3 ways to increase member registration on your website

Meredith -

Having members register on your website is an important part of being able to experience and use all of the features available with HOA Express. This provides you with the opportunity to have an online member directory, improve communication with your membership, and increase engagement, amongst other things.

If you’ve noticed a lag in member registration, read on for three ways you can incentivize your members to register for an account on your website!

1. Lay out the benefits

An individual is more likely to sign up for something when they’re aware of the benefits of doing so. Therefore, we recommend clearly outlining these benefits for your members, so they’re aware of what they’d gain by registering on your website and what they’d miss out on if they didn’t.

Registering for an account on your website helps keep your members in the loop about what's happening in your community. Below are some things members can do once they have a registered and approved account:

  • Log in to access restricted pages (e.g., member directory)
  • Receive communications from the community
  • Add content to certain pages (e.g., forum)
  • Participate in online surveys
  • Submit online payments

Tip

We recommend adding this information to a public “General Text” page on your website. Here, you can outline the benefits of registering for an account and provide additional helpful resources from the HOA Express help center. Below is an example of how this page could look:

2. Include interactive pages

In addition to having informative pages on your website for members to visit (e.g., a calendar, announcements page, important forms and documents) adding pages members can interact with also helps encourage them to register!

Below is a list of some of the interactive page types you can add to your website:

  • Classifieds
  • Forum (e.g., for community discussions or local recommendations)
  • Garage Sales
  • Photo Gallery (create ones for various events or fun contests)
  • Recipes

While you could leave these pages accessible to the public, only approved members have access to log in and contribute to them. If there’s new content regularly added to them, a member is more likely to register and log in so they can participate on those pages.

3. Restrict access to members

Aside from the homepage, for each page you add to your website, you have the option to leave it viewable by the public or add a restriction to password protect its content. When a page restriction is applied, our system requires the user to be logged in to an approved account before they can view that content.

In addition to restricting pages that should only be viewed by members, like community financial records, you can also lock pages that your members are more likely to visit often. Doing so will incentivize them to register for an account so they can gain access to those pages.

If you're not sure which pages to restrict, you can visit the "Analytics" section in the Admin Control Panel to see the top viewed pages on your website. This can help you gain a better idea of which pages to restrict to only your members, so they're encouraged to register for an account to continue viewing them.

Tip

One way you can organize pages only accessible by approved members is to place them under a "Members only" or "Members area" folder. This is a quick signifier to members that there are pages they likely want access to that are restricted from public view.

Wrapping up

Your community website has the potential to be an exciting way for your members to connect and find all of the information they need in one place. For your community to receive the full benefits of this, it's important your members register for an account on your website so they can engage further.

By implementing the above tips, you'll help inform your members of the benefits of registering and motivate them to create an account so they can join in on the fun!