Building a vibrant and engaged member community is crucial for many organizations, from associations and non-profits to professional groups and corporations looking to foster customer loyalty. Higher Logic has long been a prominent player in this space, offering robust community management solutions. However, the market is rich with innovative platforms that provide diverse features, pricing structures, and approaches to community engagement.
If you're exploring alternatives to Higher Logic, you've come to the right place. We've compiled a list of 10 top platforms that excel at helping organizations connect, communicate, and grow their member communities.
1. Breezio
Breezio is a dynamic and comprehensive engagement platform designed to facilitate meaningful interactions within communities. It emphasizes a user-friendly interface and a rich feature set to drive collaboration, learning, and networking. Breezio goes beyond basic forums by incorporating elements like virtual events, content co-creation, and personalized engagement paths, making it a strong contender for organizations seeking an all-in-one solution.
Strengths:
- Intuitive User Experience: Easy for members to navigate and engage with content and each other.
- Rich Media Integration: Supports diverse content formats, including video, live streaming, and interactive discussions.
- Knowledge focused communities. Besides networking features, Breezio offers powerful features to create articles, collections, video content, and foster rich interactions around that content.
- Association expertise. Breezio has a special emphasis on and deep experience with associations.
- Dedicated Support. Breezio is known for its exceptional support and onboarding team that handholders customers through their journey.
- Monetization. Breezio allows communities to be monetized in various ways - from banner ads, to membership tiers, to premium content.
2. Mighty Networks
Mighty Networks empowers creators and organizations to build communities around shared interests, online courses, and events, all under their own brand. It excels at combining content, commerce, and community in one place, making it ideal for those who want to monetize their expertise.
Strengths:
- Integrated Courses: Offers powerful tools for creating and selling online courses directly within the community.
- Flexible Monetization: Supports subscriptions, one-time payments, and bundles for content and access.
- Branded Experience: Allows for extensive customization to match your organization's brand.
- Native Mobile Apps: Provides branded mobile apps for a superior member experience on the go.
Disciple
Disciple is a powerful, mobile-first community platform that allows creators and organizations to build and launch their own fully branded, native mobile apps on iOS and Android without writing any code. It focuses on providing a private, controlled social space where you own the data and control the algorithm, away from the noise of mainstream social media.
Strengths:
- Branded Mobile Apps: Its core strength is enabling anyone to launch a white-labeled community app in the Apple App and Google Play stores.
- Full Ownership and Control: You control the content, member data, and the feed algorithm, ensuring your content reaches your audience without ads or distractions.
- Monetization Tools: The platform is built for business, with integrated features for creating subscriptions, selling online courses, and putting content behind paywalls.
- Rich Engagement Features: Includes a full suite of community tools like groups, activity feeds, direct messaging, member profiles, and live streaming to keep members engaged.
4. Bettermode
Bettermode is a highly customizable and flexible community platform designed to integrate seamlessly into a company's existing website and product ecosystem. It's strong for customer communities, offering modular "Spaces" and embeddable widgets to bring the community to where the users are.
Strengths:
- Highly Customizable: Adaptable design and structure to perfectly match your brand's look and feel.
- Engagement Widgets: Offers a range of widgets to embed community features on other websites or apps.
- App Ecosystem: Integrates with popular tools like Zapier, Slack, and Salesforce.
- Gamification: Encourages participation through points, badges, and leaderboards.
5. Glue Up
Glue Up is an all-in-one membership management software that includes a robust community platform. It's particularly well-suited for associations, chambers of commerce, and non-profits that need to manage memberships, events, and communications alongside their community engagement efforts.
Strengths:
- Integrated Membership Management: Combines CRM, event management, email marketing, and finance tools.
- Event Focus: Excellent for organizations that run frequent virtual, in-person, or hybrid events.
- Mobile App: Provides a branded mobile app for members to network, register for events, and engage on the go.
- Automation: Automates workflows for membership renewals, event invitations, and communication.
6. Hivebrite
Hivebrite is a comprehensive and highly configurable community management platform trusted by educational institutions, non-profits, and corporate alumni networks. It provides a full suite of tools to manage, engage, and grow a private community network.
Strengths:
- Powerful Member Directory: Features advanced search and filtering to help members connect.
- Career Services: Includes job boards, mentoring modules, and career development tools.
- Fundraising and Donations: Integrated tools for managing fundraising campaigns and processing payments.
- Data Management: Centralizes member data with robust administrative controls.
7. Member Nova
Member Nova is an association management software (AMS) with a strong focus on member engagement and data management. It's designed for professional and trade associations that need to handle complex membership structures, dues, and events while providing a modern community experience.
Strengths:
- Deep AMS Integration: Seamlessly connects community activity with the core member database.
- E-commerce Capabilities: Manages everything from dues and event registrations to online store purchases.
- Committee Management: Specific tools designed to facilitate the work of boards and committees.
- Reporting and Analytics: Provides comprehensive reports on membership, financials, and engagement.
8. Forj.ai
Forj.ai is a member experience platform that leverages AI to drive engagement and connection within communities, particularly for associations and professional groups. It focuses on personalizing the member journey and providing actionable insights to community managers.
Strengths:
- AI-Powered Insights: Uses artificial intelligence to predict member churn and suggest engagement strategies.
- Personalization: Delivers tailored content and connection recommendations to individual members.
- Virtual Event Platform: Offers a robust solution for hosting engaging online and hybrid events.
- Integration with AMS/CRM: Connects with leading association management and customer relationship systems.
9. Tradewing
Tradewing is a community and events platform built specifically for professional associations. It combines the functionality of a community forum, virtual event platform, and member communication tool into a single, intuitive interface.
Strengths:
- Industry Specific: Designed with the unique needs of trade and professional associations in mind.
- Turnkey Solution: Aims to be an easy-to-launch and easy-to-manage platform.
- Integrated Virtual Events: Host everything from multi-day conferences to simple webinars within the platform.
- Sponsor and Exhibitor Tools: Provides dedicated features for sponsor visibility and lead generation.
10. Circle.so
Circle is a modern community platform designed for creators, coaches, and brands looking to build engaged online communities. It emphasizes a clean, minimalist design and powerful features for discussions, content sharing, and live events, making it feel like a private social network.
Strengths:
- Clean and Modern Interface: Focuses on a distraction-free, intuitive environment for members.
- Flexible Content Organization: Supports various content formats and spaces for different topics.
- Live Streams and Events: Integrated tools for hosting live interactions, Q&As, and workshops.
- Workflow Automation: Set up automated welcome messages, reminders, and other workflows to engage members.
