Group promotions question

[Jordan Miller]

Hey IPB fam, I could use some clarification please. 🙏 

I set up rules for Group promotion.

I want the system to promote members to different groups based on the amount of Reputation they get (the +1 for "liking" someone's reply)

The more Reputation you have, the hotter you are 😏 
 
Spark    0-9 Reputation score    
Ember    10 Reputation score    
Flame    50 Reputation score    

There are instances I want to manually move a member from Spark to Ember for instance.

If I tell the system to move them from Spark to Ember, it won't unless I manually increase that member's reputation to any number between 10 and 49. Is that how I should proceed, or am I missing something? Basically, if I want to manually move a member from Spark to Ember, I must increase their reputation score first so that it matches with the rules in place (even if they did not earn that reputation)? 

I would also love to discuss what you guys do with Secondary groups. I am trying to think of a scenario where you would want a user to belong to a second group with different permissions. If anyone has insight on that I'd love to know more and cook up some more concepts for my forum.

Thanks!

 

[Joel R]

You should be able to manually move a member into another group without having the promotion rules apply to them.  

The reason why is that when you define the group promotion rule, you can define the group on which the rule will run.  For example, your rule for Spark2Ember will only run on the Spark group.  It won't apply to the Ember group.  

Also, major kudos to the names of your membergroups.  I love 🤩 the creativity of your group names! 

[Jordan Miller]

3 minutes ago, Joel R said:

You should be able to manually move a member into another group without having the promotion rules apply to them.  

The reason why is that when you define the group promotion rule, you can define the group on which the rule will run.  For example, your rule for Spark2Ember will only run on the Spark group.  It won't apply to the Ember group.  

Hey @Joel R always good to hear from ya.

 Interesting. What would I change to solve this? Currently all rules are set to "All Groups."

I tried telling the 'Spark' promotion rule to filter for Spark and Ember but when I went to change the test member account from Spark to Ember with 0 Reputation, it still did not move them to Ember. 

[Joel R]

In the settings for each tile, there is an option for the rule to only move members from X membergroup.

[Joel R]

The problem is that you're applying the rules to all groups. You want to only apply your Spark2Ember rule only on Spark group, Ember2Flame rule only on Ember group etc.

[Jordan Miller]

21 minutes ago, Joel R said:

The problem is that you're applying the rules to all groups. You want to only apply your Spark2Ember rule only on Spark group, Ember2Flame rule only on Ember group etc.

This did the trick!! 👏😭 

Thank you! @Joel R

I have one more question about Group promotion rules if you don't mind.

I am going to give members the option to subscribe. Once they buy with either dollars or points, they'll get moved to the Premium group. No matter what group or secondary group they're in... it shouldn't matter right? The Group Promotions will ignore the rules if they are a subscriber yea? 

I would love some reassurance that when someone subscribes, they their Premium account won't get moved to one of the Fire groups because their reputation count may reach a new level. 

[Joel R]

Just now, breatheheavy

21 minutes ago, Joel R said:

The problem is that you're applying the rules to all groups. You want to only apply your Spark2Ember rule only on Spark group, Ember2Flame rule only on Ember group etc.

This did the trick!! 👏😭 

Thank you! @Joel R

I have one more question about Group promotion rules if you don't mind.

I am going to give members the option to subscribe. Once they buy with either dollars or points, they'll get moved to the Premium group. No matter what group or secondary group they're in... it shouldn't matter right? The Group Promotions will ignore the rules if they are a subscriber yea? 

I would love some reassurance that when someone subscribes, they their Premium account won't get moved to one of the Fire groups because their reputation count may reach a new level. 

If you move the user into a primary group called Premium, then no those group promotion rules won't apply.

The software will also ask, when you set up your Subscriber settings, if you'd like to move the member back to their original group once the subscription expires.

[Jordan Miller]

5 minutes ago, Joel R said:

If you move the user into a primary group called Premium, then no those group promotion rules won't apply.

The software will also ask, when you set up your Subscriber settings, if you'd like to move the member back to their original group once the subscription expires.

Brilliant! Just wanted to make double sure before I pull the trigger so I don't anger any members heh. 

Wondering... what's an example where an admin would want their users included in a secondary group? Would love an example! Having trouble wrapping my head around that.

[Joel R]

11 minutes ago, breatheheavy said:

Wondering... what's an example where an admin would want their users included in a secondary group? Would love an example! Having trouble wrapping my head around that.

Most people use it to give expanded permissions or features to members who may be members of multiple usergroups. 

