A somewhat different use for eMember – newbie question…

[pauley13]

Hi,

I’ve sent you an email with this question as well, but I only just discovered this forum, so maybe you’ll prefer to answer in here for all to see I’ll also rephrase the question to make it totally clear.

1) I’m planning to launch a WSO, i.e. an EXTERNAL page. I’ll probably have more than one such page in other areas of the web.

2) I’m selling a product which is not just a download but also access to my site created to support the product. The site has loads of pages and posts, etc.

3) ORIGINALLY, I imagined that I would simply set up a PayPal button on the WSO page, then from PayPal I would send people to a Thank-You page where they would register with my aWeber, and from there I would send them an email with membership site access. But in that scenario I would still have a problem with not just registering them with aWeber but also with my membership site. So – I bought eMember!

4) Now I see that your philosophy seems to be a bit different (I can adapt, if need be, but first I need to find out if I can do this “my way”). Here you want me to create a free membership area, then get people to opt in, and then get to paid membership area, etc.

5) So how would I go about setting this up? Apart from copying your recommended setup (which would force me to reorganize the whole site, etc – which I CAN do if I must, lol), is there a simple way for me to do this?

6) Currently, I have locked down the site and when people get to the URL they see the “login or join” screen. I guess I could now modify the “join” screen to become a “register” screen, but then how would I be able to verify that the payment has indeed been made? After all the person can just enter the login URL and could register himself without paying.

Is there a way to do this?

If not – then my question gets more complicated, possibly, LOL.

My site membership site – with (currently) 100% premium content – has some 20 pages (menus, submenus) and lots of posts. If I add a “register” section to this, I don’t want it to show once you’re logged in. But when you’re not logged in, you’ll see all these menus and options none of which will let you in until you register/pay.

So, I guess I managed to get myself slightly confused, hehe.

Can you help?

Thanks!

paul

[Peter]

Hi paul,

You say that WSO is an external page but what is it exactly?

Before I go on I want to suggest that you should look at the eMember documentation and videos to get a general idea of the capabilities of eMember and membership setup and workflow:

Documentation

Some answers to your questions inline:

3) ORIGINALLY, I imagined that I would simply set up a PayPal button on the WSO page, then from PayPal I would send people to a Thank-You page where they would register with my aWeber, and from there I would send them an email with membership site access. But in that scenario I would still have a problem with not just registering them with aWeber but also with my membership site.

You can send people from the “external” WSO page to your WordPress landing page which will have a membership registration payment button. (setting up a paypal button with eMember is explained here: http://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/wordpress-membership/how-to-use-a-simple-paypal-payment-button-to-accept-membership-payment-146)

Alternatively you can integrate eStore with eMember and use a “Buy Now” button to send your clients to PayPal too. (see http://tipsandtricks-hq.com/wordpress-membership/?p=60)

4) Now I see that your philosophy seems to be a bit different (I can adapt, if need be, but first I need to find out if I can do this “my way”). Here you want me to create a free membership area, then get people to opt in, and then get to paid membership area, etc.

No you do not have to create a “FREE” membership if you don’t want to. You can have a paid-only membership for your site using the techniques mentioned in the above answer.

5) So how would I go about setting this up? Apart from copying your recommended setup (which would force me to reorganize the whole site, etc – which I CAN do if I must, lol), is there a simple way for me to do this?

This is not a question which can be answered in a few lines. Depends how you want your purchase flow to work but as mentioned previously you should start by looking at the documentation to familiarise yourself with eMember.

6) Currently, I have locked down the site and when people get to the URL they see the “login or join” screen. I guess I could now modify the “join” screen to become a “register” screen, but then how would I be able to verify that the payment has indeed been made? After all the person can just enter the login URL and could register himself without paying.

Is there a way to do this?

In terms of membership registration you can configure eMember so that people have to pay in order to register and gain access to their content. see my answers in 3) above.

The eMember plugin allows you to quite easily protect your content in various ways which can restrict what people see depending on their membership level. Once again the plugin is very flexible in how you can do this and you would really need to watch some of the videos and read the documentation to get a general idea of what’s possible.

[pauley13]

Hi Peter,

Thanks a bunch for your answer!

I have gone through much of your documentation and vids and will go through the links you’ve mentioned above later today. I guess I must have gotten myself pretty totally confused. I’m good at that lol.

The WSO page is not yet launched, of course, but it is premade just waiting to be posted once I figure this out. I will study the above and will let you know if I hit a brick wall somewhere.

