How can we help?

Click "Start free" on the homepage, or open the sign up page. Enter your email, your first and last name, and a password, then accept the terms and pick a few interests. We also send you a verification email. You can start exploring right away, and a reminder stays at the top of the app until you click the link in that email.

Open Discover to browse communities by category or search for one, or open a link a creator shared with you. Then open the community and click "Join for Free." Every community can be joined for free, and some also offer paid tiers with more inside.

The strip on the left holds your communities, plus Direct Messages and Explore Communities. Click a community to open it: its menu lists Community Home, the chat rooms, and a link for each kind of content the community has, such as Posts, Courses, Files, Events, and Shop. Along the top, or the bottom bar on a phone, you can switch between Discover, What's New, and your communities. Your profile, settings, and Help & Support are in the menu under your profile picture.

Yes. Creating an account, joining communities, and starting a community of your own are all free. When a creator earns on MemberPad, from paid memberships or one-time sales, we keep a standard platform fee of 9%. Stripe's card processing fee is separate.

Click "Start a community" in the main menu, or "Create A Community" at the bottom of the sidebar, and enter your community's name, type, and description. Then finish setting it up in Backstage Admin: add your logo and banner under Community Settings, create tiers under Tiers & Pricing, connect payments under Payments & Payouts, and write the page new members see first under Welcome.

Yes. In Backstage Admin, open Community Settings to change your community's name, description, and category, upload a logo and a banner, pick a banner color, an accent color, and a theme, add social links, and connect your own domain. Your community's web address is created from its name when you set it up, and it can't be changed in Community Settings. For a fuller public site, use Public Site.

Share your community's public page. Its link looks like memberpad.com/c/your-community, or uses your own domain if you've connected one. Post it anywhere: social media, email, or your website. People who open it land on your community's page, where they can join.

A community has four built in roles. A Member joined for free. A Paid Member is on a paid tier and gets what that tier unlocks. An Admin manages content, members, and settings. The Host is the owner, with full control, including payments and payouts. Only the host can make someone an admin: open Members, click the member, and choose Change Role. You can also appoint moderators and choose what each one can do: moderate messages, time members out, or ban them. And you can create up to 25 custom roles, which are display titles only and grant no permissions.

In Backstage Admin, open Members to see everyone with their role, plan, join date, and last login. You can filter to removed, blocked, or canceled members and export the list to CSV. Click a member to change their role, time them out, ban them, or remove them; removed members can rejoin later. A time out lets them keep reading but stops them posting, commenting, reacting, or voting for as long as you choose, and lifts by itself. Only the host can make someone an admin or change an admin's role.

Yes, once the creator switches it on. It ranks members by the points they earned over the last seven days, the last thirty days, and all time, shows the top ten, and always pins your own place even if you are further down. Owners and admins are never ranked. Creators can preview the real board before revealing it, and turn it off again at any time.

It is what a band's fan club opens on. The band's banner runs across the top with a marquee of what is coming up, such as the next show, a presale, a drop, or a listening party. Under it you find the band, the record they are featuring, photos and the set list from their last show, the tour dates, and your own pass with the nights you checked in. Your fan number is on it too, once the band has run its fan club setup. A locked post shows as a backstage door with the name of the pass that opens it. People who have not joined see a public version of the club, with no fan's name anywhere on it.

Your community has to be in the Music category, with "Yes, it's for a band" chosen in Community Settings. Then, in Backstage Admin, open Fan Club Settings (under Fans). Once the one-time setup on its Setup tab has run, the other tabs let you name the club, choose what one fan and many fans are called, write a note from the band, pick what the banner shows when you have no banner image, show, hide, and reorder the home's sections, choose which tabs sit on the top row and which wait under More (visitors see the same menu on your public pages), rank fans by points (the same switch as the leaderboard), and choose who is in the band. To choose the record the club home leads with, open Music and click "Feature on club home" on a published album. If you built a site with Public Site, visitors keep seeing your site.

In Backstage Admin, open Fan Club Settings (under Fans) and go to Band Members & Profiles. Your host and admins are in the band to begin with, and you can take any of them out. To add someone, search for any member of the fan club and click Add, up to 20 people. Someone not in the club yet? Search by their email and invite them: they get one email, they are on the band page from then on, and the spot is theirs when they sign in or create their account. Click Edit profile on each person to add a band photo, their role in the band and instrument, a short bio, their story, their hometown, the year they joined the band, their gear, favorite songs to play, up to four links, and the short name their page link uses. Band members can also edit their own profile from The band tab while they are shown on the band page; for someone you have hidden, fill it in here. Being in the band is for show: it puts someone on the band page and gives them no extra powers. Fans see the band on The band tab, and visitors on your public band page, unless you built your own site with Public Site. Removing someone from the fan club takes them out of the band too.

