Membership: User Guide

1. About This Tool

The Membership app is the sixth app in the Build Your Club Governance suite. It is built for small membership organizations: booster clubs, friends-of groups, community associations, alumni circles, and any nonprofit where people join, pay annual dues, and (with care) renew year after year.

Three working tabs hold your data:

• Member Roster: every member, with contact details, level, join and renewal dates, and an automatically derived lifecycle status.
• Levels & Dues: your membership tiers (Individual, Family, Student, Life, and so on), each with annual dues and benefits. The app computes member counts and expected dues per level for you.
• Renewals: who is due in the next 45 days, who is overdue, one-click "Mark renewed," your payment link, bulk reminder sending, and a monthly dues digest.

The AI Automations page turns that data into the documents a membership chair actually writes: welcomes, receipts, renewal reminders, win-back letters, event invitations, a directory, health and pricing analyses, and the annual report for the board.

Everything you enter is stored locally in your browser (localStorage), so the app works instantly and your roster stays on your machine. AI drafting and email sending go through the Build Your Club automations service when you are signed in.

2. Getting Started

1. Sign in. Visit the member portal at app.buildyourclub.com and sign in with Google. Signing in unlocks AI drafting, email sending, and the dues digest; the roster, levels, and renewals tabs work without it.
2. Name your organization on the Dashboard. It appears on every letter and report.
3. Set up your levels under Levels & Dues. The "Use typical levels" button gives you Individual, Family, Student, and Life as a starting point; adjust the amounts to yours.
4. Add your members on the Member Roster. Name and level are the essentials; join and renewal dates power the automatic status.
5. Paste your payment link under Renewals, so reminders can tell people exactly how to pay.

That is the whole setup. From then on, the Dashboard funnel and the Renewals lists update themselves every time you open the app.

Everything you type is saved automatically in your browser; a small ✓ Saved pill flashes in the bottom-right corner whenever the app records a change.

3. The Member Lifecycle Model

The app uses the platform's published member lifecycle: prospective → new → active → renewing → lapsed, with life members standing outside the cycle. You never set a member's status by hand. The app derives it from three facts you record: the join date, the renewal date, and the life-member checkbox.

The derivation rules, exactly as the app applies them

Because the status is computed, it is always current: a member quietly slides from active to renewing to lapsed as the calendar moves, and slides back to active the moment you click "Mark renewed."

4. The Dashboard

The Dashboard is your at-a-glance health check:

• Organization name: set once; used on every generated document.
• Stat tiles: total members, how many are due or overdue, dues expected this year (levels × paying members, computed by the app), and how much you have marked paid this year.
• Lifecycle funnel: a bar per status, counted live from your roster.
• Payment-link callout: a nudge until you set your link, confirmation once you have.
• Quick links to every tab, plus a pointer to the member-lifecycle scenario in the Scenario Library.

"Dues expected this year" counts members whose status is new, active, renewing, or lapsed (lapsed members still represent recoverable dues). Life members and prospects are excluded. "Marked paid" totals the level dues of members whose recorded paid date falls in the current calendar year; clicking "Mark renewed" on the Renewals tab records that date for you.

5. Member Roster

The roster is the single source of truth. For each member you record:

• Name, email, phone
• Level, chosen from your Levels & Dues list, which also sets their dues amount
• Join date (leave blank for a prospect)
• Renewal date (when the current membership runs out)
• Life member checkbox
• Notes: how they joined, volunteer roles, household members covered, anything worth remembering

Email history

Every email the app sends about a member is logged on that member's roster record: Send now emails, Send later scheduled sends (with the delivery date), and each Bulk Renewal Reminder — including failed bulk sends, which appear with a red failed badge so you can chase them. A small ✉ count chip next to the member's name (and the ✉ button in their row) opens the history: date, subject, and a badge for the type and the automation that produced it. The history lives in the member's record in your browser's saved data, so it persists with the roster.

Filtering and exporting

Filter chips above the table show the count per status and narrow the list with one click. The Export CSV button downloads the whole roster, including the derived status, paid dates, and notes, as a spreadsheet-ready file built entirely in your browser; nothing is uploaded anywhere.

6. Levels & Dues

Levels are your membership products: a name, an annual dues amount, and a one-line description of the benefits. Typical small-organization sets look like Individual ($35), Family ($60), Student ($15), and Life ($0 annual, honored separately).

Two columns in the table are computed by the app and cannot be edited:

• Members: how many roster members carry this level.
• Expected dues / yr: the level's dues times its paying members (statuses new, active, renewing, lapsed). A total row sums every level.

These numbers feed the Dashboard tiles and every automation that talks about money. The AI never calculates them; it only writes around figures the app has already computed.

7. Renewals & Your Payment Link

The payment-link model, honestly explained

Build Your Club never touches your money. There is no platform wallet, no processing fee, no middleman account. Instead, you paste your organization's own payment link: a PayPal pay link, a Stripe payment link, or your donation page. The app includes that link in every renewal reminder, members pay you directly through your own account, and when the money arrives you click Mark renewed here to keep the records straight.

Mark renewed does two things: advances the member's renewal date by exactly one year, and records today as their paid date (which feeds the "marked paid this year" tile on the Dashboard).

The two lists

• Due in the next 45 days: members whose renewal date is approaching. Remind them now, gently.
• Overdue: renewal date passed. Up to 60 days overdue they still count as renewing (most are just late); past 60 days they show as lapsed on the roster and become win-back candidates.

