Wordpress membership and forum combo?

28 replies
Hi,

As usual with wordpress, there's way more than one way to do things. There are tons of free and paid membership and forum plugins.

I was wondering if anybody has any recommendation of plugins that would make a good membership site that can have the usual content behind it as well as an integrated user forum. The option to charge by paypal would be desirable.

Like anybody, I'm hoping for free, but paid would be fine if it's way better.

Thanks for your help,
Scott
#combo #forum #membership #wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author BeechHill
    The two popular forums for WordPress are bbPress and Simpleress. There was also Mingle Forums although the author has stopped support on the last version for a complete overhaul. It should still work just fine though. Any of these will integrate with WordPress and just about any membership site. Most membership plugins have PayPal as a standard payment processor built in and they will protect your forum as a paid members for use only area. Just check to make sure that the membership software shares user authentication.

    There are also WordPress bridge plugins for forums like MyBB and phpBB. If you have membership software that also covers folders outside of WordPress then these should be protected too.
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    • Profile picture of the author Scott Lyons
      Originally Posted by BeechHill View Post

      The two popular forums for WordPress are bbPress and Simpleress. There was also Mingle Forums although the author has stopped support on the last version for a complete overhaul. It should still work just fine though. Any of these will integrate with WordPress and just about any membership site. Most membership plugins have PayPal as a standard payment processor built in and they will protect your forum as a paid members for use only area. Just check to make sure that the membership software shares user authentication.

      There are also WordPress bridge plugins for forums like MyBB and phpBB. If you have membership software that also covers folders outside of WordPress then these should be protected too.
      Great! Thanks Gary.

      Now any recommendations on a good membership plugin?

      Thanks for your help!
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      • Profile picture of the author BeechHill
        Originally Posted by Scott Lyons View Post

        Great! Thanks Gary.

        Now any recommendations on a good membership plugin?

        Thanks for your help!
        IMO, the best free plugin is S2member. As for what I'm using right now, it's Andrew Hunter's MemberSonic. No problem in integrating a forum with either of these.

        You will get a never ending opinion here from others as there must be at least a a good dozen leading alternatives for WordPress.
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  • Profile picture of the author mstrmindmktg
    For a membership site plugin, I recommend WishList. It has a lot of functionality for any type of site you want to do. WishList also has plugins that are subplugins, if you will, for WishList that enhance it even further. Has great shopping integration and works well with SimplePress.

    You can buy one license or a multi-site license. If you only do the one, you can at least move it to another site if you decide to change. Hope this helps.
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    • Profile picture of the author Scott Lyons
      Thanks a bunch! The s2Member looks like it's not actually free unless I messed something.

      This is a great start, but any other recommendations are welcome!
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      • Profile picture of the author BeechHill
        Originally Posted by Scott Lyons View Post

        Thanks a bunch! The s2Member looks like it's not actually free unless I messed something.

        This is a great start, but any other recommendations are welcome!
        Here's the link for the s2member plugin from the WordPress repository... S2member All the docs are at their website, previous link. There is a paid version upgrade, which adds a little more flexibility, but the free version is enough for most people.
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  • Profile picture of the author WillR
    For a more advanced solution I would recommend:

    Digital Access Pass

    Integrated with...

    V Bulletin
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  • Profile picture of the author alksense
    I use Wishlist Member and Simpleress together and it works great

    Wishlist is $97 for single site license and Simpleress is free.

    I accept payment via Clickbank but Wishlist also integrates with PayPal as well as a host of other payment processors.
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  • Profile picture of the author smartprofitmoney
    Hello, Yes s2member is great, you can see mine in my WSO just click on demo, Check my signature

    Thanks Rob.
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  • Profile picture of the author alksense
    Also, I don't know if you're looking for a theme for your new membership site but I use OptimizePress and I am very happy with the members area page templates.
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    • Profile picture of the author PeterKnight
      I would go with bbPress nowadays for the forum. It gets a lot of love.

      For a membership plugin it depends on how much customization you need. If it's just the standard features Wishlist is great, although I don't like the fact they encrypt their code and I think they should just go with a GPL license. If you want to custom features that aren't supported out of the box it's a real pain.

      S2Member is another alternative but be prepared to do a lot of research, I find it takes a lot of time to get it configured. On the plus side you'll be able to find plenty of developers who can work with the plugin.

      Chris Lema posted a decision chart for WordPress membership plugins that may be helpful to you.
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      • Profile picture of the author Scott Lyons
        Great help guys! Any and all other opinions welcome!
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        • Profile picture of the author Scott Lyons
          Another question...

