Here's the first thing you need to know: The User Registration process.

There is no such thing as "pre-registration" in DAP for buying products or becoming a member (eg., expecting people to "register" first before they buy something).

Instead, the "purchase" of a product itself is the actual registration.

So the basic flow is like this...

1. Visitor arrives at your web site
2. They click on a buy button on your sales page to become a member (or buy a 1-time product)
3. They're taken to...
   a) Your Payment Processor directly (eg., Paypal, ClickBank), or...
   b) Your 3rd-party Cart (eg., 1ShoppingCart, PremiumWebCart), or...
   c) The DAP shopping cart checkout page (where they check out right on your web site)
4. When they complete checkout and finish paying for the product, at that very instant, DAP (on your site) gets the buyer's information from the payment processor or shopping cart. And THAT is actually when the member account is first created, member is sent the Welcome Email that you have previously configured in DAP (you'll see how to do all of that shortly), etc.
5. Seconds after they complete checkout and finish paying, they are automatically logged in to the member's area on your site, and they can start consuming your members-only content that you have made available to "buyers of this product" (a.k.a "members of this level"). If this is not a "membership" product, then you could also send them to any static "Thank You" page - you don't have to log them in automatically if you don't wish to.

Only 3 Steps To A Membership Site

1) Create a Product: Name the product, set up pricing, protect content, set up dripping (if any - if not, everything is available from day 1) etc.

2) Create a "Buy Button": Each product gets its own buy button that you will publish on your sales page. Example: If you have three products (or "levels") called "Platinum Members", "Gold Members" and "Silver Members", then you'll be creating 3 products first, then you will create 3 buy buttons (one for each Product), and put those 3 buttons on your sales page.

3) Publish the "Buy Button" on your sales page.

That's it, really!

Everything else is just tinkering with the details (where do they login, where do they go after they login, is the product recurring or one-time, what content can they access, etc)

 

One DAP Product Per Membership Level

The basic idea in DAP, is to create one DAP product per membership level.

So if you have 3 levels in your membership site called "Platinum Members", "Gold Members" and "Silver Members", then you would create 3 recurring products in DAP by those names, create 3 buy buttons and put those three buttons on your sales page.

And under each of those products, you would separately protect all pages/posts /categories/files that should be available to members of each of those levels.

So say you have 9 pages of content. And you want Platinum members to get access to all 9, Gold members to get access to only 6, and Silver to get access to only 3.

You would go into the "Platinum Members" product in DAP, go to the "ContentResponder" tab, and move all 9 pages from left to right, and once those 9 pages are protected as part of that product, that means that anyone who is a platinum member would have access to just those 9 pages, and nothing else.

Then you would go into the "Gold Members" product in DAP, go to the "ContentResponder" tab, and this time, move only 6 pages from left to right, and once those 6 pages are protected as part of that product, that means that anyone who is a gold member would have access to just those 6 pages, and nothing else. And they wouldn't be able to access any pages that are protected as part of OTHER products but NOT this product. So they won't be able to access those 3 extra pages that the Platinum members get access to.

Then you would go into the "Silver Members" product in DAP, go to the "ContentResponder" tab, and this time, move only 3 pages from left to right, and once those 3 pages are protected as part of that product, that means that anyone who is a gold member would have access to just those 3 pages, and nothing else. And they wouldn't be able to access any pages that are protected as part of OTHER products but NOT this product. So they won't be able to access those 6 extra pages that the Platinum members get access to, or the 3 extra pages that the Gold members get access to.

So each product is a self-contained bucket of information, which defines what content is available to the buyers of that product.

Now, if you are selling a one-time product called "FaceBook Secrets", then you would create a one-time product in DAP with that same name, set up the product, protect only the "FaceBook Secrets" related pages and posts and files under this product, create a buy button, and publish that button on your sales page.

Hope all of this makes sense. If not, you can always watch the setup videos in the menu to your left, which should give you more details.

Now, let's start creating the member pages like login page, member home page, etc.

