Automating member placement with Dynamic Membership

Automating member placement with Dynamic Membership

Understand dynamic membership

Dynamic Membership helps you automatically place members into the right spaces or boards based on their profile information. Instead of adding members manually, you create a workflow rule that checks profile fields, such as interests, skills, and custom profile fields, then performs an action when the rule matches. Each time a new user is added to the community or an existing profile is updated, the rule is triggered.   
In a community context, this is useful when you want membership to stay organized automatically. For example, you might add members to a city or interest based spaces, a topic-based boards without having to manage those assignments manually.

This capability is available only to community's Superhost, Hosts, and members with appropriate custom role.  

Decide when to use a rule   

Use a dynamic membership rule when membership should depend on something already stored in the member’s profile.
Good examples include:
  • Adding members from a specific location to a regional community space or board
  • Adding members with a shared interest to a themed discussion space or board

For example, if a member’s Location is “Los Angeles” and their Interests include “Football,” you can automatically place them in a space such as Los Angeles Football Fans.

Create a dynamic membership rule   

  1. Click the gear icon in the right side menu.
  2. Select Settings.



  3. On the Settings page, open Dynamic Membership under Automation.



  4. Click + New Workflow Rule.



  5. Enter a clear name for the rule.



  6. Choose either No Condition or Apply condition-based filters.



Choose No Condition only when every member should receive the same action. In most cases, you will use Apply condition-based filters so the system can decide who should be added where.


Build conditions and actions   

If you choose Apply condition-based filters, define the rule using three parts:



Choose the field attribute  

Select the profile field you want the rule to evaluate. Available fields include standard and custom profile attributes such as:
  • Display name
  • About me
  • user added/enabled  
  • Email Address
  • Any Custom field created in the user profile.


Choose the rule type  

The available rule changes depending on the field type.
For text-based fields, the available rules are:
  • Is
  • Is not
  • Starts with
  • Contains
  • Ends with
  • Does not start with
  • Does not contain
  • Does not end with  


For date type fields, the available rules are:
  • Before
  • After  
  • Between
 
If the selected field is Network admin or User added/enabled, no rule options are shown.



Enter the value  
In Value, enter the profile value the rule should match.


Add more logic if needed  

To make the rule more specific:
  1. Click the add icon on the right side of the condition input box to add another condition.



  2. Choose:
    • AND if all conditions must be true
    • OR if any one condition can be true


  1. Click + Nested Condition if you want grouped logic inside the same rule.  



Add the action  

After setting the conditions:
  1. Click + Add Action.
  1. Choose what should happen when the conditions are met. The available actions are:
  • Add to Spaces
  • Add to Boards
  1. Click Save.

At this point, the rule is ready and will start working for new or updated member profiles.

Apply the rule to existing members   

A newly created rule does not automatically process older member profiles that were already in the community before the rule was created. By default, it only works on profiles added afterwards, or profiles that are updated later.

If you want the rule to evaluate existing members too:
  1. Open Settings and go to Dynamic Membership under Automation.
  2. In the configured rules list, hover over the rule you want.
  3. Click the run through filter icon beside the rule name and confirm the action.


Use this option whenever you create a rule after your community is already active and you want older members to be assigned correctly without waiting for profile updates.

Check workflow results   

Once the rule is active, use Logs to confirm that it is working as expected.
  1. Open Settings and go to Dynamic Membership under Automation.
  2. Find the rule in the configured rules list.
  3. Click the logs icon beside the rule name.
  4. In the logs table, click See more if you want additional details.  

Logs show when the rule was triggered and what result it produced. This is the best place to verify whether the correct members were evaluated and whether the intended action was applied.


  
 

Edit or delete a rule   

As your community structure changes, you may need to update or remove a rule.

To edit a rule:
  1. Open Settings and go to Dynamic Membership under Automation.
  2. Find the rule in the configured rules list.
  3. Click the edit icon on the right side of the rule name.  

To delete a rule:
  1. Go to the same configured rules list.
  2. Click the delete icon to the right of  the rule name.  


Notes
Deleting a dynamic membership rule does not undo its earlier results. Members who were already added to a group or board through that rule remain there even after the rule is removed.   
If you need any assistance, contact us at support@zohocommunityspaces.com. We're happy to help!