          S2 looks pretty comprehensive for free. There's a lot of great stuff out there, but wasn't sure I need to install/learn all that if what I need is simple enough.

          To start with, all we want to do is have people who are logged in be able to see additional elements that can't be seen otherwise. For example, an art show web site that has all the pieces listed like one or two per page or post, and the price of each piece is in the post, but it is not visible unless you log in.

          Do the solutions you guys mentioned do something like this, or is there a simpler way?

          Thanks,
          Scott
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  • Profile picture of the author roblawrence
    I actually uncovered 11 fully integrated forum solutions for wordpress while researching the topic for my site:

    There is also amember which is a paid membership plugin (not wordpress based but has a plugin) and can integrate with any standalone forum solution out there, including vbulletin, xenforo, etc.

    If you are using Wishlist, S2member, or pretty much any other native wordpress membership plugin, you need to go with a wordpress-based forum solution. Otherwise you'll have to pay someone to build a bridge, maintain it, etc. and things break.

    If you want something simple and decent, I would vote for Simple Press as it's fully integrated and works well and is supported. Or use Vanilla Forums with the wordpress bridge (they built). Don't try to cobble one yourself or get a developer to make one. It's a nightmare to avoid.

    BBpress is OK but not feature-rich enough. I've been using Simple-Press and it's worked well. There are some styling issues that could be improved but that's cosmetics and the functionality underneath it works perfectly and it has a familiar look for most users. BBpress is too bland and is a bit of a learning curve for new people.

    There are also hosted forum solutions you can consider which will embed on your site and take on the wordpress design. This is good if your site is mostly a blog and you don't want to deal with user registrations, etc. and keep things separate.

    So, yes. Certainly a lot to consider! Hope this helps.
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  • Profile picture of the author RockNRolla
    While I've not experimented with any membership plugins, I do currently have BB press installed on my new blog. I have used the theme my login plugin alongside it and it works very well.
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  • Profile picture of the author roblawrence
    I'm keeping an eye on BBPress. Yeah it's a bit bland and generic looking but I'm hoping that the wordpress community steps up and adds some more plugins for it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Tim_Carter
    S2member has built in integration with BBpress. I highly recommend s2member. I use it for all of my memberships. Free and works flawlessly with Paypal.
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    • Profile picture of the author Scott Lyons
      Originally Posted by Tim_Carter View Post

      S2member has built in integration with BBpress. I highly recommend s2member. I use it for all of my memberships. Free and works flawlessly with Paypal.
      Tim,
      Does it do what I was asking above, like showing the prices to one level and not a lower level?

      Also, do you have a site I can see, that is unless you need to keep the niche etc. to yourself. If so, I totally understand.

      Thanks,
      Scott
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  • Profile picture of the author vtotheyouknow
    Hey Scott,

    I've set up Simpleress + DAP for a client.

    As far as I can tell has one stand-out benefit:

    1. Whenever somebody becomes a customer via DAP, DAP can sync their user role to Wordpress so they automatically become forum members as well. No need for a customer to register again just to access the members forum.

    However, although Simpleress is ostensibly free, if you want any support or any of the plugins (read: functionality), you must shell out teh moolah. Kind of like S2Member. It's free(ish), until you need something done that ...isn't free(ish).

    So for membership script, if you're not totally bootstrapping, I'd go with Will's suggestion of DAP over S2 and over Wishlist as well. From a sheer functionality and support standpoint, it outclasses both.

    My preferred forum is myBB, which is completely free and open source. It's a really beautiful, functional forum. Example:

    Roosh V Forum

    It's quite customizable though so it's not quite a plug and play solution like Simpleress. But then again I don't know what you're going for...

    Good luck!
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    • Profile picture of the author Scott Lyons
      Originally Posted by vtotheyouknow View Post


      It's quite customizable though so it's not quite a plug and play solution like Simpleress. But then again I don't know what you're going for...

      Good luck!
      Great info! At the moment, the only thing we need is to be able to hide the prices on the art pieces from anybody who is not logged in. Just thought there might be an easier way than installing a whole membership system. Thanks!
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  • Profile picture of the author roblawrence
    Simple Press will work with any Wordpress based membership site. You can use wordpress membership plugin with it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Rob Maggs
    Hey Scott, I have a membership site and an active skype group, I asked my members if they'd like a forum and they said, "Hell yeah!" so I bought Vbulletin with all the bells and whistles for about $500 and guess what...?

    Nobody used it lol...my guys preferred skype chat
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