Simple Guide To aMember Memberships

How to Add Users & Affiliates In aMember

 

If you have any offline orders or want to give access to a product to a JV partner or review blogger, for example, here’s how to do it.

Start by going to your aMember control panel sidebar and select “Add User”:

STEP 1:  ENTER ACCOUNT DETAILS

Fill in the details as fully as possible on the Add User page. An explanation of all the fields you see on this page are explained below this image.

• Username:  Enter a user name for the new account you are creating (or choose to let it auto-generate by clicking the checkbox)

• Password:  Enter a unique password for the account (or choose to let it auto-generate by clicking the checkbox)

• Email:  Add the email address of the person you’re adding to the account

• Real Name:  Add the person’s first and last name

• Address details: Address details are optional, but they are good for your tax and demographic reports

• Locked: Set to unlock or else the person will not be able to log in

• PayPal Address: If adding an affiliate, enter their PayPal address so you can pay their commissions earned. If you don’t know it, ask for it or have them add it within their account once you send them their login details.

• Unsubscribed: Unchecked means they will receive emails you send to the product/list(s) you add them to. Checking this box means they will not receive your correspondence.

• Newsletter Threads: Highlight any newsletter threads you wish to subscribe the person to – always get permission first!

• Is Affiliate: If you’re setting up an affiliate, select yes. If not, set as no and they can sign up later if they want to

• Affiliate Payout: Choose how you will pay commissions to the affiliate.

Click save when you are finished. This will refresh the page and you’ll see more options at the top as shown here…

 

STEP 2:  ADD A PRODUCT TO THE NEW USER ACCOUNT

If the person will be receiving a free product, you can add the product to their account by clicking the User Payment/Subscriptions link at the top.

Using the drop down menu, select the product you wish to add to the new account. If the date range does not automatically update, you can manually set that. Choose either manual payment or free from the drop down and click Add when finished.

You’ll now see the product has been added to the account. You can edit or delete using the options to the side of the product.

 

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How to Set up Your Affiliate Program in aMember

 

aMember makes it easy to run your affiliate program. In this guide, we’re going to show how to set up your program and add some graphics and links to your affiliate program.  

 

 1. SETTING UP YOUR PROGRAM

From your aMember control panel sidebar select Affiliate Program

On the next screen, make sure you have checked “Enable Affiliate Program”:

Now, you can set up the details of your program. Choose “Affiliates” from the top menu of your Set Up/Configuration:

Now you can specify what types of payout are possible and set the percentage or dollar amounts for commission:

If you want to offer 2^nd tier commissions, you can enter those details as well:

You can also set the duration of the affiliate cookie. You can also choose to only pay commissions for the first payment:

And finally, you can add/edit emails to notify you of new affiliates, send a welcome and sales notification to the affiliate.

Click “Save” when you’re done. Now that you’re program is set up, you’re ready to start adding graphics and links.

To get started, click “Affiliate Program” in your control panel sidebar.

 

2. ADD NEW AFFILIATE GRAPHIC

Click Manage Banners and Text Links

Then click either Add new banner or Add new link

Fill in the following details then click save

• The page URL that the customer should be directed to once they click the image
• The URL where the image is located. You have to load the banner to your server first. aMember will not load them up for you.
• A descriptive alternate text for when the image cannot be displayed
• The width and height of the image

You should now see your new graphic image and you can delete or edit it, using the link options to the right:

 

3. ADD NEW AFFILIATE TEXT LINK

From here:

Choose to “Add new link”.

Fill in the following details. Click save when you’re finished.

• The page URL that the customer should be directed to once they click the image
• Descriptive text that you want to show as the link title

You should now see your new text link.

 

You can delete or edit the text or link by using the options to the side of it.

 

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How to Add a Product To aMember

 

aMember allows you to easily add products for sale and password protect them. To get started, log into your aMember control panel and on the sidebar select “Manage Products”.

 

Then select Add New Product

 

 

STEP 1: ADD PRODUCT DETAILS

Start by entering the name and description for your product. This will be visible to people who order your product. You can use basic HTML tags to format your text.

 

STEP 2: SUBSCRIPTION TERMS

Next, enter the subscription terms. The form looks like this. Below the image, we’ll explain what these fields mean.