Posts are written by a community's host and admins. In Backstage Admin, open Posts & Media and click "New Post." Write in the editor and add images, an uploaded video, or a YouTube link under Cover Media; the first image becomes the cover. Under Content Access, choose Free to make the post public, so anyone can read it, share it, and find it in search, or Paid Plans Only to limit it to the tiers you pick. Then publish it, save it as a draft, or schedule it for later.

Yes. When creating or editing a post, you can save it as a draft instead of publishing it right away. Drafts are visible only to you and the other admins, and you can come back to edit and publish them at any time.

Yes. Under Cover Media in the post editor, choose YouTube and paste the link from YouTube's Share button. You'll see the video's title and thumbnail before you save, and it plays in YouTube's own player inside the post, in the feed and on the post page, using none of your video minutes. A YouTube cover starts from the beginning each time and earns no watch points, and the video has to be public or unlisted with embedding allowed. Anyone with the link can still watch it on YouTube, so for a paid post an unlisted video is the better fit. A post has an uploaded video or a YouTube link, not both.

When you create a post, course, file folder, chat room, event, or video category, set Content Access to paid and tick the tiers that get in. Files are locked by folder and videos by category, not one at a time, and a free post is public, so anyone on the web can read it. Courses, folders, events, and notebooks can also be sold as a one-time purchase in your Shop. People without access can see that the content exists, but can't open it until they're on a tier that includes it or have bought it.

Yes. On the event page, or on its card in the calendar, members choose I'm going, Maybe, or Can't make it, and tapping the same answer again takes it back. People who are going get a bell, a push, and an email before it starts, at the time the creator chose, and can add the event to their own calendar, one date or the whole series. If the creator set a capacity, later answers join a waitlist, and the next person moves up and is told when a place opens. Creators see the headcount on every event and can open the list of names.

Yes. Members can leave comments and reactions on posts, which helps build engagement in your community. As an admin, you can moderate comments from the post itself.

Yes, if your community is in the Music category. In Backstage Admin, open Music and click "New album." Give it a title, a cover, a release type (album, EP, or single), and a release date, then drag your MP3 files onto the song list, up to 200 MB a song and 50 songs an album. Choose who can listen: free for all members, Paid Plans Only with the tiers you pick, a one-time purchase in your Shop, or tiers and a price together. Albums start as drafts, so members see nothing until you publish.

You are hearing its free preview. When a band locks an album, members who have not unlocked it hear the first 15, 30, 45, or 60 seconds of each song, whichever the band chose, and songs marked Free play in full. Members with access to the album hear every song all the way through.

In Backstage Admin, open Courses and click "New Course." Add a title, a description, and a header image, and choose who can access it. Then click "Add Lesson" to build it out: a lesson can hold a video, written content, and downloadable resources, and you can add quizzes and assignments too. Group lessons into sections, and drag lessons and sections into the order you want.

Yes. Give a section or a single lesson, quiz, or assignment a release schedule: open it a number of days after a member starts the course, a number of days after they joined your community, or on a set date and time. A lesson opens at the later of its own schedule and its section's, so anything you add to a scheduled section waits with it. Members see locked lessons with when they open, and get a notification when they do, plus an email unless you or they turn course emails off. Those emails count toward your monthly email allowance. Schedules work alongside quizzes that must be passed to continue.

The creator releases that course over time. The lesson unlocks by itself at the time shown, counted from when you first opened the course, from when you joined the community, or from a set date, depending on how the creator set it up. You will get a notification when it opens. Anything you already finished or started stays open to you even if the schedule changes.

MemberPad supports the common video formats, including MP4, MOV, and WebM. Videos are transcoded for adaptive streaming, so they play smoothly at the best quality each viewer's connection allows, up to 1080p.

Yes. In the lesson editor, choose YouTube link above the video box and paste the link from YouTube's Share button. You'll see the video's title and thumbnail, and the link saves with the lesson, so you can add it before the lesson's first save. It plays in YouTube's own player and uses none of your video minutes. It starts from the beginning each time and doesn't roll into the next lesson, so members finish it with Mark Complete. Anyone with the link can still watch it on YouTube, so use an unlisted video for a paid course. To switch to an upload, choose Upload a file and save.

Yes. In Backstage Admin, open Videos, select a category, click Add Video, and choose YouTube link. Paste the link from YouTube's Share button, and you'll see the video's title and thumbnail before you add it. It plays in YouTube's own player and uses none of your video minutes. A YouTube video doesn't remember where a member stopped, doesn't play the next video on its own, and earns no watch points. It has to be public or unlisted with embedding allowed, and anyone with its link can still watch it on YouTube, even in a paid category.