"Login" Page (LP)

1. Log in to WP Admin
2. Create a new Page
3. Give it the title: Login
4. In the body, enter just the text: %%LOGIN_FORM%%
5. Save the page.
6. Click on "View Page". You'll be taken to:
   http://YourSite.com/login/
7. If you're already logged in as DAP admin, it will not show a login form. You will just see the message:
   
   You are already logged in... Click here to continue.
   
   And clicking on that "Click here" link will take you to the DAP Admin Dashboard.
8. If you weren't logged in as DAP Admin, then you will see a login form that asks for an email and password. This is the universal log in form for all of your members - free members, paid members, affiliates, etc. And that includes yourself as the DAP Admin.
9. Make a note of this page's URL for later use. Let's refer to this as "LP" going forward.

"My Content" Page

1. Create another new Page in WP
2. Give it the title: My Content
3. In the body, enter just the text: %%USERLINKS%%
4. Save the page.
5. Click on "View Page". You'll be taken to:
   http://YourSite.com/my-content/
6. This page basically shows the member viewing it, a list of all the products they have access to, when the access to the Product starts and ends, etc. This is the page that will list all of the links that are "dripping" on them, one by one, as and when they drip. The most recently dripped link will show up at the top of the list. Anyway, you probably won't see any links there at this point.
7. Make a note of this page's URL for later use. Let's refer to this as "MCP" going forward.

"My Profile" Page

1. Create another new Page in WP
2. Give it the title: My Profile
3. In the body, enter just the text: %%USERPROFILE%%
4. Save the page.
5. Click on "View Page". You'll be taken to:
   http://YourSite.com/my-profile/
6. This page basically shows the member viewing it, their user profile, where they can change their name, email, password, etc.
7. Make a note of this page's URL for later use. Let's refer to this as "MPP" going forward.

"Member Home" Page

1. Create another new Page in WP
2. Give it the title: Member Home
3. In the body, enter just the text Welcome Members for now. This is basically your members' home page. This could be the page they will see every time they log in (up to you). For now, let's assume that this is. Here's where you will normally have your welcome message for new members as well as returning members. You can come back and modify it later.
4. Save the page.
5. Click on "View Page". You'll be taken to:
   http://YourSite.com/member-home/
6. Make a note of this page's URL for later use. Let's refer to this as "MHP" going forward.

Creating a One-Time Product

When you're creating your very first product, there are a few extra steps, most of which are a one-time setup because it's the first time you're setting up DAP. Once you complete the one-time setup, starting with the 2nd product, it's going to take you literally just a few minutes to create each product.

Let's walk through one full product end-to-end so you can understand the full flow.

