Referrals and how supporters join

Supporters join a club through an ambassador. Each published ambassador has a join page. A supporter fills it in, pays, and lands on the club's welcome page. The ambassador is recorded as their referrer, and the supporter appears on the ambassador's Referrals panel (see The members list).

Reaching the join page

Supporters reach an ambassador's join page from the ambassador's story page. To link to the join page directly in an email or on a page, use the "Referral page url" merge tag. See Merge tags.

The join page uses the club's Supporter join page design. To change what it says and how it looks, see Pages.

What the supporter fills in

The join form asks for:

• An amount: one of the club's membership options, or their own amount in the field marked "Enter your own amount". They can also choose the currency. See Membership options and intervals.
• How often to give: one of the donation intervals the club offers. Only intervals your payment provider for that currency can take are shown. If the club offers only one interval, that interval is still shown, and it is used even if the supporter doesn't select it.
• A tip: shown only when tipping is turned on. See Tipping.
• Their details: First name, Last name, Email and Phone number. The phone number is optional.
• Terms and conditions: a box they must tick to accept.
• Mailing list opt-in: a box they can tick to receive email updates from your organisation.

The headings and the wording next to each box come from the page design, so they may differ from club to club.

Errors on the form

If something is missing or wrong, the join page shows it again with an error next to the part of the form that needs fixing. A supporter sees an error when:

• they haven't chosen a membership option or entered an amount;
• their own amount isn't more than 0;
• they haven't chosen how often to give, when there is more than one interval to choose from;
• first name, last name or email is blank, or the email address isn't valid;
• they haven't ticked the terms and conditions box ("Terms must be accepted");
• the currency only takes whole amounts and the amount or tip has a part after the decimal point;
• the interval they chose isn't available for donations in that currency.

Nothing is saved until the form is accepted.

What happens when they submit

When the form is accepted:

1. Their donor record. If the email address matches any donor record in your organisation, whether or not that person has given anything, that record is used. Otherwise a new one is created with the name and email they entered. The phone number they entered is added to the record.
2. Email consent. Their consent to receive email is set from the opt-in box: Given if they ticked it, Revoked if they left it unticked. This replaces any consent recorded before. See Opt-in and opt-out.
3. Their membership. They become a Pending supporter of the club, with the ambassador as their referrer. The date, IP address and device are recorded with their acceptance of the terms. If they are already a member of this club, their existing membership is used and isn't changed.
4. Payment. They are sent to pay. What they see depends on your payment provider. See How supporters pay. If they cancel payment, they return to the ambassador's story page.
5. Welcome page. Once they have paid, they see the club's Membership welcome page.

When their payment goes through, their pending membership becomes active. Your organisation's default "Supporter activated" automation then emails the supporter, the referring ambassador, the club's other active ambassadors and your organisation's administrators. These emails aren't sent:

• if they were already an active member of the club, because their membership is already active and isn't activated again;
• if their existing membership of the club has no referring ambassador, or is an ambassador membership, because it isn't a supporter's membership;
• if they are an inactive ambassador of the club, because their membership isn't activated;
• if the "Supporter activated" workflow is switched off for the club;
• to any address Supporter Club has marked as undeliverable.

If they don't pay, your organisation's default "Referral completed" automation waits 15 minutes. If their membership is still pending, it emails them with the subject "First name, do you still want to support us?".

For both automations, see Organisation automations.

When the join page is available

• Club live, ambassador published: the join page works.
• Club live, ambassador unpublished or inactive: visitors to the join page are sent to wherever the ambassador's redirect points, or see Not Found. See Unpublishing, redirects and inactive ambassadors.
• Club not live yet: the join page works for any ambassador, published or not, so you can walk through joining before launch. No real payment is taken: the supporter sees a simulated payment page instead.
• Club archived with a redirect: visitors are sent to the home page of the club it redirects to.

Joining on the ambassador's page

Some accounts can choose, when they create a club, to have supporters join on the ambassador's page instead of a separate join page. Supporters then join in a window over the ambassador's page, without leaving it. The choice is made when the club is created and can't be changed afterwards. See Creating a club.

In these clubs, joining has these steps, all in the window:

1. Details: the same form as the separate join page, with the same errors.
2. Payment: on a Stripe route, the supporter enters their card in the window and pays without leaving. If the payment fails, the window shows an error (by default "Your payment could not be completed. Please try another card.") and they can try another card. With other payment providers, the window links them on to pay. See How supporters pay.
3. Welcome: a welcome message once they have paid.
4. Share: a screen for sharing the club, with the default message "Join me in supporting club name."

What happens to their donor record, consent and membership is the same as above. The same rules apply for unpublished ambassadors, clubs that aren't live and archived clubs.

A join page made for one ambassador

If a join page has been made for a single ambassador, that ambassador's join page uses it instead of the club's Supporter join page. See Pages for a single ambassador.