Tips and Tricks

Allow users to choose membership products at registration

Chad Butler · Sep 20, 2018 ·

NOTE: This post is a tutorial for a process that is no longer necessary since the inclusion of the “membership” field type in WP-Members 3.2.6. If you’re using a recent version of WP-Members, then you already have a simple way of adding a membership selection to the WP-Members registration form by creating a custom field and selecting “membership” as the field type.

This process is for people who need to assign a membership when the user registers through the WP-Members registration form. Since this is applied at registration, it is not recommended for users who are selling memberships, unless you are using moderated registration to approve the registration. Similarly, this is not recommended for installs integrating the selling of memberships through WooCommerce.

This is a working example of using WP-Members Membership Products. In this tutorial, we’ll add a custom field to display a multiple checkbox group in the registration form with a checkbox for each membership product. The user can select one or several at registration.

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Send new user activation link with manual admin approval

Chad Butler · Mar 19, 2018 ·

This post describes a very similar process to what is described in the tutorial titled “Send new user an activation link in the new registration email.” The twist on this version is that this will send the user an email requesting that they confirm their email address, then it will send the admin a notification to manually activate that user.

The original version in the other tutorial was intended for use where users just need to confirm their email address. This version is for confirming their email address and then approving the account. Continue Reading →

Handling form layout when using a builder plugin

Chad Butler · Jan 31, 2018 ·

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Builder plugins (and themes that use them) such as SiteOrigin, Elegant Builder, Divi, and others, have become more popular.

Without beating a topic that has already been beat to death in the WordPress developer community, let me just say that my position on it is conflicted.

First, I generally agree with the assessment provided by Pippin Williamson:

Builders provide a poor user experience and cause significant compatibility problems for other plugins.

The other big issue is that their use violates a primary reason for using a CMS in the first place – separating content from design. Using a builder embeds design elements into the content which is a major design flaw from a CMS site management perspective.

On the other hand, I also agree with Chris Lema – builders exist because there is a market demand for them:

Why do people want WordPress Page Builders?
Simple. They offer customers a solution for personalization that mass-produced themes can’t offer, while at a lower price than working with a professional web developer and web designer.

A bigger problem than simple compatibility however, is that there is simply no industry standardization. In the WP development community, most successful plugin developers work with WP’s core standards. That makes it easier for everyone because if something isn’t initially compatible, a couple of adjustments with filter/action hooks and you’re dovetailing seamlessly.

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Restrict Registration to MailChimp List Subscribers

Chad Butler · Jan 17, 2018 ·

Generally, the WP-Members MailChimp extension is used to subscribe users to your list when they register. But using the extension’s API, it can also be used to restrict site registration to users who are subscribed an existing MailChimp list.

This process requires the WP-Members MailChimp Integration extension.

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Adding MailChimp Interest Groups

Chad Butler · Oct 24, 2017 ·

The MailChimp extension will be adding support for Interests (also known as Interest Groups) in a future version. Until that is added, there is a way you can utilize Interests now with a little bit of custom code added to your theme’s functions.php file. Continue Reading →