Creating a plan allows you to charge people a monthly/annual subscription fee for access to your community.
In this article, we'll show you how to create a community plan on Podia.
Introduction
Community Plans are the easiest way to charge people on a monthly/annual basis for access to your community.
These plans can be free or paid, and you can create multiple plans depending on how you want to structure your community.
Community plans can be used to offer:
Free or limited access
Paid tiers or levels of access
Access to different types of content
Note: Members can only be enrolled in one community plan at a time.
If someone needs access to content from multiple plans, you’ll need to create a single plan that includes everything they should have access to. If they simply want to move to a different plan, they can switch plans directly from their billing page.
Creating a new plan
Here's how to create a new plan on Podia:
From your home feed, click on your site name and select Admin from the dropdown menu.
From the Admin dashboard, click Plans in the sidebar menu.
From the Plans page, click "+ New plan" at the top-right corner.
Create your Plan by filling in the details, such as the name, privacy settings, and other options.
Navigate to the Pricing tab and click on Edit next to Offer to set up a price for your plan.
When you’re done, click Publish at the top-right corner to finish creating your plan.
Customizing your plan
As your community plan is created, it's now time to customize it.
You can navigate between the 3 available tabs to customize different aspects of your plan:
Details
Pricing
Availability
Here are the parameters for each one of the options.
Details
Details: Name, description, and image.
Included items: Give members access to specific products once they join your plan.
Included events: Give members access to specific events once they join your plan.
Spaces: Grant access to spaces via this particular plan.
Integrations: Sync new product signups with an external mailing list when they complete their account setup.
Pricing
Offer: Set up a price for your plan. Community plans only support subscription pricing.
You'll also be able to set up a trial period for paid community plans.
Upsells: Set up upsells that customers can buy after they purchase your community plan. Upsells show up during checkout after the main product is purchased.
Availability
Availability: Determine availability options, such as status, visibility, and access
Status: Choose if you want your plan to be available to new and existing customers or not.
Visibility: Choose whether you want your plan to appear on your site. Hidden plan are only available through their specific checkout link or if manually added to your site.
Access: Choose if people can sign up for this plan or not.
Limits: Set up a start date, access duration, or sign-up limits.
Publishing your plan
Once you've set up all the details and a price for your community plan, hit the Publish button to make it available for new signups.
FAQs
Can I publish my plan without setting up a price for it?
Can I publish my plan without setting up a price for it?
No. You must set a price for your community plan before publishing it, and a plan can’t be published without a price.
To add a price, go to the Pricing tab while editing your plan and set a price under the Offer section.
Can I create free community plans?
Can I create free community plans?
No. All plans must have a price set in order to be published.
If you need to control access for different groups, you can use free products instead and grant access to specific spaces or products through those.
What's the difference between plans and the free community access?
What's the difference between plans and the free community access?
By default, anyone who signs up for your site will get free access to your community.
You can add more control by creating paid plans. These plans let you decide which products and spaces members can access, so you can organize your content and offers more clearly.
For example, higher-priced plans can include more benefits, additional products, and access to more exclusive spaces, while lower-tier plans can offer more limited access.
Can I change the price of a plan after I publish it?
Can I change the price of a plan after I publish it?
Yes, you can change the price of a plan after you publish it.
Changing the price of a plan will just impact new signups. Existing customers will remain locked into the pricing of their signup.
What billing intervals are available for plans?
What billing intervals are available for plans?
Plans are billed on a monthly and/or yearly basis, with the customer’s billing date determined by the day they joined your plan.
For example, if a members signs up for a monthly subscription on May 14th, their next billing date will be June 14th.
Can customers sign up for more than one plan?
Can customers sign up for more than one plan?
Members are only able to have one active plan.
If they want to join a different plan, they'll need to change their plan directly from their dashboard.
Why can't I select a paid payment option?
Why can't I select a paid payment option?
Before you can create a paid plan, you’ll need to connect a Stripe account to Podia.
At this time, PayPal is not supported for plans.
Can I set up a one-time payment option that grants access forever?
Can I set up a one-time payment option that grants access forever?
No. At this time, plans cannot be purchased with a one-time payment.
Plans are designed to use recurring billing only, with either monthly or annual subscription options.
How does it work when a customer upgrades their plan during their billing cycle?
How does it work when a customer upgrades their plan during their billing cycle?
When a customer upgrades their plan, we prorate the cost based on what they’ve already used. Any unused time from their current plan is converted into credit and applied toward the new plan, so they only pay the remaining difference.
This doesn’t result in a discount or lost revenue, because they still pay for the time used on the original plan plus the remaining value of the higher plan. Charging the full difference on top of that would mean charging twice for the same time.