Managing a Small Association Website

When I launched a local networking group for virtual assistants in 2008, I didn’t expect I’d also become its tech department. But here we are nearly two decades later, and I’ve learned a lot about what not to do when managing a small association website. If you’re in charge of a small group or association, this post might save you some headaches.

Background

As Founder and Director of the Golden Horseshoe Virtual Assistants (GHVA), my goal is to promote the group both to potential members and to businesses who may need to hire a virtual assistant.

In 2013, we signed up for a membership management system called Wild Apricot. It seemed ideal, because it offered all of the following features:

• Member database, with automated process for sending out renewal notices and changing a member’s status to Lapsed if they didn’t renew before their membership expired
• Online payments for membership applications, renewals, and events
• Automated emails to let members and potential members know about upcoming events, including appropriate reminders for those who have or haven’t registered
• Ability to send email newsletters and other communications to members and/or potential members, including specific segments of the list
• Discussion forums

It was more expensive than our previous system, which used various spreadsheets, but because it streamlined so many processes, it seemed like a worthwhile investment. Time is money, right?

Why Changes Were Needed

After several price increases, it became clear that this was no longer a viable solution for such a small group, and it was time to find an alternative.

I looked at other membership management software, but quickly discovered that any cost savings would be eaten up by the time required to learn and migrate to a new system.

I then started looking at WordPress plugins that could handle member management (including a public directory), event promotion and registration, and email to members and prospective members. There are many options, but again the time involved to make the transition would outweigh most of the cost savings, especially since most of the premium plugins I looked at required yearly license renewals.

Finally I had a brainwave, that I could achieve what was needed using developer tools that I already own. Because Wild Apricot has a lot of limitations I won’t go into here, we already had a WordPress site as our public face, so it was just a matter of adding the new features and functions to our existing site.

The Tech Stack that Saved the Day

Feel free to skip this section if you don’t love WordPress plugins as much as I do. But if you’re curious about the tech stack I used, dive in!

• Beaver Builder theme with Themer Add-on and Page Builder Plugin – for flexibility in terms of page layouts and customization
• Gravity Forms plugin with MailChimp, PayPal Standard and User Registration Add-ons – for membership registrations, event registrations, and mailing list subscriptions
• Gravity View plugin – to display member directory and profiles to the public and RFPs to members
• Advanced Access Manager plugin – to restrict access to certain pages to members only
• Mailchimp – for email marketing and communication

I used the free versions of Advanced Access Manager and Mailchimp, and was able to use the remaining tools at no additional cost since I owned unlimited licenses. It would definitely be more costly for someone who doesn’t already have access to these tools.

Benefits of the New System

Other than saving hundreds of dollars, life is now easier for me and my members, in a number of ways:

Centralized Information

Having one website instead of two just makes sense! Easier for everyone to understand, and less work for me to manage. And because I’m working exclusively in the WordPress site, I’m more on top of things that need to be updated or improved than when my time was divided.

Better Branding and SEO

Since the events are now housed on the main website, we no longer have to use ugly links like https://ghva.wildapricot.org/event-3364546 to promote them.

Not only are the event pages more appealing visually and the links less confusing, they work better when sharing on social media sites as well, because it’s WordPress!

Easier to Register for Events

On the Wild Apricot system, you have to go through several screens to register for an event. As a result, people often thought they’d signed up when they hadn’t actually got to the final confirmation screen, so our expected headcount wasn’t always accurate.

On Wild Apricot, event registrations are tied to the contact records. That’s a great feature because you can easily see how many events someone has attended or how long it’s been since they came out.

However, many people use multiple email addresses, and if they happened to register for an event using a different one (which happened more often than you might think), it would create a new record. Maybe not a big deal in the big scheme of things, but when your account is limited to a certain number of contacts, you want to make sure this doesn’t bump you up to a more expensive plan. And if the person in question was a member, it meant that their participation wouldn’t be accurately reflected in their member profile. As a result, I’d have to check periodically and merge records where needed. Now it’s not an issue.

Simpler Membership Management Process

Membership management is where Wild Apricot excels. It sends out automatic renewal notices and reminders, and changes a member’s status to Lapsed if they don’t renew by their expiry date.

We had occasional hiccups when a member chose to pay by e-transfer or cheque because I’d have to manually mark them as paid and renewed (two separate steps in two different screens).

I certainly didn’t want to be issuing manual invoices to members every year. Instead I set up the membership fee as a yearly subscription through PayPal, a feature that’s only available in Wild Apricot if you pay an additional fee.

Streamlined Communications

Instead of an automated series of emails every month, subscribers now receive one message listing upcoming events, which takes minimal time to put together. And Mailchimp’s tagging feature allows me to send targeted emails to members, lapsed members, or non-members when appropriate.

Instead of a Discussion Forum on the website, which really wasn’t used very often, online conversations now take place in the more active Facebook group.

Simplifying Even Further

Since the pandemic, the GHVA Group has evolved from in-person discussions on specific topics to a less structured online format. That means I no longer have to create detailed event listings, so it takes even less time to keep the site up-to-date.

Unfortunately, the Advanced Access Manager plugin I originally used to restrict access to certain pages to members behaved somewhat erratically, meaning frequent troubleshooting. Since the new event format eliminated the need to post meeting notes, this feature was scrapped altogether, and existing member content moved to a private WordPress.com site.

When the terms of my Gravity View license changed, I would have had to start paying to keep using it on this site. In its place, I set up the Business Directory Plugin in a way that allows members to create and manage their own profiles.

Do you run a small association?

Managing a small association doesn’t have to mean big tech headaches. With a little creativity and the right tools, you can build something that works for you, not the other way around.

Please leave a comment if you’ve got questions or a great system for your own group.

Photo by SolidPhotos / Depositphotos