• Price:  The price of the product or the recurring subscription. If you have a trial period, enter the regular price the product will be.
• Duration:  The length of time for which a subscriber will have access to the product. For example, if you are setting up a recurring monthly subscription, you would enter 30 days or 1 month. If the product is a one-time buy, you might select lifetime.
• Trial Period Price: If you’re offering a trial period, set the trial price here.
• Trial Period Duration: Enter the duration of your trial period here.
• Recurring Billing: If your product is a recurring subscription, select this.
• Fixed Subscription Date: If you want all subscriptions to start on a set date, regardless of when a person joins, enter the date here. This might be useful if you selling a product prior to the official launch/release date. Leave it blank if you want the subscription to start immediately upon purchase.
• Add Tax: Select if you want to charge tax (tax settings will need to be set up in the “Set up/Configuration” section).
• Custom Subscription Terms: By default the terms are pulled from the information you entered above (In our example, the default would show as: “$5 for the first month. Then $97.00 for each month, for 11 installments”). If you prefer to write out custom terms, you can add those here.
• Recurring Times: The number of subscription payments you will charge for the product. For example, if you offer a 4-month coaching program and the customer will be charged X amount each month for 4 months, you would enter 4 here. If your subscription product is ongoing until the customer cancels, leave this blank.
• PayPal Currency: Assuming you selected in your configuration to accept PayPal payments, you can set the currency in which you accept here. If you use a different payment processor, you don’t need to do anything with this option.

 

STEP 3: PRODUCT URLS

Now it’s time to enter your product download URLs. An explanation of these is below this image.

• Product URL: Enter the link to your product download page or the product itself. This link will be added to the customer member area once they purchase.
• Additional URLs: If you offer a bonus item or multiple products with the purchase of this product, add the extra download link(s) here.

 

STEP 4: PRODUCT AVAILABILITY/VISIBILITY

Now you can enter details about who can order this product and how it will be shown to your customers. The terminology is defined below the following image:

• Scope: This determines who can view and order this product
  • Visible to All: The product will be listed on the main signup page and in the Add/Renew subscriptions list within member accounts.
  • Only Signup: The product will only be listed on the signup page
  • Only Members: The product will only be listed in the add/renew subscription area of member accounts.
  • Disabled: The product will not appear for any users.

• Sorting Order: This determines the order in which products will be listed on the signup page and in the list of products shown to members. It’s good for grouping certain types of products together. If you leave it blank, by default, your products will be shown alphabetically.

• Price Group ID: Assigning a single price group # to multiple products allows you to display only those grouped products on a custom signup page. You can also assign a product a negative # if you want only that product to show in the list when customers order. In our example, the price group 0 ensures the product will show on the default order page and -1 means that we can also link to an order page that only shows our product.

• Renewal Group: Typically this is generated automatically by aMember, so no custom settings are necessary. However, it is where you could tell amember how to calculate a subscription date when a customer renews.

• Display Agreement: Check this if you require customers to agree to your custom terms & conditions before they can sign up.

• Require another subscription: If customers are required to have previously purchased a different product in order to buy another product. For example: If you require customers to have previously purchased product A before they can purchase product B.

• Disallow subscription: If you want to block certain customers from being able to purchase this product, set that here.

 

STEP 5: ADDITIONAL OPTIONS

In the Additional Options section, you can reset the email schedule sent to members, add customers to additional products and you can also set affiliate commissions specific to this product. The commissions will override the settings you have in your main affiliate configuration. If you leave this blank, the regular commissions will apply.

 

STEP 6: OPTIONAL EMAIL SETTINGS

This is where you can create a customized signup template for this product, expiry notifications and autoresponder messages. Here is some opportunity for powerful follow up with your customers:

 

When you’re done, click “Save”.

 

STEP 7: PROTECT PRODUCT

If you want to make sure only members can download your product, you’ll need to protect the folder in which it is located. To do this, click the Protect Folder link in the sidebar of your control panel

Then click the Protect Another Folder link

 

Click Browse

 

A pop-up box will appear. Select the folder you want to protect then click continue.

 

Choose the protection method you want to add to this folder. Typically it will be a “new-rewrite”.

Next select which product(s) you want to have access to this folder. For example, if this folder is only being used for “Product A” downloads, then just select “Product A” from the list. If all products have – or may eventually have – access to the folder, you can select “just any active subscription is enough” rather than choosing all of the products individually.

 

Click “Continue” once you’ve made your selections. You should now see your new folder is protected in your protection list.

 

 

STEP 8: GENERATE PRODUCT BUY LINKS

Once again, click the Manage Products link as shows in step 1. Next, click the link under your product list called Signup Link Wizard.

The options you choose here will determine what your custom signup link will be

Simply select if you want to:

1. Display a certain price group (remember, we set this in step 2
2. Pre-select a certain product
3. Pre-select one payment option and if so, which payment option it will be.

Finally, just copy the link from the Use Signup Link area and paste it into your website page where you want your signup link to go.

 

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4. EXTRA TOOLS:

 

5. MEMBERSHIP AREA SET UP:

Once you have all your ideas together, it’s time to decide how members will get access to it. When setting up your members’ area, here are a few things to include and decide on:

• Will members get access to only that month’s/week’s content or will they access all the available information?
• Create a welcome page that gives an overview of how the membership works. Also consider adding a screen capture video that shows the various features of the memberships.
• Make it easy to find links to renew memberships, add products and get technical support.
• What will you include:

• Download area?
• Blog?
• Forum?
• Chat?
• Form to suggest upcoming content / ask questions?
• A link to your affiliate program, so members can promote?

