Members Advantage

We use Advantage Membership, now re-branded as Members Advantage, to support several discreet membership programs. Specifically, we are on version 17.0, to which we upgrade in June 2017. The original implementation in 2014 was to version 13r1. We use the membership module, automated data feed processes, eCommerce capability, circulation audit functionality. and additional functionality to support non-membership publishing activity. We refer to the system just as 'Advantage' which I will do here. We work as a service provider to other membership organizations, managing discreet membership offerings for completely different companies in the same system - Advantage. This AMS allows us to setup and manage separate rules for membership categories, dues, renewal, included products, optional products, and delivery options. We are able to support multiyear offerings, migration or sequenced renewal between member categories, and a very flexible demographic or profile collection mechanism. And we have the flexibility to do all of this without constraining the options of any specific membership organization. In addition to supporting the membership options end, Advantage also provides us sophisticated support for print and online content products that can be bundled with membership offerings. All of the transactions, membership or otherwise, generated accounting bookkeeping entries within Advantage, so we are able to simply feed data to our accounting system with no need for an additional step or system to create the accounting transactions. One important lesson learned during our implementation is to clearly define and document your business rules. Because Advantage is flexible, configurable, and provides mechanisms for customization, you need to be sure you understand what you want before building. By jumping in with incomplete requirements at the start, we configured ourselves into a corner a few times.

We have been using the Advantage Membership Module for over 10 years. This module currently supports 100's of thousands of membership subscriptions for our titles. It offers a great deal of flexibility and really has allowed our membership business to grow and thrive. We are able to create robust reporting from the data created with the membership creation and movement of those members. We are using version 17.6 of the application and are considering transitioning from the current membership module to the new Members Advantage functionality. (This is actually a point of greatness for this application, we are not forced to adapt right away, instead we are given the opportunity to move over business when it makes sense to move our business. Also, we are able to help drive the product direction through the fantastic relationship that ACS commits to having with all of their clients. So the tool can move and grow with our business needs)