Monetization overview
The pieces for charging inside your community (products, billing options, plans, add-ons, coupons and downsell), how they connect, the order to create them in, what selling costs, and which one to use in each case.
Memberfy charges inside the community: members choose, pay by PIX, boleto or card without leaving your address, and access turns on and off by itself as payments come in. The money lands in the community's balance and leaves through a payout to your bank account. This article is the map: what each piece is, how they fit together, and where to start.
Where it lives
Everything is under Administration › Monetization, in seven tabs, in this order:
| Tab | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Dashboard | The financial panel: total revenue, available for payout, held, pending, the latest transactions and the Request Payout button |
| Payments | Where the money goes: Business Information, the bank account and the payout history |
| Products | What you sell once: a recorded course, a ticket, a one-off mentoring session |
| Plans | The subscription tiers and the add-ons of each one |
| Options | The recurring ways to pay for a plan: Monthly, Annual |
| Coupons | Discount codes |
| Fees | The platform fee and the calculator |
Who subscribes to what lives in Members › Subscriptions, with the community's other people. See Subscription management.
Who can open Monetization: owner, admin and finance. The first two create and edit; finance only views. See Roles and permissions.
The pieces
| Piece | What it is | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Product | Something sold once, paid in full or in up to 12 installments | The "Excel from scratch" course for R$ 297, the ticket to the annual meetup |
| Billing option | A recurring way to pay, with a price and an interval | Growth · Monthly at R$ 129; Growth · Annual at R$ 1,188 in up to 12 installments |
| Plan | A subscription tier that groups billing options and says what the member gets | The Growth plan, with Monthly and Annual |
| Add-on | An extra that only plan holders can buy, billed together with the plan | Coworking Extension, R$ 450 a month |
| Coupon | A discount code | LANCAMENTO20: 20% off the first charge |
| Downsell | The discounted last chance for whoever skipped an add-on | Coworking at 10% off for as long as the subscription lasts |
Plus two pricing rules for monthly and annual billing options:
- Contract length: a minimum term (3, 6 or 12 months) billed month by month.
- Annual in installments: the whole year in one purchase, in up to 12 card installments.
How the pieces connect
In the API, a plan is a subscription group, and a billing option is a product of type SUBSCRIPTION. On screen, the names are the ones in the table above.
The order to create them in
Each piece uses the one before it, so order matters:
- Payout setup: submit the Business Information and the bank account for review. While it runs, steps 2 to 5 can be done as drafts; publishing and selling wait for approval. See Business information.
- Billing options, one per way to pay (Monthly, Annual).
- The plan, ticking the options from step 2.
- The add-ons, as monthly options outside any plan, ticked in the plan's Add-ons (upsell) section.
- The downsell for each add-on, in the plan itself.
- Access: spaces with Subscribers visibility, or Private unlocked for the plan.
- Coupons, whenever you want.
See also Creation order, which shows the same sequence in the API.
While the community can't sell yet, a notice at the top of Monetization says where the review stands (not submitted, under review with the expected answer date, rejected with the reason, or sales suspended after editing approved information) and takes you to the Business Information through the Open Business Information button. See The notice in Monetization.
Which one to use
| I want to… | Use |
|---|---|
| Charge a monthly fee for access to the community | A plan with a Monthly option |
| Offer monthly and annual, with a discount on annual | A plan with two options; the pricing page shows the savings on its own |
| Have tiers (Starter, Growth, Business) | One plan per tier |
| Lock subscribers in for a term | A monthly option with a contract length |
| Sell the whole year by card, in installments | An annual in installments option |
| Sell a standalone course | A product that unlocks the course space |
| Sell an extra only to existing subscribers | An add-on on the plan |
| Give a launch discount | A coupon |
| Win back whoever skipped the extra | A downsell |
A complete example, with numbers
A community using Memberfy's own catalog:
| Plan | Monthly | Annual |
|---|---|---|
| Starter (up to 100 members) | R$ 64 | R$ 588 in up to 12 installments (R$ 49 a month) |
| Growth (up to 1,000) | R$ 129 | R$ 1,188 in up to 12 installments (R$ 99 a month) |
| Business (up to 5,000) | R$ 389 | R$ 3,588 in up to 12 installments |
| Scale (up to 20,000) | R$ 649 | R$ 5,988 in up to 12 installments |
Add-ons: Coworking Extension (R$ 450 a month) and Planning & HR Extension (R$ 950 a month) on every plan; +2,000 members pack (R$ 99 a month) on Scale only.
