How to manage members and communities in HubSpot
Membership groups, masterminds and communities all share one problem: people belong to groups, attend events and change over time, and HubSpot's standard fields only hold one answer per person. Here is how teams usually model it.
Start with the shape of the data
- People are contacts.
- Groups (a chapter, a cohort, a table) are records in their own right.
- Events are records too, linked to the people who were invited or came.
When groups and events are records and not properties, a person can be in several of each and keep the history.
Use association labels for roles
The link between a person and a group can carry a label: Member, Chair, Guest, Alumni. Because the label sits on the link, the same person can be a member of one group and a guest at another. See association labels explained.
Keep joining and leaving simple
- New member: create the link with the Member label and set the start date.
- Leaving: change the label to Alumni, don't delete the link, so you keep the history.
- Guests: link them as Guest for the event they attended, nothing more.
Reports worth having
- Members per group against a target.
- Attendance by group and by event.
- Members who have not attended anything in a long while.
Plan check. Groups and events as their own records usually mean custom objects, which need Enterprise. If you are not on Enterprise, Companies can stand in for groups, with some compromises.
Where HubRSVP fits
HubRSVP is part of Kikaye, a set of small HubSpot apps on one login. See what HubRSVP does, or read the setup guide.