Hi guys, I want to build a membership site, where a support/helpdesk is behind the pay wall.

I realize that this is unusual because most people/businesses make the helpdesk free, so you just point your customer to the helpdesk. I want to charge for my support, so I need to figure out a way to have a paid help desk.


I want to have my own in-house affiliate program as well, though this part can be installed later.

I have been looking at help desk solutions, and at membership scripts. The membership scripts that I found that look like the best values don't integrate with any helpdesk solutions. Some of the membership scripts integrate with forum software like vBulletin, but I think using forum software would be a clunky solution and may be confusing for my customers.

I found a helpdesk solution that I like called tenderapp, and its an SaaS, and is not a self-hosted solution. I like Tender because its cheap, it has a knowledge base, a ticket system, and a forum.

I asked the people that own tender if they knew of a way that I could put thier helpdesk behind a pay wall. THey told me

Once you've found the paywall you want to use that fits your workflow, you can use SSO to pass your customer/client's login information from your site to your Tender site. You can make your Tender site private so unless they have a login on your site proper they can't even create a user for Tender.

SSO is Single Sign-On

I'm looking at using Digital Access Pass as the membership software, but I don't think it can pass login info to Tender. DAP has an SSO feature for Wordpress. DAP does support affiliate programs, so that's a plus.

ANyone know of something I can use for the SSO solution?
(I am not a programmer, so I could not write anything, though I might be able to outsource it).

And perhaps a better question: Is there a simpler way of accomplishing what I want to do?

The problem is that what you are looking for is highly specialised.

Good luck though. I would buy something that does 90% of the job, and then pay someone else to develop the rest.

If that's the only solution for me, I can probably outsource a coder to do it. I continued looking for a solution after I posted this thread, and I learned a little more. In a forum for a membership script (aMember), I saw someone mention a login API. I think that is what I need.

I went to Tender's site and searched for login API, and found a page:

Share your own site's authentication with Tender
There are two formats for passing your site's user details to Tender so have Tender automatically create a corresponding user profile: Multipass and HMAC cookies. Multipass tokens are the newer and preferred method. HMAC cookies are the older format.

Before using either of these methods, enable the API key under Account & Settings "Extras" and then under "Single Sign-On".

(sorry, I can't post working links)

Since I am not a coder, if I do hire one, can I just point him/her to that page, and say, I want a SSO solution from my membership script to Tender?



Before that I also found out that aMember lists 2 helpdesks that they integrate with via plugins. THey support Kayako and PerlDesk. I had not heard of PerlDesk before. I looked at both helpdesk solutions and did not see one of the features I desired, which is a built in forum, so that's a deal breaker for me.

I just learned of something:
client management, billing & Support solutions for Web hosts have many of the features I want. I would not need a separate membership script if I went this route. This is interesting....hmmm

I am looking at WHMCS and that also happens to be the system my own web host uses (conincidence).

It doesn't have a couple of things: no integrated forum, and I don't think it has an affilate program managment or integration either.

One of the services I wanted to offer my clients is web hosting, but I was planning on adding that later on, as it won't be my core business.

It sounds like you are going to have to carefully write up a technical specifications document and work with a qualified outsourcer in order to accomplish what you want to do since the existing solutions don't provide 100% of what you need.

I haven't made a final decision yet, but I am considering using aMemeber with a SSO plugin to Tender.

Hi, Try with AJ Help Desk which is the best help desk software for smarter e-support solutions & also it is available in saas as well as in the download version.

That's true. iKode service desk is a good customer service software. I am using it now. Very impressive!

You could do this completely on wordpress..

There are themes that are supportdesk themes..... And then all you would need to do is add a plugin that turns the theme into a membership site. (checkout magicmembers)

I don't know how advanced you want it, but that seems like a good start.

-Red