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Member Compass: Novi's Online Member Portal
Member Compass: Novi's Online Member Portal

Learn what the Member Compass is, what it looks like, and how your members can see and use it.

Jenn Norman, CAE avatar
Written by Jenn Norman, CAE
Updated over a week ago

Member Compass Video Overviews:

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What is the Member Compass?

Your members' online profile and guide to their information within your association. 


How Does it Work?

An individual must first create a user account. Once they are logged in, they will be able to see and access their profile information, membership status, transaction history, ecommerce orders, event registrations, and more.

They can get to their Member Compass by clicking on their name in the top-right hand corner, similar to other social platforms.

Note that non-members with a login still have their own Member Compass, but cannot access members-only information.

Sharing Links to the Member Compass

To share a direct link with your members to their Member Compass Dashboard, add /member-compass to the end of your website domain.

Section/Tab

You can also share a direct link to the tabs within the Member Compass by adding /member-compass#NAME-OF-TAB, or right-click on the tab and click Copy Link Address.

Add the following to the end of your website domain to direct users straight to a specific tab in their Member Compass:

  • Dashboard = /member-compass

  • Pay Balance = /member-compass#pay-balance

  • Account History = /member-compass#accounting

  • My Events = /member-compass#events

  • Continuing Education = /member-compass#continuing-education

  • My Orders = /member-compass#orders

  • Profile = /member-compass#profile

  • Login & Password = /member-compass#login-and-password

  • Payment Methods = /member-compass#payment-methods

  • Companies = /member-compass#companies

  • People = /member-compass#staff

  • Reports = /reports/report-list

Note: Logged-in Members may see different tabs in their Member Compass, based on their engagement and whether or not they have management access to their company's account. In addition, both members and non-members may have an account, though their access to certain things on the website will differ. Learn how to grant management access so that people are able to update their company's profile.

Specific Field

To link to a specific field within the Profile tab, add the section name to your domain. Like this: /member-compass#profile-DISPLAY-NAME-OF-FIELD.

If linking directly from the Member Compass itself, utilize only the tab and Display Name for the field in the link like this: #profile-DISPLAY-NAME-OF-FIELD.


What Will Users See?

What individuals will see depends on their status in your membership list and/or their level of access. 

All Individuals 

Regardless of member type, status, or family relationships - All logged-in users will be able to see:

  • Their Dashboard with their membership status

  • Transactions billed to themselves

  • Their event history

  • Their continuing education credits

  • Their order history

  • Their own personal profile information

Individuals with Company Privileges

Including Primary Contacts, Billing Contacts, and Management Access - Logged in users that are assigned as the Primary and/or Billing Contact for a company, as well as users with management access, can see all of the above, as well as:

  • View and edit the company profile(s) - if they have access to one company they will have a "Company" tab in their Member Compass, but if they have access to more than one company they will have a "Companies" tab with a list of all the companies

  • View and pay transactions for the company, all sub-companies, and related contacts

  • View their parent company's order history and subscriptions (they will not see this information for sub-companies or related people)

  • Manage the people list for the company and all sub-companies (this is optional with a setting - see the People section below for more info), including add/remove people members, edit people member profiles, and edit people member management access (with an option to select multiple companies in the family, if applicable)

  • View related record's event registration history and upcoming events.

Note: Anyone in the family tree can have access to multiple company profiles and their people lists. Learn how to give an individual access to multiple related companies.


Individuals with Reports Access

  • A list of reports that are available for viewing based on the settings for each custom report.


Member Compass Sections

Sections available to all users:

DASHBOARD

The Dashboard section is the first page your member will see upon login. This section will show them their membership status (the messaging here varies depending on your membership structure and the particular member's status), a message from you, any outstanding invoices, upcoming events, and featured blog categories.

Keep in mind, this is the dashboard for a test account (and primary contact of a company), so a particular member may not have these exact sections.

PAY BALANCE

The Pay Balance tab shows transactions that have been billed to the member. Primary Contacts, Billing Contacts, and those with management access will also be able to see open balances for their company, all sub-companies, and related people.

The member has the option to select the Full Balance, Overdue Balance, or choose from Specific Invoices. For payment, the member can use a previously saved Credit/Debit Card or add a new card.

If the member has not previously signed up for Auto-Pay for membership renewals, that option will be given in the Payment box. If they need to opt-out, they can so do in the Payment Methods tab.

ACCOUNT HISTORY

By default, everyone will have an Account History tab that will show transactions that have been billed to them. Here, members can view transactions, pay invoices, or print transactions in bulk.

Primary Contacts, Billing Contacts, and those with management access will also be able to see transactions billed to their company, all sub-companies, and other related contacts of the company.

Transactions are sorted by default in order of open invoices that are due. The "sort by" tool allows users to sort their transactions by balance, who was billed, transaction date, due date, status, and total. Note that the transaction status appears in the righthand corner of the transaction space.

MY EVENTS

The My Events tab will show any upcoming events the user is registered for as well as events they have registered for in the past.

