Wild Apricot - Wildly Easy to Create Member Based Websites
I’ve been finding some really great products lately (thanks to Emily Chang’s eHub) and Wild Apricot is one of them. Wild Apricot is “web based software for professional associations and non-profits.” It’s very similar to SiteKreator.com (although easier to use but probably not as powerful).
Audience and Features
Wild Apricot is marketing itself for a specific space, namely associations and non-profits - the organizations that are “understaffed and overworked”. What allows them to do so is that their product focuses on things like Events and Members, the two quintessential features needed by those in this space. In addition to managing members, organizations will eventually be able to do membership e-mailing through Wild Apricot.
One feature I did see missing was the ability to accept payments for Events. That’ll be necessary if they want this tool to be taken seriously. That feature appears set to launch in September.
I really like the Wild Apricot interface - and that’s probably because Bonasource, the company that developed it, are usability consultants (as well as web developers). I’ve seen good web apps come out of usability shops lately (14 Dayz, developed by Brains4All comes to mind).
Pricing
Pricing for Wild Apricot is based on the number of members. For websites with less than 50 members, the service will always be free (although Google Ads will run on those sites). From there, pricing starts at $50/month for 51-200 members.
There is a special right now, where those who sign-up before September 2006 will always have a free site, regardless of the number of members. The catch there is that online payments and membership e-mailing won’t be available in those versions, even after they are released.
Conclusion
Wild Apricot might be able to find a sweet spot in this marketplace. As someone who lives in the non-profit capital of the world (Washington D.C.) and works with them often, I know how difficult the web can be for these organizations. Wild Apricot can make managing websites simpler, as well as more cost effective.
A final note. Wild Apricot is floating an idea on their “Customize theme” page of the backend, whereby they ask:
We are also considering providing tools for graphic designers to develop new custom themes to be used in Wild Apricot system. Let us know if you consider this important.
That would be a real winner, as some of the similar products evolving (SiteKreator.com) seem not to be thinking about that. It would definitely be a differentiator and if they could create a community around the product, it might gain even larger traction.
July 20, 2006 at 7:10 am
Ken, great summary!
About event payments - yes, this is coming, actually we plan to release it in a couple of weeks (as well as payments for membership, renewals, etc.)
Regarding the tool for custom themes - thanks for feedbackl. BTW, check out shopify.com if you have not seen it - they have a similar concept (theme builder) already implemented.
January 23, 2007 at 8:35 am
Hi all,
Since our launch in July 2006, we have introduced new pricing for Wild Apricot. Realizing that many small groups and non-profits can’t easily invest $50 or more every month, we now have two new account plans starting at $12 and $25. So we have made all the great Wild Apricot features - website with easy to use content management, customizable members and contacts database, event registrations, emailing, donations and more- affordable to all sizes of organizations.
In addition, we have increased the allowable contact database size for each of the existing plans, without increasing the monthly rate (and we took the opportunity to rename each plan as well). For example, whereas the account plan previously called Premium 200 had a contact database limitation of 200 records, it has now been renamed Community Plan, and increased to 500 records!
Check out the pricing page and sign up for a trial account (no credit card needed) at http://www.wildapricot.com/Pricing.aspx
Read about new features and improvements on our blog at http://www.wildapricot.com/blogs/newsblog/default.aspx