What is a Membership?

Membership – In the Online Commerce Suite, the way to process or submit recurring charges on a regular basis where the consumer subscribes to a service or a newsletter.

Memberships organization is a term which refers to any organization that allows people to subscribe, and often requires them to pay a membership fee or “subscription”.

Memberships organizations typically have a particular purpose, which involves connecting people together around a particular profession, industry, activity, interest, mission or geographical location. This might simply be to encourage or facilitate interaction and collaboration, but it also often involves promoting and enhancing the purpose itself.

They are often not for profit, but there are also many commercially run membership organizations, and some larger not for profit membership organizations (like the National Trust in the United Kingdom) which have commercial subsidiaries.

They vary in size from very small, voluntary associations, which may not be formally established, to very large nationally or internationally renowned organizations, like the aforementioned National Trust, which had 3.7 million members in 2010, each paying about £50 per year. Some of these memberships organizations are referred to as multi-chapters if they have a main parent organization that is made up of chapters, clubs, or regions.

Types of memberships organization include Professional associations, Trade associations, Voluntary associations, Political parties, Clubs and a wide range of others.

Memberships organizations typically rely on Memberships software to provide their services to their members.