What Is Fluent Community?
Fluent Community is similar to platforms like Circle.so. It combines a discussion area and a course platform into one unified space. Even though it’s a WordPress plugin, it works as a standalone portal separate from your main site’s design and theme.
For example, I set mine up on a subdomain: community.jonathanjernigan.com. If a visitor lands on a WordPress page but isn’t an admin, they’re redirected to the community portal. All the configuration happens inside Fluent Community itself, which keeps things clean and organized.
Why I Ditched Facebook and Discord
Platforms like Facebook groups or Discord are convenient, but I don’t own the data or control the platform. That means all that shared knowledge and discussion can disappear if the platform changes or deletes it.
Fluent Community solves this by giving me full ownership and control. It also lets me do things like:
- Add a comment section under each course lesson
- Charge for access to specific discussion areas or courses
- Create custom access setups like an all-access pass
Inside the Fluent Community Portal
Unified Feed and Discussion Areas
Once logged in, users are greeted with a feed system that pulls in recent posts from all channels. It works kind of like a social media feed.
You can scroll through recent posts, like a live build session announcement I shared, or a post from a community member about background removal tools. If you want to narrow things down, just head into a specific discussion area. These are the channels you create based on your community’s needs.
I’ve grouped mine by topic: ACF & dynamic data, DNS & hosting, etc. My paid courses are listed below those.
Navigating Courses
From the main menu, users can click the Courses button or head straight into a course. Inside, modules are neatly organized, and each lesson includes a discussion area at the bottom where users can comment, something my previous platform didn’t support.
Keeping Members Engaged with Notifications
One major challenge with private communities is engagement. Since Fluent Community isn’t built on platforms users visit daily (like Facebook), notifications are key.
Here’s how Fluent Community handles that:
- Email Notifications: Users receive emails for comments on their posts, or replies to their comments, and those emails include a preview of the post, along with a “Join the Conversation” button. This link supports auto-login, which is a huge win for reducing friction.
- Weekly Digest Emails: You can set up a weekly recap, mine goes out on Fridays, which includes highlights tailored to what each member has interacted with. I always see a spike in engagement when this email goes out.
Selling Access with Automations
I offer two ways to join my community:
- All Access Pass: A monthly subscription that unlocks everything
- Individual Course Purchases: Access to just that course’s content and discussion area
Since Fluent Community is part of the Fluent ecosystem, I can tie everything together with Fluent CRM.
Automating Access with Fluent CRM
I use automations to manage access:
- If someone buys just the CSS Made Easy course, they get tagged and added to only that course area.
- If they refund, the tag is removed and access is revoked.
- If they already own a course and upgrade to the all-access pass, the system opens up the remaining content automatically, no new account creation needed.
All of this is powered by Fluent CRM and Fluent Forms, and although it takes some effort to set it all up, once it’s set up, it just works.
Creating Posts and Announcements
Posting in Fluent Community feels familiar, like a Facebook-style interface:
- Add a title and description
- Upload images, embed media, or add polls
- As an admin, you can send email notifications when publishing a new post
For example, when I opened Generate Made Easy recently, I pushed an announcement so everyone interested in that course knew it was available.
Media Storage with Cloudflare R2
As your community grows, media storage can get out of hand. Fluent Community integrates with Cloudflare R2, allowing you to:
- Offload images and files outside of your WordPress media library
- Get 10 GB free storage, and pay very little beyond that
Using their pricing calculator, even storing 500 GB costs around $30/month. That’s incredibly affordable for the scale you’d need to even reach that.
Everything Works Together
Because it’s part of the Fluent ecosystem, Fluent Community plays well with:
- Fluent CRM
- Fluent Forms
- Automations and tagging
- External storage like Cloudflare R2
That means you can build incredibly powerful, integrated systems—all inside WordPress.
Quick Note on Bugs and Development
There is currently one small bug related to email notifications when using @mentions in posts. The Fluent team is aware and already has a fix on the way. Their responsiveness has been fantastic. Multiple updates have shipped just in the short time I’ve been using the platform, including:
- Polls
- Bug fixes
- Theme compatibility
- Block editor support in course editing
Final Thoughts
Fluent Community is fast, polished, and rock-solid. Even with nearly 200 members using it across various channels and courses on a basic 2 GB Vultur server, it performs great.
If you’re considering Fluent Community, I highly recommend it. Learn more using this link: https://jonathanjernigan.com/go/fluent-community