1. Log in to your DAP Dashboard
2. Go to Products/Levels > Manage
3. You will now be on the General Settings tab
4. Select Example Subscription Product (if not already selected)
5. Click on Save As New button. That will save it as a new product with the word "Copy" at the end of the product name: Example Subscription Product Copy
6. Modify Product Name. Eg., Platinum Members
7. Modify Product Description. Eg., Platinum Members get access to our entire library of Videos
8. Sales Page URL: Enter http://YourSite.com/ for now (of course, replace "YourSite.com" with your actual domain name). You can change it later to point to your actual sales page where your buy button is going to be for this product
9. Error Page URL: Skip for now
10. Post-Login URL: Enter the URL of the Member Home Page (MHP) we created earlier. It should look something like http://YourSite.com/member-home/
11. Product Status: Active
12. Click on Save Product. Product will now be saved, and the name in the Product menu on the left will have changed from Example Subscription Product to Platinum Members
13. Go to the next tab on the same page: Pricing And Recurring
14. Will there be more than 1 Payment?: Set to No
15. One-Time Price: Set this ONLY if...
    a) You are selling via Paypal and using DAP-generated Buy Buttons, or...
    b) You are selling via Authorize.net or Paypal Website Payments Pro
    If neither, then go to next tab Email Notifications
16. Go to next tab Email Notifications
17. The Welcome Email: Subject & Body : Skip for now.
    Both have default values filled in. No need to modify this yet. You can always customize this later.
18. Double-Optin Email: Subject & Body : Make both the Subject and Body blank. Since this is a paid product, you don't need the member to double optin, as they've just purchased this product. So empty both fields and click on Save Product button towards the bottom of the tab. Ignore all other fields on this tab for now.
19. Go to the next tab: ContentResponder
20. ContentResponder: This is the tab where you specify which blog posts and/or pages are going to be available to those who have purchased this Product. The left column - Available Content - shows published pages and posts from your WordPress blog. The right column - Protected Content - shows all of the content already "added" to this Product.
21. To see how this works, pick the first blog post from the left by highlighting it, then click on the round, blue "Arrow" image (pointing from left to right) to "Add" the selected post to this Product.
22. As soon as you do that, a few moments later, you'll see the post appear in the Protected Content column on the right, as a clickable link. That means, this post is now protected, and is accessible ONLY to users who have purchased this Product (Platinum Members). To test, click on this newly added link on the right, and that blog post will open up in a new tab in your browser. And you will see the DAP "Lock" image with a message that says Sorry, you don't have access to this content....
23. You see the "Sorry..." message only because you as the DAP Admin don't have to this protected content yet. That is because, you, the DAP Admin, don't have access to the Platinum Members product yet. So the next thing is to give yourself access to the Product.
24. Go to Users > Manage in the DAP Dashboard menu at the top.
    TIP: You can open the above Manage link in a new browser tab by doing a "Right-click, Open in new tab" as you hover over that link with your mouse. This is so you can continue to have the Product page open in a new tab, and come back to it quickly.
25. On the Users > Manage page, you'll see a big box at the top with two columns: Search on the left, and Operations on the right. Then you'll see a list of users below in the list of users below. At this time, you will see only 1 user listed - that is yourself, the DAP Admin user. Now we have to give you access to your newly created product, Platinum Members.
26. To do this, first check the checkbox at the beginning of that row, and then from under the Operations tab, where it says Give Selected User(s) Access to the Product... , click on the drop-down list, select Platinum Members, then click on the Go button. That will give you access to the product.
27. Now, in the search results below, you'll see that the Admin user now has access to the Platinum Members product. But DAP initially adds you as a FREE user. So on that same row, click on the link that says PAID to make you a paid user, just as if you had just paid yourself and purchased the product. So you, the DAP Admin, now have valid access to this product.
28. Go back to the Products/Levels > Manage screen (if you have it open in a separate tab, this is where you will find it useful) and select the Platinum Members product. Then go to the ContentResponder tab. Now click on the protected link in the right section under Protected Content.
    
    It will open in a new tab, and this time, you won't see the "Lock" image, but instead, you'll see the full content of that post. That's because you now have valid, paid access to the Platinum Members product under which you had protected this post.
29. At a later time, you can add the rest of your content to this product, by adding the content from left to right, and making it a part of this product. For now, let's see how to set the dripping for this post.
30. Now, to the left of the newly protected link (under Protected Content), you will see a small link with the text "edit". Clicking on that will launch the "Drip Settings Popup". And there, you will see that the Start Day # is set to 1 by default. Which means, this content is available to the user from day 1 (the day they purchased this product).
    
    As you add more content to this product, by default, they're all initially set to drip on day 1. But if you want to drip, say, one post per week, then you can click on the "edit" link next to each content, and set the Start Day to be, say, 1, 8, 15, etc. Setting to 8 means that the content will be released to the user only on the 8th day (from the time of their purchasing this product). And until then, if they visit that post or page directly, then they will see the same "Lock" image you saw earlier.
31. Go to the next tab: Autoresponders
32. This is the tab where you can create a fully pre-scheduled, Autoresponder series for each product by itself. Similar to the ContentResponder tab, this tab also has two columns: Available Emails on the left, Assigned Emails on the right.
    
    Initially, you'll see just one pre-written autoresponder email in the Available Emails column. And there are two links next to it: add & edit.
    
