1. MEMBERSHIP ID #:

Pros:

• Virtually guaranteed to be unique as it stays with the member for their entire life cycle with the organization. (Ex. Student -> Regular Member -> Lifetime Member -> etc.)

• No need for user (or staff, for that matter) to maintain and/or validate this unique identifier.

• Takes the more secure step (of the 2 options) of aligning the website with the AMS for easy user management.

Cons:

• Might not be intuitive for the members to remember (depending on ID structure)

2. MEMBER'S EMAIL ADDRESS:

Pros:

• Easy for the user to remember.

• Takes the less secure step (of the 2 options) of aligning the website with the AMS for easy user management. (Data validation aside...the possibility does exist that a husband and wife are both members of the organization and both use the same household email address.)

Cons:

• Some level of login modification/maintenance is probably necessary; Possibility exists that when a user changes the email address that they have on file with the association, that the email login will need to be changed accordingly.

For the member organizations that we've developed such website login solutions, our preference is typically to suggest using the Member ID as the unique login for the website. If that isn't an option, the email address is a good fallback. Password should probably be a system-generated, random set of numbers and letters that the user must change upon their initial login.

It also depends upon the level of secure information that the user will be accessing. Access to members-only content pages is a different animal than access to chapter documentation and/or personal information.