Membership

Modules>Membership

The Membership Module enables you to effectively set up and manage all of your Associations, Members, and Chapters.

The Group Items within the Membership Module include:

Overview Associations Chapters Members

Dues Products Member Renewal Process Member Drop Process

The primary Profile Pages in the Membership Module include:

• Association Profile
• Membership Profile
• Chapter Profile
• Member Type Profile

Membership Setup

NetForum uses drop-down lists for easy data entry. You set-up the lists with information specific to the kinds of organizations and memberships you interact with (e.g., you set-up types of associations, membership products, membership types, etc.).

Bold text indicates that the field is Required data.

You can add, edit, or delete data from the Membership Setup pages just as you would from any NetForum child form. However, once a data element is used on a profile page or form, it can only be disabled or hidden but not deleted.

You can also access the Setup links from the Overview Group Item.

Membership Workflow

The following is the recommended order of tasks for setting up and managing your Associations and their members in NetForum:

1. Add your Association. This creates the Association Profile Page - Nearly every form in the Membership module requires that you specify the Association that you are creating it for. Therefore, begin by setting up your Association. If you plan to have Chapters within your Association, create them during this step as well since they will be asked for as well during Member Type set-up.
2. Add the Business Unit. The Business Unit is the financial entity of the Association and is considered the General Ledger. As such, every Association must have at least one Business Unit tied to it and set-up correctly to handle the associated costs. You will be able to set-up your Business Unit either from the Accounting module or through the Association's Child Form itself during your Association set-up. All tabs under the Business Unit Profile should be set-up properly for your Association to run smoothly.
3. Add the Association Member Types. Once the Association is set-up and ready to handle finances, the Member Types that will be part of the Memberships and Membership Packages are ready to be created on your Association Profile along with their relevant Member Status states if you plan on using them. For example, you can now create your Memberships such as Associate Member, Senior Member, etc. and set their status states to 'Pending Payment', if desired, so that when the first payment is received the member status flips to 'Active'. The Member Type and Member Status pages detail this step.
4. Set up the Membership Drop-Down Lists - Many options available in the drop-down menus when you begin managing your Associations, Chapters, and Membership Packages are set-up in Membership Setup. You are now able to specify terminations reasons (non-payment, member moved, etc.) for example, or what benefits a Membership package should receive before you set-up these packages. Membership Setup also enables you to view all Member Types at a glance.
5. Set Up the Membership System Options - Administrators / advanced users can complete this step on the back-end and should consider what options they may want to use other than the default options provided. A search on Category: Membership System Options provides a list of these options.
6. Add Membership Dues Packages - Finally, complete your Association and Chapters by adding the Membership and Dues Packages that they will sell. This is the final step once all your Association and Membership Types are in place. After this step is completed, you are ready to begin adding Members and Selling Memberships.