How To Setup WordPress Client Portal With Plugins
Managing multiple clients in buisness can be overwhelming. You have to respond to their queries, exchange files with them, keep them updated about the progress of their projects, and so much more. You may consider getting more hands to help. While this isn’t a bad idea, using a WordPress client portal plugin on your website is a better option.
In this short tutorial, you will learn more about WordPress client portal, when to use it, and what is the best client portals plugin for WordPress.
If you are a small business willing to grow more quickly, this guide can be a great starting point.
Content:
- What is a WordPress Client Portal?
- Benefits Of Having A WordPress Customer Portal
- How To Use A Client Portal WordPress Plugin
- Best WordPress Plugins For The Job
What Is A WordPress Client Portal?
Client portals are basically client management tools responsible for a more intimate and efficient user experience. They help website owners run growing WordPress websites and have better crowd control over their users.
This can be done using different types of both free and paid memberships or dashboards with special client access. You can also create the client login passwords so that some data can only be seen by specific users.
The possibilities are endless, you just need to know what exactly you are looking for (or at least have a general idea). Let’s see some of the instances in which you may want to use them.
What Are The Benefits Of Having A WordPress Customer Portal?
By having WordPress websites that offer any kind of service, it is your duty to do your best to please your clients. This way, you can gather more users, make better relationships with current ones, and have an overall more stable business practice.
Now, how can a WordPress customer portal help you with that?
**Grouping users using a secure client portal can help you easily exchange information between you and your clients. With private messaging, you don’t have to rely on other sources like emails, contact form, or different messaging services.
**A portal can lower the cost of customer support. Some plugins can help you create self-helping parts of the website, where users can see the solutions to their problems instantly. Hence, there is no need to pay more for 24/7 customer service.
**Letting people customize their user profile makes your site look more professional and user-friendly. It also gives users some control and overview, which is always a plus.
**You can share useful information with your WooCommerce customers and improve your sales. If you offer special discounts to registered users, you can see a huge increase in both network traffic and registration.
**Since we are talking about a portal as a part of your WordPress site, what you are getting is a very secure WordPress experience. If you did everything to make your website safe, this also applies to the portal itself.
Using third party portals, or similar services doesn’t guarantee the same security as you being in control of everything.
How To Use A Client Portal WordPress Plugin
Now we are going to show you how these client Portal plugins work in WordPress. We are using MemberMouse in this tutorial but the process is similar to the others.
Installing The Plugin
The first step is logging into your portal plugin’s site dashboard. Next, proceed to the “My Account” section, to authorize your site for using the plugin.
To find the exact URL of your WordPress website, go back to WordPress, Settings > General. Under the WordPress Adress (URL) you will see the correct location you need to paste.
After that part is done, go back to the plugin’s website dashboard and download it.
Back in WordPress:
- Go to Plugins > Add New.
- Choose the “Upload Plugin” option.
- Upload it, install and activate.
Using The Plugin
If you need a detailed explanation of each section of the plugin, the videos on their site, and in the plugin itself can be of great help. There is also a “Need Help?” button on the top right corner of the screen if you come across an issue you can’t solve.
We are going to do a quick review in this article, so you can have good basic knowledge.
After installing, you will get access to the dashboard that looks something like this.
Aside from the many options it offers, this plugin provides you with informative training videos, so you are all covered. You also get a general overview of things like membership, bundle and product numbers on the same screen.
Manage Members
Next, we have A “Manage Members” section where you will spend most of your time. Under “General” you can search for members you want to check. You can enter each of their profiles, see their details, and tweak settings.
You can also create new members and perform an advanced search by membership levels, date, name, etc.
“Access Rights” tab gives you the opportunity to set clearance for specific users, change their membership or even cancel it.
You can see transactions your clients make, and issue a refund if necessary in the “Transactions” tab.
Product Settings
In “Product Settings” you can create things like products, different membership levels, bundles, and coupons. This is where you are choosing what you want to sell, or provide as a service.
The only thing you need to do is click on “Create Product/Membership Level/Bundle“, fill the information and you are good to go.
This whole section is pretty much self-explanatory, so we won’t go any deeper into it.
Checkout Settings – WordPress Client Portal
If you switch to “Checkout Settings” you can configure what the users will have to accept when they want to go forward with the transaction. (for example, complying to “Terms of Use” like in the example below) You can decide what countries can buy your services, shipping methods, and other settings alike, too.
Payment Settings
This section is reserved for configuring payment methods both onsite and offsite. You will have to set the preferred method of payment, so there would be no hassle or problems later on. Onsite gives you Stripe, LimeLight, Braintree, and Authorize.net choices.
ClickBank, Coinbase and Paypal are available as offsite payment methods.
Developer Tools
Another great tool to have in your WordPress developer’s belt is the “Push Notifications” option. You can create special triggers that go off whenever specific action happens on your site. This can help you have a clearer picture of how your website is doing, and how to improve things.
