So You Want to Add a Members-Only Area to Your WordPress Website

This week I’ve been asked by two clients to add password-protected membership areas to their websites. In one case, the client wants to create a members-only area containing paid content. In the other case, the client wants a highly secure portal for company-confidential internal documents that is accessible by her employees all over the world.

I’m aware of almost a dozen ‘membership plugins’ for WordPress. Each has it’s own set of functions and features. I’m not going to recommend – or even name – specific plugins here. Instead, I’m going to talk about some of the things you should consider when selecting a membership plugin.

Merchant Account Support

If you are planning on selling access to content, I’ve found that until your monthly revenues reach at least $2500/month it is more cost-effective to collect payments using PayPal. Once you begin to reach that $2500/month threshold, it is worthwhile to compare the fees charged by PayPal vs most merchant accounts.

Credit card processing involves three components:

• Your Bank
• Merchant Account
• Payment Gateway

The Payment Gateway is the ‘go-between’ between your website and your merchant account. The payment gateway is the thing your website connects to, and passes credit card charges to it. The most widely known and accepted payment gateway is Authorize.net. Most providers of merchant accounts support Authorize.net. If you expect to take payments via credit card then make sure your membership plugin supports Authorize.net (sometimes this is through an extra-cost extension)

Alternatively, some membership plugins rely upon WooCommerce, a popular shopping cart plugin, for handling payments. That’s OK, but it means an additional piece to connect up and get working.

Email Marketing Integration

One of your most valuable assets is the list of past and present members, and you’ll probably want to send them occasional emails. Be sure to determine that the plugin either:

1. Stores member email addresses and has its own ability to compose and send emails, or
2. Integrates with the Email Marketing application you use (MailChimp, Constant Contact, AWeber, ActiveCampaign, etc)

Free Version or Trial Period

Personally, I’m a fan of products that offer a free version or a free trial period. It’s almost impossible to determine a product’s true suitability until you actually put it through its paces. If possible, choose a membership plugin that allows you to take it for a test drive before spending any money on it.

How Will You Be Charging for Access? – One-time or Recurring

Just make sure the membership plugin supports the payment mode you need. A word of warning: Most merchant accounts discourage payment plans that automatically recur quarterly, semi-annually, or annually.

Do you need Membership Tiers?

If so make sure the membership plugin supports tiers or groups, each with their own content. Make sure that the plugin supports a way for members to upgrade from a lower tier to an upper one.

How easy is it to set up?

There is a membership plugin that has been around longer than almost all the others. It is the Swiss army knife of membership plugins. It will do everything. I have never been able to install it without at least one call to tech support.

When evaluating a membership plugin, spend some time exploring the FAQ. Do a Google search for “[plugin name] problem”

Can it Protect Non-WordPress files?

This is the big one. Does your membership area contain high-value content that unscrupulous members will want to pass around? Such an unscrupulous member can right-click on your video while watching it, copy the URL, and send it to all his buddies. If that is an issue, then select a plugin that can protect videos, PDFs, and other files as well as WordPress pages and posts.

One way to solve this problem is to store your videos and other files on Amazon S3 and then use a plugin like s3flowshield or S3MediaVault to make it available only to members.

Does the plugin save members as WordPress users?

Some membership plugins store users as WordPress users. Other plugins have their own user table, keeping your member users separate. Personally, I’m a fan of the latter method. There is a security vulnerability called ‘privilege escalation’ that would theoretically allow a devious, determined, and tech-savvy user to turn themselves into your website’s admin. At the present time, WordPress contains no known privilege escalation vulnerabilities.

Do you need a record of pages the member has visited (“I have read and understand this instruction”)

When my client mentioned to me that she wanted a staff portal for processes and company policies, I asked her if she would like the portal to make staff acknowledge reading said policies. There are plugins such as Read and Understood that can be used to implement this functionality.

Discount Codes

Do you have the need to offer a discount on your membership fee?  (Believe me, you will). You will wont a flexible mechanism that, for example, allows you to create trackable discount codes for specific events or circumstances.

Hopefully this article will give you something to think about. Too many times I’ve seen people who ‘didn’t know what they didn’t know’ jump in prematurely, select a product, and then waste countless hours only to discover it was not suitable.