Someone subscribes to Growth Monthly with the Coworking Extension: they pay R$ 129 + R$ 450 = R$ 579, in a single payment. The platform fee is 6.99% of R$ 579 (R$ 40.47) plus R$ 2.49 once per order: R$ 42.96. The community keeps R$ 536.04.
What selling costs
The platform fee is 6.99% + R$ 2.49 per charge, the same for PIX, boleto and card, and it applies to every sale and every renewal. Each payout costs R$ 3.67. On each product, you choose who pays the fee: the community or the buyer. See Platform fee.
What happens after a sale
- The payment is confirmed (instantly for card and PIX; when it clears, for boleto).
- Access to the plan's or product's spaces is unlocked.
- The buyer gets the confirmation email, and the community gets the sale notice.
- The sale goes into the statement and, after the payment method's waiting period, becomes available for payout.
See Checkout, Balance and statement and Payouts.
Checklist before you promote it
- Payout setup approved: Business Information and bank account with Approved status under Monetization › Payments.
- Billing options set to Active, with at least one payment method ticked.
- Plan with its options ticked, and a description and benefits filled in.
- Spaces that only payers should see set to Subscribers, or Private unlocked for the plan.
- Test the
/pricingpage with a member account: the plan shows up, the prices match, the total is right. - Who pays the fees checked on each option: the screen's default is Buyer.
- A test coupon, if you're going to use coupons, validated at checkout.
Common errors and how to fix them
| What happens | Why | What to do |
|---|---|---|
The plan doesn't show up on /pricing | The plan has no active billing option, or it is inactive | Activate the option and check the plan |
| Payment configuration has not been set up for this community | Payout setup hasn't been approved yet | Finish your Business information |
| To publish and start selling, the community needs approved business information… | The Business Information isn't approved (or it was edited and went back to review) | What you created stays as a draft. Submit it for review and publish after it's approved |
| This product has no payment method enabled. Contact the community. | No method is ticked on the option | Tick PIX, card or boleto under Payment & Pricing |
| The checkout total is higher than the price | Who Pays the Fees? is set to Buyer | Change it to Organization if the community should absorb the fee |
| The subscriber paid and can't see the space | The space isn't unlocked for the plan | Edit the space: Private with the plan under Who gets in, or Subscribers |
| I can't delete a plan | It has billing options attached or active subscriptions | Remove the options and wait for the subscriptions to end, or just deactivate it |
Frequently asked questions
Do I need an account with a payment gateway? No. Payment processing is Memberfy's: you register your details and a bank account, and that's it.
Can I charge in dollars? Each plan has one currency, and all its options use it. The default is the Brazilian real.
Can a community have a free part and a paid part? Yes, that's the most common setup: Members spaces open to everyone, and Subscribers or Private spaces for those who pay.
Can finance create a coupon? No. Finance sees coupons and how they're used; creating and editing belongs to the owner and admins.
Can I change a plan's price later? The new price applies to people who subscribe afterward; existing subscribers keep the price they signed up at. To avoid surprising anyone, create a new option and deactivate the old one.
Can one person have two plans? They can subscribe to more than one plan, each billed separately. For an extra on top of a plan, the right way is an add-on, billed together.
Where do members pay?
On the community's pricing page, /pricing. Each plan also has a direct link, /pricing/<plan>.