A level is the answer to two questions: what somebody pays, and what they get. Everything else about your membership follows from the levels you set up, so it is worth an hour once and then almost no thought again. This note covers making one, and the settings that decide how somebody joins and how they pay. If you have not opened the tool before, How to make edits on an Avistra website shows the sign-in, and How to add members and look after them covers the list itself.
Changing any of this needs your passkey.
Making a level
Dashboard in the bar, then Membership on the left, then Levels, then New level.
- Name. What you call it. Full member, Associate, Student, Corporate.
- Price, and how often: a year, a month, or free, or arranged for one you settle outside the site.
- Level order. The one that needs explaining, and it is worth getting right.
What the level order does
The level order is a ladder, and 0 is the bottom. A member sees anything marked for their own level and anything below it.
So if Associate is 1 and Full member is 2, a full member reaches everything an associate reaches, plus whatever is marked Full member. You do not have to tick a list of what each level can see; you set the ladder once, mark a document or an event with the level it starts at, and the reaching takes care of itself.
If you only have one kind of membership, leave it at one level, or none. The ladder is there when you need it.
One person, or an organization
A level belongs either to one person or to an organization. An organization's level includes a number of seats: the organization pays once, and the person who manages the seats fills them from their own account. Set the seats to 0 and they say how many they want and pay per seat.
Organizations only appear once your site says it has them, in Settings. Most sites never will.
What it includes
A few lines, one each. They show as a list on the join page, so this is sales copy rather than record-keeping: say what somebody gets for their money, in their words, not yours.
Under it is a tick for whether somebody can choose this level on the join page at all. Turn it off for a level you hand out yourself, an honorary membership or a staff one, and it still works, it is just not on offer.
How somebody joins
Membership, then Settings. The first block is Joining.
New members need approving. Off, somebody joins and is in. On, they apply, you look at it in Applications, and only then is anything charged: the card is held, not taken, until you approve. Use it where membership means something you vouch for; leave it off where it does not.
Membership types says who a membership belongs to: individual, organizational, or both. Set to individual, everything about organizations and seats stays out of sight.
Accounts for people who are not members is on to start with, so anybody you know, a registrant or a donor, can sign in to Your account to see their registrations and receipts. Turn it off and only members can sign in.
Joining codes, their own section under Membership, take something off a new member's first payment. Renewals are always full price.
How they pay
Membership, then Renewals, then How people may pay. The amount always comes from the level. This block only decides what somebody may choose when they join or renew, and you can offer any combination of the three:
- One payment, good for a year. Nothing renews on its own. They get a reminder before it runs out, and they renew if they want to. The gentlest option, and the right default for most.
- A subscription that renews every year. Charged automatically until they stop it.
- A subscription paid monthly. A twelfth of the level's price, unless the level sets its own monthly amount.
Offer all three and somebody picks what suits them. Offer one and that is what joining means on your site.
When a year ends
Also under Renewals. Renewal date is either a year after each person paid, or the same date for everyone, for an organization that runs on a season. Grace period keeps somebody's membership for a number of days after it runs out: they read Renewal due, keep everything and see a renew button, and after that they become Inactive.
Reminders
A member hears from you before their year is out, by name, without you doing anything. Renewals lists each reminder with what it says, and you choose which go. Nobody is chased, and nobody is cut off silently.
Taking money
Card payments need a Stripe account connected to the site: How to connect your Stripe account walks through it. Everything above works without one: you can run a membership on levels that are free or arranged, take payment however you already do, and use Record a payment on the person's record when a check arrives.
If you get stuck
Levels are the part worth talking through rather than guessing at. Choose Support request in the bar, tell us what you charge and what each kind of member gets, and we will set it up with you. How to submit a support request on an Avistra website shows how.