Yes, when gamification is switched on and visible to members. In the course's access settings, choose the level a member has to reach. Anyone below it sees the level they need, where they are now, and how many points they have to go, instead of a paywall, and the course opens for them the moment they climb into it.

Yes. In the course editor, set Access to Paid Plans Only and choose which tiers include the course. You can also turn on One-Time Purchase to sell the course on its own in your Shop. Access covers the whole course, so there are no free preview lessons. Members without access still see the course listed, but can't open its lessons.

Every community can store at least 1,800 minutes of video, and that allowance grows as your community earns. Video that free members can watch has its own, smaller allowance. Once your community brings in more than $2,000 a month in recurring revenue, these limits no longer apply. If you get close, you can ask for more from the notice in the editor. Videos stream at up to 1080p. YouTube videos you link in the Video Library don't count toward either allowance.

Each community can have several chat rooms, which admins can group into sections and open to everyone or only to certain tiers. Messages arrive in real time, and links show a preview. Rooms keep recent history, so members can catch up on what they missed.

Yes. Open someone's profile and click "Message," or open Direct Messages from the strip on the left and choose New message or New group. To start a conversation, you need to be on a paid tier, or be an admin or the host, in a community you share with that person. A group holds up to 10 people from one community, and starting one or adding someone to it takes the same paid tier, admin or host role in that community. Anyone can reply once they're in a conversation, and anyone in a group can mute it or leave. People added to a group can see its earlier messages. You'll see which conversations have unread messages, but there are no read receipts.

The Support Inbox lets members message a community's admins privately. Members find it in the community menu as "Contact Creator," or whatever name the creator gives it. Admins answer every conversation from Support Inbox in Backstage Admin, and can broadcast a message to all members or to the members they pick. A creator can also turn the inbox off.

No. Chat rooms, direct messages, and the Support Inbox keep recent history, and older messages expire on their own. Treat chat as conversation rather than an archive: anything members need to keep belongs in a post, a file, or a course.

In Backstage Admin, open Files, create a folder, and upload into it. Each file can be up to 50 MB. Access is set on the folder, not on single files: make the folder free for all members, or limit it to the tiers you choose. Members open the Files tab in your community and download whatever their access allows. To offer one file on its own, add it as a digital product instead.

Yes. In Backstage Admin under Files, create folders to group files by topic, module, or whatever suits your community. Folders are a single level, so there are no folders inside folders. Members can open each folder and download the files they have access to.

Yes. Each file can be up to 50 MB, whatever its type. Files also count toward your community's storage allowance, which starts at 5 GB and grows as your community earns. Once your community brings in more than $2,000 a month in recurring revenue, the allowance no longer applies.

Yes, by folder. When you create or edit a folder, choose Paid Plans Only and tick the tiers that should have access. You can also sell a whole folder as a one-time purchase in your Shop. Single files can't be locked or priced on their own, so put exclusive files in a folder of their own, or sell one file as a digital product.

Open the community and go to its Membership tab, or visit its public page. Pick a tier, choose monthly or yearly if both are offered, and click "Subscribe Now," or the free trial button if the tier has a trial. You'll finish paying on a secure Stripe Checkout page.

Yes. Open the menu under your profile picture and choose Subscriptions & Purchases, then click "Change Plan" on an active subscription to see the other tiers. When you switch, the price difference for the rest of your billing period is prorated and charged right away, and if that charge can't go through, your plan stays as it is. If you subscribed through Apple, change your plan in your Apple ID settings.

Open Subscriptions & Purchases from the menu under your profile picture, click "Cancel Subscription" on the one you want to end, and confirm. You keep access until the end of your current billing period, and there are no cancellation fees. Until then, you can click "Reactivate" to keep it going. Subscriptions made through Apple are canceled in your Apple ID settings.

MemberPad uses Stripe for secure payment processing, so you can pay with all major credit and debit cards, such as Visa, Mastercard, and American Express. MemberPad never stores your card details.

MemberPad's Refund Policy applies to every community, and creators can offer more generous terms. Start by messaging the creator through the "Contact Creator" link in the community menu. If you can't sort it out together, email [email protected] with your account email, the community or product name, the purchase date, and the reason, and we'll help.

Subscriptions renew automatically at the end of each billing period, monthly or yearly, using your payment method on file. The amount usually matches your last charge, but it can differ if a discount code has ended or a free trial has just finished. You'll find the date under "Next renewal" on your Subscriptions & Purchases page, along with your billing history.

