The Alan Weiss Approach

Alan Weiss runs the Million Dollar Club.

It’s a small community of elite consultants (you need to earn over $1m per year). The community talk online and regularly meet in ridiculously exotic locations to discuss ideas and improve each other's businesses.

To join this community you need to fit the following criteria:

• Seven-figure revenues for your firm over the year prior to the meeting.
• You must be either the owner or co-owner of the firm, or a solo practitioner.
• You must be willing to share your intellectual property, ideas, and advice freely, without ego, and without reservation. (I vet members to ensure the “chemistry” will be good.)
• Commitment to attend the annual meetings as a top priority, not “bumped” by business or professional issues.
• The first meeting would be in 2010 at a mutually convenient time and mutually appealing place. The meeting fee is $15,000{...}

These are dozens of failed attempts by businesses (FT amongst them) to create similarly elite communities of top business professionals. 

If you're trying to create an elite group of people together in your community have two options. The first is to be a peer amongst them. Alan succeeds where FT fails solely because of this. The second is to find an elite person or persons to be the public head of the community. You take the back seat.