Best WordPress Plugins For The Job
When you are looking for the best client portals plugin there are some things you should expect from it. This WordPress plugin should:
- Have a fast and reliable support service.
- Be easily integrable.
- Have a user-friendly interface.
- Have controls based on clearance.
- Be highly customizable and secure.
- Have some kind of file sharing system. (file uploads and downloads)
- Be compatible with other plugins and services.
There are so many choices on the Internet, and some of them have very questionable quality. That is why we conducted a small list of ones we think are the best, so you wouldn’t have to waste your time with those “bad seeds”.
MemberMouse
Membermouse is compact and straight to the point client portal WordPress plugin perfect for subscription and membership sites. Its easy-to-use interface lets you set up a complete membership platform without any effort.
The Features
With Membermouse customer portal plugin you can:
- Manage your customers – it gives you the ability to register new members and guide certain aspects related to those users. With this kind of control, you can grow mailing lists, set different billing systems, separate memberships, etc.
- Protect member’s area – with a couple of clicks you can set limitations on access to premium content like lessons, videos, texts and more. Hence, you can reject users without passwords or with a different type of membership from entering certain pages or data you want to sell.
- Automate profile control – by giving users the power over their profiles you have one less thing to worry about. They can update their private information, billing details, passwords, change their membership or even cancel subscriptions.
- Gather useful data like lifetime customer value, accounting level detail, affiliate tracking and so on. This information can shape your future business plans.
The Price
It is a premium plugin and it has a couple of different payment plans:
- For website owners with around 1,000 members, it will cost $19.95 / month.
- For 5,000 members, the price is $39.95 / month.
- WordPress sites with 10,000 users will have to pay $59.95 / month.
- And finally, for advanced users with 50,000 members, the price is $99 / month
There is also a 14-day free trial, so there is nothing stopping you from trying it.
Furthermore, if you are already using another management plugin MemberMouse’s powerful import wizard can make your transition a breeze. You just need to upload a file containing your member’s information and it will automatically make accounts for all those users.
Clinked Client Portal
This client portal plugin lets you create a secure, information-sharing and customizable portal with a couple of clicks. You get the ability to have a closer relationship with your clients, make their experience more personal and so much more.
The Features
With Clinked you get:
- A branded mobile app – you can request a custom app, made specifically for your business. This way your team members (or users) can download it and share data or information right from their hands. (Available for both iOS and Android devices)
- File sharing – your users can download and upload files from anywhere and any device seamlessly. You can control who has access to which file and who has permission to upload.
- Customizable workspaces – this client portal WordPress plugin allows you to share and collaborate with your clients inside a secure environment. You can make special “rooms” for different purposes, and let specific users in.
- Collaboration options – you get the ability to request approvals, leave comments on documents, assign tasks and much much more.
The Price
If you get an annual contract the prices are as follows:
- $83 / month is considered a starter plan, that will get you a “white label” WordPress client portal, 100 GB storage, 100 members and unlimited guests
- For $209 / month, you get all “starter” features, group chat, full-text search, 1TB, and a custom domain.
- $416 /month is a premium plan with all of the features from previous plans, 250 members, 3TB storage and white-label email notifications.
- Lastly, you can choose an enterprise plan costing $836 / month, with everything we mentioned, 1000 members, 5TB of space, mobile app, and active directory and single sign-on.
There is also a 10-day free trial with 10 members, 100 MB storage, realtime chat and a couple of other perks.
Paid Memberships Pro
This plugin provides a very simple yet efficient way of setting up a membership site. Aside from having all the features you would ever need to make such a site, it comes with 64 premium add ons. (around $3,200 in value) That’s a truly impressive deal!
It has more than 80,000 active installs which is a great reason to trust in this product.
The Features
Paid Memberships Pro can:
- Manage thousands of members – with organization options this tool offers, you can easily handle a huge number of users with ease.
- Help you get paid – whether you provide e-learning classes or other digital courseware, this plugin has the tools to increase your revenue.
- Accept large payment traffic – you won’t have any problems related to payment, or decline in money transfer traffic. It is compatible with a good number of payment options like Paypal, Braintree, and Stripe.
- Help you make private groups – with a more intimate setting, your users will feel much more inclined to spend more money, and stay on your site longer. You can also give those users discounts to encourage them even more.
The Price
It is a premium plugin but it also has a free version:
- A plugin, documentation with 14 free Add Ons, you can get free of charge
- For $297 you get 64 premium add ons, 14 free add ons, unlimited support for a maximum of 5 sites and add on updates.
- If that is not enough for you, for $597 you also get support and updates for an unlimited number of websites, everything from other plans, and discounted annual renewal.
WordPress Client Portal – Conclusion
Whether you are a small business willing to expand, a teaching facility or anything similar using a customer portal is a must-have. We have shown you how helpful WordPress client portals are and how the plugins work. Do yourself a favor and get one.
We hope this article was of some help in your site management journey. Lastly, If you are interested in more WordPress tutorials and lists check our other blog posts here. You can also comment below or share this post on your social media.
