It’s good practice to ensure your members are managed well for your thriving community. Part of member management is making sure members have the correct access to content and to connect with others within the community. Admins have the ability to manage member types and members' access in the Gradual Dashboard.
Unless certain custom rules are in place for your community, when registering new users, members will automatically be Approved and have a Standard member type.
Note: If you want to restrict anyone who isn’t a member from viewing or signing up for your community, you’ll want to make your community private. Learn more about Private Communities here.
Approved, Pending Approval, and Unapproved
There are three lists of users in your community dashboard Member List. You can change the users's access level from their profile, or in bulk from the Member List.
Approved
These users can log in and access the platform to see content, events, etc. Unless certain custom rules are in place for your community, when registering new users, members will automatically be Approved and have a Standard member type.
Pending Approval
These users CANNOT log in or access the platform as members but can access any public pages.
This list is best used for users who are temporarily suspended, and their access needs to be reviewed by admins - and potentially will be approved and provided access to the community, or unapproved and remain blocked from accessing the community as a member.
User Experience when signing up or logging in: They can enter the sign-up information but will be notified that their account is pending, and will not be able to access any logged-in pages within your community.
User Experience when admin changes setting while they are logged in: They will be logged out of the browser or mobile app session. They will be unable to log back in but can access any public pages on their browser.
Some sign-up rules will mark users as Pending Approval if their domain is on the block list, or not on the allow list.
Learn more about sign-up settings here.
Unapproved
These users CANNOT log in or access the platform as members but can access any public pages. This list is best used for users who should remain suspended or blocked from accessing the community as a member and do not need to be reviewed.
User Experience when signing up or logging in: They can enter the sign-up information but will be notified that their account is pending, and will not be able to access any logged-in pages within your community.
User Experience when admin changes setting while they are logged in: They will be logged out of the browser or mobile app session. They will be unable to log back in but can access any public pages on their browser.
Users cannot be deleted from your dashboard entirely but can be marked Unapproved to restrict their access and login.
Unapproved members cannot access events on the Gradual Go event mobile app at all.
Member Types
Standard
Standard users are able to attend and engage in all features of your community.
These users:
✅ Can see & register for all events
✅ Can see and join Roundtables
✅ Can chat and submit questions during events
✅ Can join 1:1 match calls
✅ Can see content
✅ Can join Clubs (Chapters and Interest Groups)
✅ Can see Forum posts
✅ Can post, comment, and react to posts in the Forum
✅ Can see the 'People' tab and members' profiles throughout the platform
✅ Can message other members
✅ Can see the 'Channels' tab and post discussions within
Notes:
Users must complete their profile to engage in many of the interactive elements of the community.
You can still further restrict content, users, and events even for standard users using access groups or Spaces. These groups allow you to create a subset of users and assign content or events that can only be viewed by that group of users.
Guest
'Guest' users have controlled access to member and event engagement across the platform. Guests are not visible (their profile) to others, so others cannot message them, or see them in the People tab. However, they can see others on the platform and within events.
These users:
✅ Can see & register for all events
✅ Can see and join Roundtables
✅ Can join 1:1 match calls
✅ Can see content
✅ Can join Clubs (Chapters and Interest Groups)
✅ Can see Forum posts
✅ Can post, comment, and react to posts in the Forum
✅ Can see the 'People' tab and members' profiles throughout the platform
❌ Their profile is hidden from other members in the People tab, and on event landing pages (as attendees)
❌ Cannot message other members
❌ Cannot chat and submit questions during events
❌ Can see the 'Channels' tab but cannot post discussions within
Notes:
If a member is Marked 'Guest' At The Community Level, they will automatically be registered as a Guest in the event.
Limited Approval
These users can join the community, view content, and attend live stream & hybrid events, but cannot see or interact with anyone else on the platform.
These users:
✅ Can see & register for live stream & hybrid events
✅ Can see content
✅ Can see and join Clubs (Chapters and Interest Groups)
❌ Cannot see the 'People' tab and members' profiles throughout the platform
❌ Their profile is hidden from other members in the People tab and throughout the platform
❌ Cannot register for in-person events, 1:1 match events, meetings, or webinars
❌ Cannot see or join Roundtables
❌ Cannot see or join 1:1 match calls
❌ Cannot message other members
❌ Cannot chat and submit questions during events
❌ Cannot see the 'Channels' tab or post discussions within
❌ Cannot see Forum posts
❌ Cannot post, comment, and react to posts in the Forum
💡 Pro Tip: Customers will often use the Limited Approval member type for competitors, or a read-only mode for users that should not be permitted to interact or view others on the platform.
Note: If you are looking to give Admin access to a member, this happens in the Permissions tab on the Gradual dashboard menu.
Managing and changing member approval and Member Type
From Gradual dashboard, you can select Members and the Member List. From there, you will see all the Approved members, all Pending users, and all Unapproved users.
You can bulk update member types in the dashboard by following these steps.
Using the action buttons in the list or directly from a member’s profile, you can approve, unapprove or mark users pending.
Note: If you unapprove or mark a user pending the user will be immediately logged off the platform and be required to log in again for the change to take effect.
You can also manage Member Type within this list or directly from the member’s profile. Once you update the member type, be sure to hit “save” to save your change.
💡 Pro Tip: We recommend you check your Member List regularly to ensure no one is stuck in ‘Pending’ status, especially before an event.