Bulk renewal reminders Autopilot Max

The bulk sender emails a personalized reminder to every due or overdue member with an email address, up to 25 per batch. Each email carries the member's name, level, dues amount, renewal date, your payment link, and an optional personal note. Before anything is sent, the app shows you the exact recipient list and asks you to confirm; afterwards it shows a sent/failed report you can export for your files. This automation uses a fixed, tested template rather than AI, because real emails to real members should never improvise.

The monthly dues digest Autopilot Max

A monthly nudge to your sign-in email when it's time to run renewals: pick a day of the month, click Save digest, and the platform emails you on that day each month so the Renewals tab actually gets opened. Remove it any time with one click.

Sending email: now or later

Every document the automations draft opens in an editor whose Email panel can deliver it two ways. Send now sends immediately. Send later reveals a date picker (today onward, up to a year out): pick the delivery date, click Schedule, and the platform sends the email for you on that day, around 9-10am Eastern. Scheduled emails appear in a compact Scheduled emails card on the Dashboard, listing each pending recipient, subject, and date, with a ✕ button to cancel any of them before they go out. Scheduling requires being signed in. Either way, the result is unmissable: a large centered confirmation overlay appears — green check for a successful send or schedule, red for a failure with the reason — and fades after a couple of seconds (or click to dismiss).

✨ AI Automations Beta

Twelve automations, grouped by the plan tier they will belong to after beta (everything is free for everyone during beta). Each card harvests what it needs from your roster and levels, shows you a "Pulled from your records" banner so you can see exactly what it found, sends code-computed numbers to the AI, and opens the draft in an editor with Copy, Text, Print, Word, and Email export. For the member-targeted automations (welcome, receipt, renewal, win-back, life member), the Email panel's "To" field comes prefilled with the chosen member's address; you can still edit it before sending.

• Included: New Member Welcome, Dues Receipt
• Autopilot: Renewal Reminder Letter, Lapsed Member Win-Back, Life Member Recognition, Member Event Invitation
• Autopilot Pro: Membership Health Analysis, Dues & Levels Review, Win-Back Campaign Plan
• Autopilot Max: Membership Directory Compiler, Annual Membership Report, Bulk Renewal Reminders

The full what-it-does / what-it-needs / what-you-get breakdown for each lives in the AI Automations Guide.

Your Membership Workflow

The lifecycle tells you which automation to reach for, and when:

8. Retention Best Practices

• Renewal is won in the first 90 days. A member who is welcomed, thanked, and invited to something within their first three months renews at dramatically higher rates. The New status exists so you can see exactly who is in that window.
• Remind early, remind twice. Send the first reminder when the member enters the 45-day window and a second near the date. The bulk sender makes both a five-minute job.
• Treat "lapsed" as "late" for 60 days. Most small-organization lapses are forgetfulness, not a decision. The grace window in the model reflects that; so should your tone.
• Win-backs work best with news. "We miss you" plus "here is what is new since you left" outperforms guilt every time. Put the news in the win-back letter's notes field.
• Watch the funnel, not just the total. A flat member count can hide a leaky funnel where new joins exactly replace quiet lapses. The Membership Health Analysis reads the funnel for you.

9. Dues Best Practices

• Few levels, clear differences. Three or four levels members can explain to each other beat seven they cannot. Each level's benefits line should answer "what do I get for the extra money?"
• Price the Family level honestly. If Family costs less than two Individuals, expect couples to choose it; that is fine if it is intentional. The Dues & Levels Review flags cannibalization like this.
• Raise dues rarely, explain always. A small increase with a one-paragraph explanation retains better than silent creep. The review automation can model what a change means for expected revenue using your real counts.
• Receipt every payment. It is professional, it prevents disputes, and the Dues Receipt automation makes it one click with the tax wording handled correctly.
• Reconcile monthly. The dues digest exists so that once a month, you open Renewals, compare the lists against your bank account, and click Mark renewed for whoever has paid.

10. Common Pitfalls

• Setting statuses by hand somewhere else. A spreadsheet column called "status" goes stale the day after you update it. Here, status is derived from dates, so it cannot go stale.
• No renewal dates on the roster. Without a renewal date the app cannot tell you who is due. When importing an old list, set everyone's renewal to their next anniversary, even approximately.
• Forgetting to Mark renewed. If payments arrive but never get recorded, the lists fill with false overdues and reminders annoy paid-up members. Make Mark renewed part of your deposit routine.
• Deleting lapsed members. A lapsed member is a warm lead with history, the easiest "new" member you will ever recruit. Keep them on the roster and run the win-back.
• Calling dues a donation on receipts. Dues that come with benefits are generally not charitable contributions to that extent. Use the receipt automation's wording rather than improvising.
• Sending bulk email without checking the list. The confirm dialog exists for a reason: read the recipient list before you click. It is your last chance to catch the member who paid in cash yesterday.

Contact & Support

Questions, feedback, or stuck on a step? We read everything.

• Website: buildyourclub.com
• All apps: buildyourclub.com/apps.html
• Open the app: Membership
• Automation details: AI Automations Guide

This guide is general information for small nonprofits, not legal, tax, or professional advice. Build Your Club, LLC.

A note on legal advice

Build Your Club provides plain-language educational tools and document drafts, not legal advice. For decisions with legal consequences, consult a qualified attorney who works with nonprofits.

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