Before visitors can begin to signup for Membership the following must be setup:

§         Configure Membership Features Management

§         Create Membership Email Broadcast Templates

§         Create Membership Types

§         Define your Membership Approval Process

§         Define your Membership Billings Process & define required Terms

 

Membership has four distinct processes:

1.      Define Membership Types & Fees

2.      Membership signup process.

3.      Membership approval process.

4.      Membership billing process.

 

For each Membership Type that a contact or company signs up for, the system creates a Membership record in the Memberships table.  Note that a contact or company may signup for and be a member of more than one Membership Type. 

 

Each Membership record can have only one application (link to a Survey record).  If approval of the Membership Type is required, the approval status is recorded in the Membership record.  Membership records have one or more related Order records, which are created when fees are billed.  When a Membership is for a Company, the Contact ID is used to specify the Primary Contact, thus all Memberships have a Contact record.  The contact record is created from either the Signup page or the Contact/Member Management page.  Each Membership Type may specify a Registration form that is substituted for the one specified in Features Management User Signup page, such that if the member applicant needs to signup after clicking on Join, the Registration form specified for the Membership they are signing up for shall be displayed; if they already have a login this does not apply.

 

The system creates an Order record with Order Items for each applicable membership fee.  When a payment is entered into the system, the system creates a Payment Transaction record.  More than one Payment record can be created in order to enter partial payments; however, when online payment is required, the Order amount must be paid in full.  When membership type requires approval, the member also has an Application record that is created using the Survey Engine, which creates a Survey record and one or more corresponding Answer records.  The Application Approval page is used to review and approve applications. Approval status, approved by and approval dates are stored in the Membership record.

 

Links to Membership can be created using the Menu Builder, Mini Browser Builder and/or Greeting Management where Greeting tags link to either the Membership Types page that lists all available memberships or directly to a specific Membership Type’s Membership Detail page.

 

The Membership Features page is used to configure parameters to support Membership Types.

 

The Membership Type Management page is used to add and edit Membership Types. 

 

Membership is included as an Order Features Type.  Membership billing can be done via the Invoicing process, which provides the ability to automate the creation of Membership Invoices for new Members, Recurring Dues and Renewals. 

 

Once an Administrator has learned how to create surveys the Administrator will understand how to create Membership Applications because applications are also created using the Survey Engine;

 

If your organization requires members to be approved for membership, create one or more Security Groups for Approving Membership and assign to the individuals that are responsible for this.  This done using Security Group Management then using Contact Management to assign the responsible individuals to the Security Group.