
- Apps: The Naut Sports Picks whop utilizes the Chat, Content, Affiliate Links, Sports App, and Help Desk apps.
- Products: The Naut Sports Picks whop has two products called Regular Membership and Premium Membership. The Regular Membership product lets users access all apps of the whop except one of the two Sports Apps. This is a free product. The Premium Membership product lets users access all apps, including the premium Sports App, where users can find high-risk and high-reward picks. This is a paid product.
How to Create a whop
All right, so far, you know what whops, apps, and products are. They’re amazing - you can create your dream hub. But how? In this section, we’re going to walk you through the easy steps of creating your very own whop. First of all, you should know that there are two ways of creating a whop. The first one is by using the https://whop.com/hub/new/ URL, which will direct you to the first step of creating a hub. The other way is by clicking on the Create new (plus icon) on the left-side dashboard while you’re viewing a hub.
After either using the URL or clicking on the Create new button, it’s time to follow the steps of creating a whop:
- In the first step, you should give your whop a cool name. Make sure it is not too long or too short. After deciding on the name of your whop, click the Next button at the bottom right.
- In the second step, click on the dropdown menu and select which niche your whop will cater to. For our Fantasy Writers Guild example, it would be “Art.”
- After selecting the niche, click on the Next button at the bottom right, and you’re all done.
After clicking the Next button on the final step of the whop creation process, you’ll be directed to your whop landing page. There, you’ll see an introductory page telling you what your next steps should be. We recommend you give it a read.
It was easy, wasn’t it? If you’ve been following along so far, now you have your very own whop - great job.
What’s Next?
After creating your whop, it’s time to actually set it up. There are three main things left for you to do: create products, add apps, and set up your store page. After you’re done with all these, you can launch your whop. Let’s see them in order:
- Create products - You should create products to be able to sell access to apps or the entirety of your whop. Remember that you can make most apps free to use, which means they won’t require apps to access. If you want to learn every detail about creating products and linking them to apps, check out our How to Create a whop Product guide.
- Add apps - Apps are the very things that make your whop a usable platform. You should take a look at every single app that is available on whop and decide which ones your platform needs. You should avoid adding too many apps to avoid clutter, but add enough apps so that your whop can function as intended. Remember that you can add multiple of the same app. Read our how to add apps to a whop guide.
- Set up store page - After you’re all done with products and apps, it’s time to set up an attractive store page for your whop. When you first create a whop, its store page will be created alongside it automatically - but it will be empty. It will only list your products and apps but nothing more.
By setting up your store page, you can provide information about your products, apps, platform, and basically, everything a potential user needs to see to be able to decide if they want to be a part of your whop or not. If you want to learn how to set up the perfect store page for your whop, check out our How to Set Up your Whop Store Page guide.
Create Your Own whop Today
Now you know everything you need to start your whop journey. If you ever want to learn more about having and running your whop, make sure to check out the Whop category of our blog and join the Whop University hub.
Creating digital content and selling access to it has never been easier. Signing up to Whop, creating your own whop, and starting to sell access takes less than 10 minutes.
