The core purpose of a membership site is to control and monetize access to your content or services.
Luckily, WordPress offers a wide array of plugins to help you create a robust membership site.
To launch a WordPress membership site, you’ll need several key plugins to manage memberships, control content access, and handle other essential aspects like payments and community interaction.
In this blog post, we’ll delve into the essential plugins you need to create and manage a successful membership site on WordPress.
Essential plugins to create and manage a WordPress membership site
There are 2 core features that you must have in order to make money with a membership site:
- Pay to unlock content.
- Different member levels or tiered access (basic/premium, bronze/gold etc.).
Membership sites thrive on the power of gated content. This means providing exclusive content made just for paying members. It’s a strong way for businesses to, increase their regular income and build stronger ties with their audience.
Every good membership site needs a few key features to succeed:
- Payment handling: This is how the site collects membership fees. It needs to be easy to use and understand and should work with any currency.
- Member levels: Sites should be able to offer different membership levels. Each level can have access to different content, which lets the site charge different amounts.
- Content control: The site needs to control who can see what content. Different members see different content based on their membership level.
- Member management: This feature helps the site keep track of its members. It should be easy to use and show important information about each member.
- User experience: The site should be easy for members to use. This includes signing up, logging in, and finding content.
📖 You might also like to read: Trending Models for Membership websites.
1. Membership Plugin
The core of your membership site is the membership plugin itself. These are essential for controlling access to your site’s content based on membership levels.
There are several excellent options available, each with its unique features and pricing structures.
Plugins like WP Full Members, Restrict Content Pro, MemberPress, and Paid Memberships Pro, etc. will allow you to create and manage different membership levels, restrict content based on membership level, and manage member accounts.
2. Payment Gateway Plugin
Monetizing your membership site is impossible without a reliable payment gateway.
Membership sites rely on recurring payments.
With a plugin that integrates Stripe with WordPress, you can easily embed checkout forms to collect recurring membership/subscription fees. It also makes the entire billing process easier to manage for everyone, and more accurate — probably more so than if you were to build your own from scratch manually.
Often, membership plugins will have built-in integrations with payment gateways like Stripe, PayPal, or WooCommerce. If not, most membership plugins like WP Full Members integrate with popular payment gateways like Stripe or PayPal.
Ensure that your chosen membership plugin supports your preferred payment gateway to accept payments easily.
3. Content Restriction Plugin
You may need content restriction plugin if a paywall feature is not built into the membership plugin you are using.
A paywall feature is installed on publishers’ websites to monetize gated content, such as via subscriptions or memberships.
MemberPress, WP Full Members, and Restrict Content Pro are examples of comprehensive membership plugins that include the content restriction functionality.
While many membership plugins include content restriction features (i.e., WP Full Members), you can also enhance this functionality with dedicated content restriction plugins like WP-Members or Paid Memberships Pro.
These plugins allow you to lock specific posts, pages, or custom content types behind membership tiers.
📖 You might also like to read: Password or Membership Plugin
4. Learning Management System (LMS) Plugin
If your membership site offers online courses or educational content, consider integrating an LMS plugin.
An LMS (Learning Management System) plugin is a software extension that adds e-learning functionality to a website, enabling users to create, manage, and sell online courses. It typically includes features like course creation, quizzes, student enrollment, progress tracking, and certification.
LMS plugins like LearnDash, LifterLMS, and Tutor LMS will help you create courses, track student progress, and offer quizzes and certificates to members.
“Nice-to-have” plugins for a WordPress membership site
Once you have the basic setup to gatekeep exclusive, paid-only content, you may start thinking about expanding the site’s features to:
- Engage / create community amongst members.
- Communicate with active (also inactive) members.
- Increase visibility (via SEO) to bring more visitors.
5. Email Marketing Automation Plugins
For renewal reminders, win-back campaigns, life-cycle email marketing and so on, you’ll need to have an email marketing management system.
You can install an email marketing automation plugin like Mailchimp for WordPress, ActiveCampaign, HubSpot, Kit (formerly ConvertKit), or FluentCRM.
Other than that:
- WooCommerce has an addon to integrate Mailchimp with WooCommerce.
- WP Full Pay also has the option to enable Mailchimp integration: as people sign up, downgrade, or make changes to their subscription packages, the audience list in Mailchimp is automatically updated.
- MemberPress offers various integrations across its different license tiers.
These email marketing plugins will help you send targeted emails, drip campaigns, and announcements to your subscribers. Some membership plugins even have built-in email marketing features like WP Full Members.
6. Community and Forum Plugins
Building a sense of community among your members can enhance the value of your membership site.
Plugins like bbPress (for forums), BuddyPress (for social networking), or BuddyBoss (social and forums) can help you create discussion forums or social communities within your WordPress site.
7. Analytics and Reporting Plugins
To track the performance of your membership site and understand member behavior, consider using analytics plugins like Google Analytics for WordPress by MonsterInsights.
Membership plugins often have basic reporting features, but integrating Google Analytics can provide more in-depth insights.
8. Security Plugins
As your member base grows, you should protect your membership site from unauthorized access and vulnerabilities. Install a robust security plugin like Wordfence, Solid Security (formerly iThemes Security) or Sucuri to safeguard your site against malware, brute force attacks, and other vulnerabilities.
9. SEO Plugin
If you are a content-heavy website like a blog or you plan on creating evergreen content to drive organic traffic, it’ll be worth it to install SEO plugins too. Some of the popular ones are:
This plugins will help you optimize your WordPress site for search engines to attract more members.
📖 You might also like to read: SEO tips for WordPress
10. Backup Plugin
You should also regularly backup your website data to prevent data loss.
Backup plugins safeguard your valuable data against potential losses. In simple terms, these plugins copy of your site’s data, including member info and content. If something goes wrong, like a crash or hack, you can quickly restore your site to a previous, problem-free version.
Examples: UpdraftPlus
Final tip
When selecting plugins, ensure they are compatible with one another and your theme. Install plugins that are regularly updated, well-supported, and have solid reviews from users.
Many all-in-one membership plugins bundle multiple features (payments, content dripping, etc.), so assess whether a single plugin can meet multiple needs to minimize potential conflicts and simplify management.