NATS4 Package Plus
NOTE: This feature is available as of version NATS 4.1.3.1
Package Plus is a feature in NATS4 that allows you to offer your members incentives to upgrade their memberships to a higher tier in your Members Area. By using Package Plus, you can group multiple join options into a package to be displayed on the join form. This lets you offer surfers multiple levels of join options on the same page, such as Trial, Silver, and Gold membership levels for example.
Creating a Package
A Package is a set of join options located on the same join form, which allows surfers to choose from multiple membership levels on one site (or multiple sites). You can create multiple packages for multiple sites in NATS, allowing you to offer your members a wide array of join options for each of your sites.
To begin creating a new Package, go to the Sites Admin and edit the tour for which you want your package to be available. On the next page, scroll down to the "Join Options for this Tour" section and create or edit a join option that you want to include in your package.
When editing/creating your join option, you will see a field labeled "Package ID." Enter any number into this field to use as your Package ID number, and create your new package. For example, you can simply input "1" if you have not created any packages yet. Configure the rest of your join option settings, give it a title to mark the level of membership you want to offer, and Save your changes.
Your new package will now be created with the Package ID number that you set. Once you have created your new Package, add the rest of the join options you want to include in that package by creating new join options and entering the Package ID number you set earlier in the "Package ID" fields.
Now that you have set up all of the join options you want to include in your Package, they will appear on your join form to provide your members with various levels of memberships to choose from. Make sure to clearly label your membership levels, and create separate pricing levels for the join options you plan to offer.
Package Upgrade
The Package Upgrade feature allows members to upgrade their membership using the join options provided on the join form. These join options must be part of the same package in order to allow your members to use the Package Upgrade feature.
To enable the Package Upgrade feature, edit the join option you want to allow your members to upgrade to, and fill in the "Package Upgrade Allowed" checkbox on the next page. Your members will only be able to upgrade to higher membership levels on the join form, and will not be able to downgrade their memberships. For example, they will be able to upgrade from Trial to Silver and Silver to Gold, but they will not be able to go from Silver to Trial or Gold to Silver.
To disable Package Upgrades for your members, simply uncheck the "Package Upgrade Allowed" checkbox for your join options.
Setting Rules
You can also use Rules to offer certain Packages to members referred from different tours, programs, affiliates, countries, and billers. You can also use rules to add your package for a specific duration of time, letting you use it as a limited promotion. Please see our NATS4 Rules wiki article for more information.
Additional Security
Package Plus also contains additional security features, which allow you to further secure the transactions occurring on your join forms. For example, you can use API calls to get secure member authorization strings, verify surfer information on the join form, and change the input source to use POST instead of GET.
MEMBER_STRING_AUTH_PACKAGEPLUS
Use the MEMBER_STRING_AUTH_PACKAGEPLUS variable to choose whether or not you wish to use the new member auth strings available in NATS 4.1. These strings contain a variety of information, and are designed to prevent unwanted package purchasing attempts by outside sources.
This feature will be set to off by default. If you want to enable this feature for your Package Plus transactions, you can add the following necessary code in the config.php script on your NATS server:
$config['MEMBER_STRING_AUTH_PACKAGEPLUS'] = 1;
This will activate the MEMBER_STRING_AUTH_TOKENPLUS setting to use additional security for your member authorization strings. Do not add the provided code if you want to leave this feature disabled.
Once you have activated this setting, you must use the get_member_package_upgrade_string API call to get the correct auth string for the member you want to upgrade. Please see our API Get Member Package Upgrade String wiki article for more information on this process.
This function will return the auth string necessary for your members to get authenticated with for the Package Plus process. Include the auth string in the link for your member, and they will be able to use the Package Plus feature with the MEMBER_STRING_AUTH_PACKAGEPLUS security setting enabled.
Join Form Verification
You can also add additional security checks when offering Package Plus options for your members on your join form. The Package Plus feature verifies member e-mail addresses by default on the join form, but you can add a switch to choose between verifying a member's e-mail address, password, or both e-mail address and password.
This feature will verify member e-mail addresses by default. If you want to enable this feature for your Package Plus transactions, you can add the following necessary code in the config.php script on your NATS server:
$config['PACKAGEPLUS_REQUIRED_FIELDS'] = 0;
Add this setting with a value of '1' if you want Package Plus to verify member passwords. Change this to a value of '2' if you want Package Plus to verify both member passwords and e-mail addresses. Do not add the provided code if you want to keep authenticating Member e-mail addresses.
This allows you to choose what member information you want to verify on the join form itself, preventing anyone from submitting a Package Plus join form with an incorrect e-mail address, password, or both.
Using $_POST
Package Plus also offers another security feature, allowing you to change the method of submitting data from $_REQUEST to $_POST to further authenticate your members' information.
This feature is set to use $_REQUEST by default. If you wish to use $_POST to authenticate your join form transactions, add the following code to your config.php script:
$config['PACKAGEPLUS_POST_ONLY'] = 1;
Add this setting with a value of '1' if you want Package Plus to only allow $_POST when authenticating your members. Do not add the provided code if you want to use $_REQUEST when authenticating members.
Throttling
Throttling is a security setting available in NATS 4.1, which allows you to lock out surfers for a specified period of time if they make too many attempts on certain pages in NATS.
You can use the Throttling feature to help secure your packageplus.php page, preventing surfers from forcing transactions without the correct auth string. Just go to the "Security" configuration page, found in the Configuration Admin.
For more information on this feature, please see our Throttling wiki article.
