What are membership plans and how do I use them?

What is a membership plan?

A membership plan is a subscription to your organization that entitles the purchaser to certain benefits.

Each member's plan makes them an active member for a specific period of time, with a start date and end date, and entitles them to specific benefits that you offer them.

SilkStart's plans are incredibly flexible - most organizations can create plans that match their organization's policies in less than 15 minutes, with no custom coding required.

How do I create a membership plan?

1. Log into your SilkStart admin panel, and navigate to Settings > Plans
2. Click on 'Add an Individual Plan' or 'Add an Organization Plan'.
3. Enter the basic information - each plan requires a name, a billing type, and a fee. All other fields are optional.
4. Click 'Save'. Your plan is now available to members.

How do I delete a membership plan?

It's easy for admins to delete a membership plan. Below are some things to know about what happens when memberships are deleted from SilkStart.

It's not recommended you delete a plan that has users actively recurring on the membership. Subscriptions will likely remain active and will continue to be billed through the payment processor.

• Permissions: You won't be able to set permissions for anyone who has the plan since there will be no user type available for that plan.
• Expiry reminders: Expiry reminders will likely not send as they are attached to the plan.
• Filters: Users will still display as having the deleted plan if they had it prior to the deletion, but admins cannot filter the member grid using this plan.
• Members: Those on manual renewal will just continue to expire naturally and need to pick a different plan if they reach the join page to renew later on.

If you are ready to delete a membership plan:

1. Log into your SilkStart admin panel, and navigate to Settings > Plans
2. Select the plan that you wish to delete.
3. Click 'Delete' in the top right hand corner

For more information on changing your plan prices, see this article.

Which Billing Type should I choose?

Billing Types define when your members' accounts will expire.

• If you want members to renew every month, choose Monthly.
• Expiry dates can be one month to the day from when the member signed up,
• OR they can be the first or last day of the next month.
• If you want members to renew every year, choose Annual
• Expiry dates can be one year to the day from when the member signed up,
• OR they can be the first or last day of the month that they signed up.
• ** If you use Stripe or Worldline (Bambora) as your payment gateway, you may configure your annual plan to last more than one year (by selecting a value from 1 to 4 years). **
• If you want members to all to expire on the same day of the year, choose Calendar
• The Renewal Date is the day that all members with this plan will expire.
• You can choose to prorate this plan if you want members signing up later in the year to pay a lower fee.
• If you want members to renew at four intervals in a calendar year, choose Quarterly.
• If you want members to purchase a permanent membership, choose Lifetime.

What options do I have when creating a membership plan?

Hide from Join Page: Tick the box next to 'Hide from Sign Up Page' to hide this plan from new members. Note: Members who have already signed up for this plan will still be able to see it when they renew their memberships.

Hide from Renewal Page: Select this option to hide this plan from members that are renewing. This means anyone renewing with this plan will have to select a new plan when their expiry date comes due.

Summary: Create a short summary of the plan. This will appear on the Sign Up page before members have selected their plan.

Plan Description: Provide a more in-depth description of the plan. This may include a list of member benefits associated with this type of restrictions for use of this plan.

Automatic or Manual Billing: Choose whether you want members to renew manually each time, or if they should be able to set up automatic renewals. You can also make automatic renewal mandatory. Note: The option for auto-renewal on Calendar plans is only available if you use PayPal as a payment gateway. Learn more about auto-billing.

Email Domains: If you would like members to signup using a specific email domain enter that domain here. Learn more about email extensions.

Custom Confirmation Message: This message will be included in the automatic confirmation message that the member receives on completing their signup or renewal - it won't be seen by anyone who has not purchased this plan.

Automatic Expiry Reminders: Set up automatic reminder emails for members whose accounts are expiring. This message can be sent as often as you want before the member's account expires. Learn how to configure your reminders.