    Clicking on add will add this email to this Product's autoresponder series, and will set it to go out on day #1 by default. Clicking on edit will take you to a different screen (Email > Autoresponders), where you can edit the subject and body of this particular email, and also create more emails in the system which then you can add to various Products separately.
    
    So you could create one single email called Thank You For Your Purchase on the Email > Autoresponders page, and then go back to the Products page (Products/Levels > Manage), pick any product, go to the Autoresponders tab, and then add this email to that specific product.
    
    Once you have added an email from the Available Emails on the left, to the Assigned Emails on the right, you will see a small edit link next to the email subject on the right. Clicking on that will launch the Email Drip Settings popup, where you can specify on which day this specific email is to be sent to buyers of this product. So if you set an email to go out on Day #7, then it will go out to the buyers of this Product (say, Platinum Members), on the 7th day after they've purchased that product or level (TIP: the day of their joining is day #1).
33. Be sure to click on the Save Product button to save all of the Product's settings.
34. We've now completed the Product setup (for the most part). It's time to create a buy button for this product, and put it on your sales page, so that people can start buying the product (or, "subscribing" to this "level").
    
    

1. In the DAP Dashboard menu at the top, go to Payment Processing > Generate Buy Buttons and that will bring you to the page where you can generate buy buttons for all of your previously created products.
   
   (TIP: On the Products page, the last tab is called Generate Buy Buttons, and within, you'll see a link that says Click here to generate buy buttons, which also brings you to the same page as going to Payment Processing > Generate Buy Buttons)
2. You'll see separate tabs for Paypal (Standard), Paypal Pro and Authorize.net, 1ShoppingCart and ClickBank. Let's just create a Paypal Standard (a.k.a "Business" or "Premier") button for now. So click on the tab Paypal (Standard)
3. Select the Platinum Members product from the list.
4. There are a couple of things to setup in Paypal first. Setup time: About 10 minutes. So simply follow Steps 1, 2 & 3 on the Paypal (Standard) tab, and continue only after you've completed those steps.
5. Now, back on the Paypal (Standard) tab, from the Choose Button Type drop-down, select Buy Now, as Platinum Members is a One-Time Product.
   
6. Now click on the Generate Button Code, you'll see a popup that gives you the HTML code for your button. Copy it. Now, let's publish it on your sales page.

Now that we have the button code for the Platinum Members product, let's publish it on our sales page.

1. Log in to WP Admin
2. Go to Pages > All Pages
3. If you have previously created a sales page (which talks about your products, why they should sign up, what they get when they sign up, etc), then edit the page.
   
   If you don't already have one, then simply create a new Page, give it the title of Sign Up.
4. Switch to the "HTML" view of the WP composition box. Then, in the body of the Page, paste the button code that you previously copied, in the appropriate location, and then save/update the page. And then click on View Page.
5. That will open up your sales page, and you should now see the standard, yellow Paypal buy button that says Buy Now.
6. Clicking on that button, should take you to Paypal, and you should see the Product name and the product description for the Platinum Members product.
7. Test the button by making a live purchase using a different paypal account (one that's different from your seller's Paypal account). For this, you may create a new Paypal account, or ask a friend or family member or business associate to do this for you.
8. Once you (or your friend) completes the purchase at Paypal, a few seconds later, you will be back at your web site, automatically logged in to the member's area, and looking at the Member Home Page (MHP) that you created towards the very beginning of this Quick Start Guide.

And that's basically it for this guide.

The goal of this guide was to quickly help you create your first Product, setup content protection and dripping, give you a quick overview of the Users page (on how to give yourself access to the Products you create as DAP Admin), showed you how to put that buy button code on your sales page, complete a test purchase, and arrive at the member's home page.

There's a full-fledged documentation section with lots of videos and neatly categorized tutorial links, at http://DigitalAccessPass.com/documentation/

We would love to hear from you what you thought about this Quick Start Guide, and how we can improve not only DigitalAccessPass, but also our videos and documentation. So feel free to send us an email through our contact us form (or simply reply to one of the emails you received from us).

Thanks!

- Veena, Ravi & the DAP Team