Example 1: Targeted Permissions

For example, if you have members who monitor the Pages wiki or who write Pages articles, but they may be spread across multiple usergroups, then you can assign them special editing privileges in Pages as a secondary group permission while still retaining their primary group.  (For example, maybe they're a "Flame" or "Ember" but you only want to give trusted people access to writing articles in your community, not all Flames or Embers.)

Example 2: Overlapping Permissions

You can also sell overlapping products in Commerce to decorate the user postbit, signature, or profile.  For example, one product might upgrade the name to a sparkling name.  One product might give a special badge on the profile.  One product might allow them private albums and blogs.  Because you want to allow users to pick-and-choose between these user upgrades, you want to only add the secondary membergroup for the feature that they purchased.  

 

To be totally honest though, my personal 'best practice' suggestion is that you want to try to keep your groups as simple and as flat as possible.  Multiple membergroups leads to a complex hierarchy, which can realistically lead to permission issues.  I've seen (and been a member of) many boards where their permissions were totally messed up, because the owner never checked all of the overlapping restrictions.  You really want to audit your permissions, menus, visitor experience, etc. on an annual basis and make sure they're manageable.

[Jordan Miller]

59 minutes ago, Joel R said:

Most people use it to give expanded permissions or features to members who may be members of multiple usergroups. 

Example 1: Targeted Permissions

For example, if you have members who monitor the Pages wiki or who write Pages articles, but they may be spread across multiple usergroups, then you can assign them special editing privileges in Pages as a secondary group permission while still retaining their primary group.  (For example, maybe they're a "Flame" or "Ember" but you only want to give trusted people access to writing articles in your community, not all Flames or Embers.)

Example 2: Overlapping Permissions

You can also sell overlapping products in Commerce to decorate the user postbit, signature, or profile.  For example, one product might upgrade the name to a sparkling name.  One product might give a special badge on the profile.  One product might allow them private albums and blogs.  Because you want to allow users to pick-and-choose between these user upgrades, you want to only add the secondary membergroup for the feature that they purchased.  

 

To be totally honest though, my personal 'best practice' suggestion is that you want to try to keep your groups as simple and as flat as possible.  Multiple membergroups leads to a complex hierarchy, which can realistically lead to permission issues.  I've seen (and been a member of) many boards where their permissions were totally messed up, because the owner never checked all of the overlapping restrictions.  You really want to audit your permissions, menus, visitor experience, etc. on an annual basis and make sure they're manageable.

Wow what an awesome response 👏 

Thank you!! The second example is something that I could potentially see happening on my forum, but for now I am going to (like you suggested) keep things simple. I have also been one of those forum admins in the past that had a MESS of permissions in the back-end. Ick. 

Thank you for taking the time to reply 🙏 

[Morrigan]

I prefer to use secondary groups as informational (for me) or permissive. Basically I just like to give people "more" things with secondary groups (especially since you can't take things away) @breatheheavy

For example I have a secondary group called "new people" that members are in for 1 week from the time they join. This shows them specific "new people" widgets/blocks to help get them integrated into the site. For example it links to our welcome guide, our welcome forum, etc. After a week, the group is removed and the blocks disappear too. (I think I remove the group if they post a lot too but don't quote me I have complicated group promotion rules). I also have a secondary group that I use to see how many of my members are inactive.

Alternatively, I use a secondary group to give access to special forums on my site.

Lastly, I have Post before register enabled but there are some things I didn't want guests to be able to post to that I did want new registered members to be able to post to. So I have a secondary group for new members that provides those permissions as a secondary group (to post to these things) where the main group does not have those.

So, I agree with @Joel R Keep it simple when it comes to groups or if you don't at least verify your permissions otherwise people may be able to see things that they shouldn't be able to see.

[Jordan Miller]

36 minutes ago, Morrigan said:

For example I have a secondary group called "new people" that members are in for 1 week from the time they join. This shows them specific "new people" widgets/blocks to help get them integrated into the site. For example it links to our welcome guide, our welcome forum, etc. After a week, the group is removed and the blocks disappear too. (I think I remove the group if they post a lot too but don't quote me I have complicated group promotion rules). I also have a secondary group that I use to see how many of my members are inactive.

Absolutely love this! 

I saw there's a plugin that shows logged in users a different homepage from guests. This could be useful to show blocks like you mentioned. I am intrigued with your secondary permissions method! I love the idea of holding their hand and guiding them on how to use the forum. I am struggling with that. There's so much to know and learn and I think my newly-registered members get overwhelmed. 

[Morrigan]

These are the ones that I use personally. I'm going to pep the top one up a bit but I didn't want it to be too intrusive and used just funny things to say. The one on the right is more to answer questions that people have able being a new member as I have a post promotion rule before some things are available to new members to ensure they are not spammers, not trolls etc:

Edited April 29, 2020 by Morrigan