 

6. PASSWORD PROTECTION & PAYMENTS:

Automating your membership is important for you and your customers. Manually managing access to your membership creates a lot of work for you and your customers don’t want to wait around while you set up their membership access. They paid and they want in now. The good news is, there are plenty of options for setting up your membership site.

A few options to consider:

• Amember: http://amember.com
• Member Gate: http://membergate.com
• DL Guard: http://dlguard.com
• Clickbank: http://clickbank.com (Clickbank will manage your payments, but you still need an  additional script to manage your password protection and access.)
• Delavo: http://delavosecure.com

 

Payment details:

• Will you offer a free or low cost trial? This is an easy way to get people in to try your product. Regular subscription payment kicks in after the trial is over.
• How often will members pay? A rule of thumb is to make members pay at interval when new content is added. For example, charge monthly only if you add new content on a monthly basis. You might also give some options for savings by paying 6 months at a time, 1 year at a time or for a lifetime membership.
• What types of payment will you accept? Will you use PayPal, a merchant account?
• Can members cancel anytime? There’s no need to lock members in a specific contract. You will find it easier to get new members if you allow cancellation anytime and it will help prevent any disputes through your merchant account or payment processor.
• Will you raise the price over a certain period of time? Sometimes it’s easier to get members in at introductory low price and allow them to keep that price, while new members coming in have to pay the current price.  By grandfathering the older members, you encourage them to keep their memberships since they are getting a better deal.

 

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aMember Product Profile

 

SUMMARY:

aMember is a script that allows you to sell subscription-based products or one-time purchase products. It includes some mailing list capabilities and has an affiliate program built-in.

The script is a one-time purchase (rather than a monthly subscription) and CGI-central, the creators of the product, will install and set up your first product for free.

 

WEBSITE:

http://amember.com

 

PRICE:

Current Price: $179.95, including free installation.

Regular Price: $199.95

 

FEATURES OVERVIEW:

aMember comes with plenty of features and here are some of the key ones:

• Ability to sell subscription-based and one-time purchase products.
• Password protection of products and memberships.
• Automatically handles subscriptions and cancellations.
• Create free memberships.
• Add custom fields to sign up forms and member profiles.
• Customers can log into their account and add more products quickly and easily.
• Affiliate program is built-in.
• Ability to set up different commissions for each product; specify commissions on first and subsequent subscription payments; and optional 2^nd tier set up.
• Ability to email customers and set up autoresponder messages for each product.
• Easy import and export of data.
• Customizable sales and other reports.
• Integrates with many 3^rd party payment processors including PayPal, 2Checkout and various merchant accounts. There are over 60 integrations available.
• Can handle offline payments.
• Create coupons that expire after a certain number of uses, by date or allow lifetime use.
• Customizable look and feel.
• Set up and collect unlimited types of sales taxes.
• Ability to ban email addresses, IPs and countries.
• Can be set up in a variety of different languages.
• Allows for sequential content, with additional plug in.

 

INTEGRATIONS:

The aMember website includes a full list of integrations, but here are some of them. Note that some plugins are free and others come with an additional cost.

• Integrates with over 60 payment processors
• Picture galleries: 4Images, Coppermine
• Autoresponder integration: Autoresponse Plus, @ Mail, ListMail Pro and Aweber (partial integration).
• Content Management Systems: Drupal, WordPress, Mambo, Joomla
• Support Ticket Systems: Kayako and Perldesk
• Course Management / Learning: Moodle and eFront
• Message Board Forums: phpBB, FudForum, FusionBB and vBulletin.

 

EASE OF USE AND OVERALL THOUGHTS:

aMember is relatively easy to use and configure, but can be overwhelming at first. There is free installation and they will also configure your payment processor and first product for you, making it much easier to get started. The look and feel of aMember is highly-customizable, but requires a bit of technical know-how. However, for day-to-day use and set up products, aMember is a very powerful program that can be managed by someone without a lot of technical knowledge.

 

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How to View Reports in aMember

 

Once you’ve got your membership running, you want to see how you’re doing, right? Well, Amember allows you to see a variety of reports.

Get start by going to “Reports” in your control panel sidebar.

 

VIEW YOUR INCOME INCOME REPORT

Highlight Income Report from the list and press proceed

Set the date range in which you want to view and click Proceed.

 
Your report will populate on the screen as shown below.

 

Select the New Report link to view another report.

 

VIEW TAX REPORT

In Step 2, select Tax Report & press proceed

 

Your report will populate on the screen.

 

 

VIEW CUSTOMER DEMOGRAPHY REPORT

Back on the report screen, choose Customer Demography and press “Proceed”. Then you’ll be asked to fill in the report parameters.

 

Your report will populate on the screen as shown below.

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