Firstly, it is important to note that a Customer and a Member are not always one in the same. A customer can exist without a membership if you sell products or services that do not grant access to a ‘Membership Type’. So when we are loading in ‘Members’, what we are doing is adding Customers and assigning them a ‘Membership Type’ in one of the methods below.
Method 1 – Checking In
The most common way is booking people in through the Checking In system, which is on your Management Dashboard.
When you operate an In-Person class, you would book in your customers through here. This is a type of Point of Sale, or you may know it as a Till or Register that allows you to record a sale as someone walks in through the door and pays in cash or card for your services/class/club, etc..
Note: A card system is not linked to this, but you can record the transaction as ‘Card’ transaction and you would present your existing virtual payment method, e.g. SumUp or Square.
As new customers join your class, you enter their name and address details and it creates them a new customer user account.
When the customer buys a product that has a ‘Membership Type’ associated with it, the sale activates that membership for the duration of the ‘Membership Type’. More about this later.
For example: Joanna is running a Yoga class week on week and she offers her class members access to various audios and meditations through her ‘Members Area’ if they attend one of her classes. So she has a product set up called ‘Standard Weekly Fee’. This product has a 7 day Membership Type set up that gives her customer 7 days access to the Members Area.
Joanna’s customer is now a ‘Member’ and details of this will be stored in the ‘Back Office’.
You’ll learn more about how to check someone in, in the next course.
Method 2 – Online Orders
When you are providing a product or service through your online portal, which can be booked online and paid for by a credit/debit card on your system, the customer will add their own details, such as their name, address, telephone number and email account. Once they make a payment for your product or service, this creates that customer a user account.
A Membership Type can be added to any online products/services, in the same way that In-Person products. So as the customer buys a product/service with a Membership Type attached, the customer is granted Membership access to the ‘Members Area’.
Once a product with a ‘Membership Type’ has been purchased, that customer is now a ‘Member’.
Method 3 – Add Manually
Adding a customer manually is by far the most labour intensive. This requires adding a new User as a ‘Customer’ and adding them to a ‘Membership Type’.
TIP: When you have existing customer base and are transitioning them over to use this system, the quickest and easiest way is to have your customers do the work for you. Firstly, you’ll get the most up to date information from your customer, and secondly, you’ll save yourself a heap of time!
Offer them a free product, for example an eBook. The Customer will input their details through Method 2 to obtain their freebie and in the process they create themselves a new customer account. If you wanted to be generous, you could even offer them the first week/month of membership for free. This would entice back some of those that might not have been in a while. It will also send them all an automatic email reminder that their membership is ending a few days before it expires.
This allows you to re-engage with lost members, give existing customers a taster of your new Members Area and ultimately improve your retention.