  • Upcoming events can quickly be added to a calendar.

  • For past events, users can see whether they have been marked as "Attended". If an attendee status is not marked as Attended or Not Attended, no status will display.

  • Primary Contacts, Billing Contacts, and those with management access will also be able to see events for other related contacts of the company by checking the box Show Related Registrations at the top of the list.

CONTINUING EDUCATION

The Continuing Education section shows any credits awarded to the user for event attendance, as well as any credits added manually to their activity timeline by admins.

Logged-in users can download a full Continuing Education Report using the button in the top right corner, or see detailed information on specific credits earned by selecting "View Credit" (Learn more about viewing credits here).

MY ORDERS

The My Orders section shows for any order purchasers. Here, they can see order information for orders they have placed, their order fulfillment status, and tracking number (if applicable), as well as subscription information.

Primary Contacts, Billing Contacts, and those with management access will also be able to see orders and subscriptions billed to their parent company.

PROFILE

All individuals will be able to edit their profile information - such as contact information and custom fields. Allowing users the ability to change their parent company is a per-association decision (learn more about this setting here). Let the Novi team know if you would like to update this setting for your website.

To maintain data integrity, individuals must contact the association to request a change to their name, title (prefix), and/or suffix.

In addition to name and company information, a profile special field can be displayed at the very top of the profile section. Set the options for this field in Association Settings > Membership.

LOGIN & PASSWORD

The Login & Password section allows users to see their main Contact Email and Login Email, and to edit their login email and password. Note that they must know their current password to make these changes.

PAYMENT METHODS

In the Payment Methods tab, members can add, update, or delete saved credit cards.

In addition, if they previously opted-in to use their card to Auto-Pay Membership Renewals, they can opt-out in this tab. A warning box like the one below will display:

Sections available only to company Primary Contacts, Billing Contacts, or users with management access to a company:

COMPANY / COMPANIES

This section allows users with company privileges to edit company information such as contact info and custom field information. The label will depend on whether they have access to one company or multiple companies. If multiple, the tab will display a list of all the companies they have access to.

Note: These users will not be able to edit the company's name.

PEOPLE

Here, users with company privileges can add and remove people members from the company's People list. They can also assign open seats to people to self-manage their own member benefits.

Items of note:

  • Adding a person will also email an invite to that individual to create their user account unless the email is already in use by another user.

  • When removing a person from the People list, the system removes the Parent Company from the person's record, but it does not delete their record from the system.

  • When giving another person management access, a dropdown will appear where they can select which companies that person should have access to.

  • If the other person is the Primary Contact or Billing Contact for their company, then the user will not be able to remove that person from the People list.

    • The person who is Primary or Billing Contact will not have a link in the Action column to "Remove from people" so the user will need to reach out to an admin.

    • In the screenshot below, Mary Morgan is an example of a person who cannot be removed via the Member Compass.

  • For memberships that are seat-based, users with management access can only assign open seats to people. If they wish to remove them from a seat and stop them from receiving member benefits they will need to remove them from the company entirely, or contact an admin to get them removed manually (so they can still be associated with the company but not inherit benefits).

Check your settings!

The People tab will only appear in the Member Compass for users with company privileges if the setting for users with management access to be able to control their company's people is turned on for your website.

  • For trade associations with company members, we recommend that this setting is turned ON so that primary contacts can remove/add person members from their company (or companies) and update the member's information.

  • For a society with individual members, you may want this turned OFF so that membership information stays protected from unwanted changes. Ultimately the decision is yours.

A second setting to consider is the one that allows the user with management access to move existing person to a different parent company.

  • They will only be able to select from a list of companies they have access to (i.e. in their family). This also means the companies must already exist in the database - the user will not be able to add a new company here.

These settings can be updated in Association Settings > Membership tab.

Section available only to people with reports access:

REPORTS

This section allows users with reports access to view/download the custom reports that are available to them.

Members will see a frontend version of the exact report you created on the backend, with the ability to print to PDF or export to Excel.

Check your settings!

The Reports tab will only appear in the Member Compass for users with reports access. To enable access, you must turn on "Share Report with Non-Admin Users" on each custom report you'd like to display, then select the appropriate group.


Creating a Membership from the Member Compass

There are a few scenarios where a user can create or renew a membership from their Member Compass. Of course, this requires that they already have a login, so a few specific scenarios would apply here:

  • The user is an expired/lapsed member who would like to renew their membership.

  • The user is an expired/lapsed member in grace period status who would like to renew their membership.

  • The user is a current member, but you have auto-renewal turned off and allow members to renew themselves prior to their expiration.

  • The user is a non-member with a login who would like to register for an individual membership.

  • The user is a prospect with a login who would like to register for an individual membership.

  • The logged-in user is the primary/billing contact or has management access to a non-member company and would like to register for a company membership.

  • The logged-in user is the primary/billing contact or has management access to a prospect company and would like to register for a company membership.

Check out a few of our deep dive articles to learn more about:

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