Digital products are items a creator sells for a one-time price, such as templates, guides, ebooks, or presets. A product is either a file you download or a link to content hosted elsewhere. Unlike a subscription, you pay once and keep access, unless the purchase is refunded or access is withdrawn, for example after a chargeback.

Open the Shop tab in the community and click "Buy" on the product you want. You'll finish paying on Stripe Checkout. When you come back, your access appears within a moment, and you can download the file or open the link.

Open the menu under your profile picture and choose Subscriptions & Purchases. Everything you've bought is listed under One-Time Purchases, where you can download it or open it again whenever you like. A purchase that was refunded or had its access suspended shows that status instead.

Yes. In Backstage Admin, open Digital Products to create and manage them. Give each one a name, a description, and a price, then upload the file or add a link to where it's hosted. Published products appear in your community's Shop tab for members to buy.

Yes. Open the community's Shop tab or a product's own page, pick a size or color if there is one, and add it to your cart. Checkout asks for your email and shipping address, so you don't need a MemberPad account, and buying merch doesn't make you a member of the community.

Your whole cart checks out at once, with one shipping charge, on Stripe Checkout. Pay by card, or with Apple Pay or Google Pay where they're offered. In the MemberPad apps, checkout opens in a sheet over the app and brings you back when you're done.

Your order confirmation email links to your order page, which shows where the order stands and, once the creator ships it, the carrier and tracking number. If you were signed in when you bought, your orders are also listed under Orders on your Subscriptions & Purchases page.

Merch is sold and shipped by the creator, so returns follow the returns policy the creator shows on the product page and on your order page. Contact the creator first, using the email on your order page if they've given one. If you can't reach them or the problem isn't resolved, email [email protected] with your order number. If a creator cancels your order before it ships, you're refunded in full.

Yes, once payments are set up. In Backstage Admin, open Store Settings to set your shipping rates, processing time and returns policy, then add products under Merch with photos, sizes or colors, prices and stock. Fans buy from your Shop tab, your public page and your site, and paid orders wait under Orders with the address to ship to. You pack and ship every order yourself, within the United States for now.

The same 9% platform fee as everything else, worked out on the items only, never on shipping or tax. Stripe's processing fee comes out of the same charge, and the rest goes to your Stripe account and pays out on your usual schedule.

As the host, open Payments & Payouts in Backstage Admin. Setup has three steps: submit your tax information, connect a Stripe account through Stripe Connect (or reuse the one from another community you host), and choose how sales tax is handled. Members can start paying once your tax form is approved, your Stripe setup is finished, and your sales tax choice is made. Then set your prices under Tiers & Pricing and Digital Products.

When a member pays, the charge runs through your connected Stripe account. Stripe deducts its processing fee, MemberPad's platform fee comes out of the same charge, and the rest stays in your Stripe balance. Stripe then pays out to your bank on the schedule set in your Stripe account.

MemberPad's standard platform fee is 9% of each paid transaction, so you only pay when you earn, and there is no monthly charge. Stripe's card processing fee is separate and charged by Stripe. If your community started with a founder code, a lower rate may apply.

In Backstage Admin, open Tiers & Pricing. For each tier, set a name, an optional description, a monthly price and an optional yearly price, an optional free trial, a badge, and a list of benefits, then choose which content the tier unlocks. You can create several tiers, such as Basic, Pro, and VIP. Every community also keeps one free tier, which can't be deleted.

Yes. The dashboard in Backstage Admin gives an overview of your community, including member count, active subscriptions, and revenue, and Members shows each member's status and plan.

Go to the login page and click "Forgot your password?" Enter your email address and we'll send you a reset link. The link expires after 1 hour. Click the link in the email to create a new password. If you don't see the email, check your spam folder.

After you sign up, we send you a verification email. Click the link in it to verify your address. Until you do, a reminder shows at the top of the app with a "Resend" button in case you need a new email. If it doesn't arrive, check your spam folder.

Click your profile picture at the top of the app and choose "Edit Profile." Your profile page opens and you edit it right there: click the camera on your picture to change it, and use the pencil icons to update your name, display name, username, and bio.

You can delete your account inside the app: click your profile picture, choose Settings, open the Delete Account tab, and confirm with your password. Your account, profile, active sessions, and membership in every community are removed immediately, and this can't be undone. Posts and messages you wrote stay in their communities but show as "Deleted user." If you run into trouble, email [email protected].

Yes. MemberPad takes security seriously. All data travels over HTTPS and passwords are securely hashed. Card and bank details are handled by a secure third party processor and never stored on our servers, and the tax ID numbers creators provide are stored encrypted.