And just for the record – your plugin is AMAZING! I just love it, so I will get it to work with my stuff if not one way then another!!

Thanks, best paul

[pauley13]

Oh and just to clarify, when I said “external” page – I simply meant that it is not part of my WordPress setup, and as in case of the WSO, it’s even hosted somewhere else. The problem with that, as I see it, is to use the PayPal code generated with eMemmber… I’m imagining. Will go through all these links and see if I can make sense of it.

p

[pauley13]

Hi again, Peter,

I have now followed the instructions step-by-step:

1. page containing membership content (that’s my membership`site http://seolater.net/members/)

2. purchase page (where they buy from – store) (http://seolater.net/xwso102.html – something like this will later be placed on WarriorForum – the PayPal button is at the very end of the page here)

3. thank you page (seen after buying) (http://seolater.net/members/thank-you/)

4. login page (http://seolater.net/members/login/)

5. membership level (2)

6. paypal buy button, including after buying: thank-you page (w. correct permalink) – done

7. Pasted paypal button code into “store” page – done

I then paid $0,01 from another PayPal account. Got the PayPal receipt – but NOT the registration confirmation email (I checked the settings etc – LOOKS ok…).

Any ideas?

thanks ever so much for your help!!!

paul

[pauley13]

hmmm…. maybe paypal is sending the buyer to the thank-you page but it doesn’t work because I did the lockdown thing…?

Any input would be helpful. Have gone through most of your videos now and I can’t see anything addressing this potential problem.

thanks p

[Peter]

Hi Paul,

Looks like your sales page is a static html page (not part of WordPress) – is that right?

Be aware that you won’t be able to use shortcodes and buttons which are directly attributable to eMember functionality on external or static html pages.

You will need to create your sales page with the paypal button within WordPress because any WordPress plugin will only work within the confines of your WP installation.

[pauley13]

I see – that’s what I thought.

Well, I’ll just have to work it out with this in mind then.

Thanks for your help!

paul

[pauley13]

OK! I think I’m getting it to work

But I do have one more question, if I may:

After I’ve blocked all the pages I wanted blocked as well as POSTS – I get two different things:

1. When I click on a forbidden page (as an unregistered user), I get to see “Please Login to view this Content (Not a member? Join Today)

2. But when I click on a forbidden POST – I only see “Content is restricted”

Is it possible for that message to be the same as in case of blocked pages?

cheers p

[pauley13]

hmmm…. you’re gonna hate me, LOL

Another problem

1. I restricted ALL content in “Manage Access Levels”

2. Then I enabled a couple of pages for the FREE user

3. And then I enabled ALL pages/posts, etc for the PREMIUM user

Works fine for the free user. Only the pages I wanted are shown.

But then i logged in as a premium user… and it’s more or less the same!

What could I be doing wrong?

cx p

[Kirk]

Hi Pauley13,

Something to consider since your requirements and workflows are probably stretching the limits of this free support forum.

I provide a service where I completely configure and setup eMember and any of the other Tips and Tricks plugins. It might save you a lot of time so you can get on with working on your business. If you are interested, have a look at my website and contact me there:

http://wpfullservice.com/custom-work/

Thanks,

Kirk.

[Peter]

Hi Paul,

See my answers and questions inline:

====

When I click on a forbidden page (as an unregistered user), I get to see “Please Login to view this Content (Not a member? Join Today)

But when I click on a forbidden POST – I only see “Content is restricted”

Is it possible for that message to be the same as in case of blocked pages?

====

Seems like you are protecting the post using a shortcode but you’re protecting the page using the “eMember Protection Options” flags in the page editor of wordpress.

Is that right?

I suspect this is why you are seeing the different messages.

If you’re using the shortcode you can suppress the restricted message such as “This content is for members only” by specifying in the shortcode as follows:

[emember_protected do_not_show_restricted_msg=1]

your protected content goes here

[/emember_protected]

[pauley13]

Hi Peter, Kirk,

Thanks for your replies and forgive me for abusing your patience here.

Kirk’s suggestion sounds great – just that I’m almost-almost there…! But I’ll defo keep it in mind. Teething problems.

Anyway, I’ll figure it out and if not, thanks, Kirk, for the service page – I may contact you through there.

Just a possible idea for you guys: a help video showing people how to set up a site with no free content – or free content located outside of the wordpress installation.

Anyway – once again HUGE thanks for all your help and a truly spectacular program!

best,

paul

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