Integration: Circle App

Using Memberstack 2.0? There is an updated version of this article here.

How to integrate a community forum on your website.

About this article:

• Difficulty level: Easy

• Technical background needed: Beginner

• Estimated time required to complete: 5 mins

What and Why?

Memberstack now directly integrates with Circle.so — a modern community-type forum that you can instantly add to your membership website. 🎉

Members can now log into your website and your Circle community with a single email and password! This is great when you want to engage directly with your audience, turn customers into super fans, offer group experiences, and really focus on creating a community feel.

What you need to get started

SSO (Single sign-on) is typically offered on Circle's Enterprise plan, but if you're a Memberstack customer and have a Circle community, reach out to Circle over at support@circle.so, and they'll enable it for free.

Once enabled, you'll see a new tab in Settings called Single Sign-On which will let you set this up in a couple of clicks.

Note: Make sure you have selected a website platform when adding a new website in Memberstack. If you haven't selected a platform, Memberstack will go into an infinite loading loop.

Step 1: Set up Circle integration in Memberstack

Navigate to Memberstack → Power-ups → Custom Integrations → New Integration → Click Circle App

Name your integration, and then locate your Circle Callback URL by navigating back to Circle. Circle Community Settings → Single Sign-On.

Once you click "Create" in Memberstack, you will be presented with your custom ID's.

Step 2: Copy over Memberstack SSO information to Circle

Navigate back to Circle Settings → Single Sign-On, and select "Memberstack" as the OAuth provider.

Type in your provider name, then paste in your Client ID along with the Secret Key provided by Memberstack and click "Save".

Step 3: Enable SSO with Memberstack

Once you've saved your settings, toggle "Enable SSO" to ON within Circle.

• Allow members with a Circle account to sign in: If you have members that have already registered their email with Circle, they can still sign in with those credentials using a separate signin button.

What happens to Circle member accounts?
If this is toggled ON, Circle members can continue to log in using the "Sign in with Circle" button. Circle will create accounts for Memberstack members automatically if the email doesn't exist within Circle.

If this is toggled OFF, members with Circle accounts will no longer be able to sign in with those credentials unless the email of their Circle account matches the email of their Memberstack account, in which case we'll link the two automatically going forward.

What happens to my admin account? If the email you use to log in to Memberstack is different from Circle, we recommend toggling this ON to ensure you don't get locked out of your admin account. Once you grant admin rights to both accounts, you can always toggle this off later.

If this is toggled OFF, you will only be able to log in under your email that is registered within Memberstack.

• Allow members to sign up via a custom URL: After enabling SSO, members won't be able to sign up via Circle. However, you can keep the signup button visible and point it to a custom URL.

Will my members still need to log in to Circle?

Memberstack will not automatically log in members the first time they visit your Circle community. They will need to log in using the same email and password. After login, they can navigate between your site and your community without needing to re-enter their email or password.

Aaaand you're finished! If the setup was successful, you will now see the Login via Memberstack Single Sign-On option when trying to sign in under your community.

Keywords: SSO, circle, community, settings, forum, email, password, single, sign, on