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All About Gift Memberships: https://help.patronmanager.com/a/2139146
Do you offer memberships that can be gifted to others? In other words, one person buys the membership for a friend or family member and wants to have it delivered on a meaningful date like a birthday or holiday?
With gift memberships in PatronManager, you can do just that, with a special step during checkout to designate the gift recipient's details.
In this article, we'll cover:
At the end we also have some frequently asked questions (FAQs).
Let's dive in!
What is a gift membership?
A gift membership allows your patrons to purchase memberships for friends and family from your Public Ticketing Site (PTS) and schedule the membership to be delivered and benefits to start on a meaningful date, like a holiday or birthday.
This allows you to welcome new members and gives your existing patrons and supporters an easy way to promote your organization while still giving you insight and information into both the purchaser and the recipient.
Not only is it a gift for the lucky giftee, it's also a gift for your organization!
How do gift memberships work?
When you set up gift memberships, you can designate certain Membership Price Levels as giftable, meaning that they're available to purchase as gifts. These giftable Membership Price Levels will appear for sale with a gift icon and the text "Gift membership" below the Membership Price Level Name.
This way, you can opt to either create a Membership to sell that's made up of only gift memberships:
Or choose to sell gift memberships alongside your other memberships:
At this time, gift memberships are only available for purchase online via the PTS.
Want to be able to sell gift memberships internally in PatronManager Box Office (PMBO)? Submit a Product Idea!
Gift memberships are always delivered with a Delivery Method of Email!
If a buyer purchases other items (e.g., single tickets, subscriptions, retail, etc.) in the same cart as a gift membership, they can still select another Delivery Method for their other items.
During checkout for a gift membership, buyers will be able to enter Gift Details:
- The recipient's First Name
- The recipient's Last Name
- The recipient's Email
- An optional Gift Message for the recipient to receive
- The date when the membership is delivered to the recipient and their benefits start via the Deliver On field
The buyer's Order Confirmation Email will also list the recipient fiends so that they have a record of what they asked to be sent and when.
After a gift membership is purchased, PatronManager creates a Benefit record for the recipient with a Start Date matching the delivery date. This means that benefits and perks of the membership don't start applying until the day the gift is delivered.
On the delivery date, PatronManager automatically sends the recipient a branded gift email.
You can also choose to resend the branded gift email at any time on or after the delivery date using the Email Gift Membership button on the recipient's Benefit record.
If a gift membership is purchased and the "Deliver On" is set to the date of purchase (i.e., the gift membership is purchased on the same date it should be delivered), the recipient should receive their membership within 5-10 minutes.
How can I set up gift memberships?
Setting up gift memberships takes a few steps:
- Create a Gift Membership Delivery Template
- Set the Gift Membership Delivery Template on your Benefit Level(s)
- Create a giftable Membership Price Level
Let's get started!
Using gift memberships requires using PatronManager Memberships and Benefits.
1.1. Go to Membership Communications
You can do this from the Membership Hub`
By clicking the tab
Or by searching and selecting from the App Launcher
1.2. Click Gift Membership Delivery
1.3. Click New Template
1.4. Set up the basics
Set up the basic settings for your template:
- Name: The name you wish to give your Gift Membership Delivery Template; for internal use only
- Active: Check this box to ensure this template is available for selection
- Default From Address: The organization-wide address that will appear to as the sender for recipients in their inbox
- Subject: The subject line you want recipients to see in their inbox
1.5. Edit your template
From here, editing the template is the same as editing other automated communication email templates, and we have detailed instructions on how to do this available for you!
When you create a Gift Membership Delivery Template, make sure to include:
- Contact: First Name (the recipient's name)
- Ticket Order Item: Message to Recipient (the message entered by the buyer for the recipient)
- If you use Digital Membership Cards, include:
- Benefit: Digital Card Link
- If you use PatronPortal, also include:
- User: Portal Login Link (the link for the recipient to log into PatronPortal)
- User: Username (the username for the recipient to log into PatronPortal)
1.6. Save your template!
2.1. Go to Benefit Levels
You can do this from the Membership Hub
Or from the Benefit Levels tab
Or by finding and selecting in the App Launcher
2.2. Select a Benefit Level that you wish to make available for gift memberships
Alternatively, you can create a new Benefit Level!
