Every member of your community has a profile, and it does two jobs. It is a page people can open, and it is the compact version that appears next to everything they write.
Both are yours to shape, in the Profiles tab of your community settings.
What a profile holds
The basics come from the account: name and profile picture. On top of that sits what the community adds.
- A header image across the top.
- The numbers: posts, Followers, Following and Points.
- The member's level and any title you gave them.
- Their badges, behind the badge list on the profile.
- Whatever your profile fields ask for, each with its icon.
- Their posts. On your own profile you switch between Your posts and Saved posts; on anyone else's you see their posts only.
A visitor sees Send message and Follow on someone else's profile. Saved posts stay private to the member who saved them.
Profile fields
Profile fields are the questions your community asks its members: what they do, where they are, what they are working on, why they joined.
They live in the Profile information for all members box. Add new field opens Create Profile Field.
Every profile field sits on a Member field. You give the profile field a Name and an Icon, then pick the member field it reads from. That list holds the member fields you already have, and Create new field at the end of it makes a new one without leaving the dialog. The field's type comes from the member field it sits on.
Fields are sorted by dragging, and the order on the profile follows it.
Adding a whole set at once
If your member fields are organised in sets, the list also offers Add all from :name (:count), with the set's name and the number of fields. It opens Add field set, and Add fields turns every field of the set into a profile field in one go. Fields added this way are not mandatory; open them afterwards if one should be.
Mandatory fields
Turn on Mandatory field and the field carries a Required chip in the list.
It does less than the name suggests. Nobody is stopped from joining the community with the field empty. What it does is block saving Edit Profile until the field is filled in, so a member who edits their profile has to answer it.
Ask for what makes members findable to each other, not what is useful to you. "What are you working on right now" starts conversations. "Company size" fills a database.
Three or four fields is a profile people complete. Ten is a form people abandon, and half-empty profiles make a community look emptier than it is.
Who sees a field
Profile fields and member fields are the same record seen from two sides. A member field is the record you keep. A profile field is that record shown in the community, under a name and icon you choose.
The member field's own Visibility still applies:
- Editable: shown on the profile, and the member fills it in.
- Read-only: shown on the profile, but only your team can change it.
- Hidden: never shown on the profile, even when it is a profile field.
An empty field is not shown at all, so a profile never displays a row of blank labels.
A shipping address stays a member field. A short bio is worth showing as a profile field.
Member profile in posts
Next to every post and comment sits a compact version of the profile. The Member profile in posts box decides what it carries.
- Show badges puts badges next to the name.
- Show level icons shows the level icon at the profile picture.
- Show level ring draws a ring around the picture that fills as the member gets closer to the next level.
The two level switches only appear while the level system is on.
The Preview shows exactly how it will look, with a level and a badge of your choosing, so you can judge it before members see it. Revert changes throws away what you have not saved.
Admin profiles
The Admin profile design box below sets how your team appears: Show admin badge, Show admin ring and an Admin color. It lets your team be recognised in a thread without anybody having to sign their posts.
Keep the difference small. A clear marker is useful; a visually louder profile for staff makes a community feel like a support desk.
Titles
A title is a label you give one member, such as Founder, Coach or VIP. You assign it with Assign title from the community's member list, as Text, Icon & Text or Image & Text. Where a member has a title, it takes the place of the level icon at their profile picture.
Following
Members can follow each other, and the Followers and Following numbers open the lists. Following is what makes a community feel like people rather than a forum: a member who follows five others has a reason to come back that has nothing to do with your posts.
What members control themselves
Members open Edit Profile on their own profile. It has four tabs.
- Details: the profile fields they may edit.
- Badges: up to three Featured badges. Pinning a fourth un-pins the oldest pick. Every badge the member holds can be pinned, including one that comes through a group.
- Profile picture: Upload photo.
- Header: Upload header, or a picture from the stock library.
Notification and community preferences are not in this dialog; they belong to the member's account settings.
If a profile has to be corrected on somebody's behalf, including a read-only field, that happens in their member profile in your audience.