by Brett Andrew
27/09/2023

The Industry Associations in Australia have been growing at a CAGR of 0.9% over the past five years and are expected to total $3.5 billion in revenue in 2023. The charity sector in Australia also saw a revenue growth of 6.8% in 2019, with charities receiving $166 billion, $11.8 billion of which came from donations.

With the growth of these sectors it is no wonder we have had an influx of organisations reaching out to us. Our history in working with some of Australia's largest not for profits, including associations and unions means that we have been part of the journey for nearly a decade.

We built mition from the ground up with 18 modules built in (not plugins!). It is enterprise grade, seamless and rated very highly by staff and members alike.

What we often see is clients who have spent a great deal of money on some WordPress or equivalent solution with the promise of being able to meet all their requirements, which is just so disheartening. We are getting more and more clients looking to completely replace a solution that they spent a fortune on.

I often wish I could have helped these clients before they spent (*cough *cough wasted) their organisations hard earned money on these terrible solutions, so here I am writing an article hoping this saves someone out there. Especially if you are searching for 'is Wordpress good for membership systems' or something similar. I am not a fan of Wordpress, however I believe it has its place, that place just doesn't belong in the realm of Enterprise CRM software, but unfortunately there are millions of unprofessional who have never successfully completed such a project, who will ensure you it is.

If this has happened to you already, go speak to the good people at mition.com and tell them you need 'saving'. They can steer you in the right direction and it won't cost a fortune. We can send you a box of tissues to dry those tears while we come up with a plan to salvage your organisations most valuable assets (your data!).

If you are one of the lucky ones who have not departed with all your money, hopefully you haven't spent a cent yet, then this is for you!

The number one thing to be mindful of: You don't want to be the first organisation they have done this kind of project for, this alone is the biggest repeated issue, the developers use your organisation to fund their research and at the end of the project you both learn it was a big mistake. They will deliver the beautiful mocked up screens as promised, but underneath is a disjointed plugin nightmare held together with dreams and sticky tape, so you will most likely have to pay them still, for what you will now classify as a "big mistake".

These key questions you should ask your provider, can easily prevent this from happening to you:

1. Experience: How many years of experience with this specific technology do you have with development?
2. Portfolio: Can you provide examples of enterprise-grade websites you’ve developed using this technology?
3. Authentication: How do you handle user authentication and session management?
4. Security: What measures do you take to ensure the security of documents and user data?
5. Automation: Can you describe your experience with automating tasks, such as content updates or user notifications?
6. Email Communications: How would you set up automated email communications for users (e.g., registration confirmation, password reset)?
7. Customisation: How comfortable are you with customising web themes and plugins to fit specific requirements? How many plugins will this solution need, have you used them before?
8. Performance: How do you optimise the performance of a WordPress site to handle high traffic volumes?
9. Updates & Maintenance: How do you handle WordPress updates and ongoing site maintenance to ensure minimal disruption to users?
10. Problem-Solving: Can you provide an example of a challenging problem you encountered in a previous project and how you solved it?
11. User Experience: Will this be a seamless experience for our members and staff?

These questions can help gauge the developer’s technical skills, experience, and problem-solving abilities, which are crucial for building and maintaining a robust, secure, and user-friendly website.