2.3. Click Edit
2.4. Select a Gift Delivery Email Template
Depending on how many you've set up, you may have one or many to choose from.
If you set up a Gift Delivery Email Template and don't see it available for selection, make sure that it's Active!
2.5. Save!
3.1. Go to Membership Inventory
You can do this from the Membership Hub
Or from the Membership Inventory tab
Or by finding and selecting in the App Launcher
3.2. Select a Membership where you wish to add a giftable Price Level
Alternatively, you can create a new membership.
3.3. Click New Membership Price Level
You'll need to scroll down to the bottom to get to this section.
3.4. Set up the Membership Price Level
- Price Level: Gift the membership a name
- Term: Select Annual
- Because gift memberships are not compatible with auto-renewal, gift memberships can only be Annual
- Price: The amount the buyer will pay, plus the Fee
- Fee: The amount for the fee, if any, that is added to the base Price
- Fair Market Value: If some or all of the Price is considered a Donation, set the amount that corresponds to the portion of the Price which is not tax deductible
- If the entire Price should be considered a Donation, set the Fair Market Value to 0
- If none of the Price should be considered a Donation, leave the Fair Market Value blank
- Visibility: Set to Public
- Because gift memberships are only purchasable online via the Public Ticketing Site (PTS), this must be set to Public
- Benefit Level: Select a Benefit Level that has a Gift Delivery Email Template set
- Sort Order (optional): Use to define the order in which Membership Price Levels display; lower numbers are listed first
- PWYW: Check if you'd like buyers to be able to purchase this Membership within a price range; if checked the Price becomes the minimum price for this Membership and buyers can enter a greater amount to pay, if desired
- A Price Level cannot be made PWYW or changed from PWYW to a regular Price Level after saving. In other words, once this box is checked, it cannot be unchecked. Likewise, if a Price Level is saved with this box unchecked, this box cannot be checked.
- Giftable: Select Gift only to make this a gift membership
- Auto-Renewal: Select Disabled
- Gift memberships are not compatible with auto-renewal
- Active: Check to make sure that this Membership is available for purchase
- Save!
4. And, with that, you've created a gift membership available for sale!
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Gift memberships are a built-in feature and free to use!
When you're ready, you'll set up gift memberships and be all good to go.
If you use PatronPortal, recipients of gift memberships will automatically get access to PatronPortal on the delivery date for their gift.
In the Gift Membership Delivery template, make sure to include a merge field with the recipient's PatronPortal login link and username so that they can get all of their information at once!
First-time PatronPortal users will receive a separate email with a link to set up their password.
Yes! Any time on or after the delivery date, you can use the Email Gift Membership button on the recipient's Benefit record to resend them their email.
Yes! Patrons can purchase any combination of items in the same cart as a gift membership.
While patrons can select their desired Delivery Method for other items in their cart, gift memberships always have a Delivery Method of Email.
If you'd like to encourage existing members to purchase gift memberships for their friends and family, you can offer an automatic member discount on giftable Membership Price Levels!
You can also link directly to memberships with giftable Price Levels from your website or call out gift memberships in the Membership sidebar text of your PTS.
At this time, gift memberships are only available for purchase on the PTS.
This means that you won't be able to internally sell gift memberships in PMBO. If you'd like the ability to sell gift memberships internally, please submit a Product Idea.
Not at this time. If this is something you'd like to be able to do, please submit a Product Idea.
If you refund a gift membership the recipient's membership and benefits are canceled and the purchaser receives their money back.
Yes! You'll have the information for both the purchaser and recipient of gift memberships in PatronManager. Both will even go through qualification, so you'll have Contact and Account records for both of them.
At this time, gift memberships cannot be set for auto-renewal.
If you would like to allow gift memberships to auto-renew, please submit a Product Idea.
The recipient receives any member renewal reminders set up for gift memberships.
The template editor is powered by BeeFree.io, specialists in email template design. If you're running into a roadblock, they have some excellent help documentation for you. Check it out right here!