Community networks and partnership charities keep asking for the same thing in briefs: a partner portal. And almost every brief adds a nervous clarification, because the word "portal" sounds expensive: something simple, something secure, definitely not a full membership system. That instinct is right. What partners usually need is a locked cupboard, not a clubhouse.
This article sets out the four honest ways to build one, what each costs, and how to choose. The right answer is usually cheaper than the brief expects.
Start with what partners actually do
Strip away the word "portal" and the need is usually three things. Partners find shared documents: templates, guidance, meeting notes. Partners see updates meant for them and no one else. And staff add both without asking a developer. If your list is longer than that, note which items are real and which arrived by imagining what a portal ought to have. Most of the cost in portal projects comes from the imagined list.
The four options, honestly priced
1. A shared drive. Free. A well-organised Google Drive or OneDrive folder, shared with partner organisations. At a dozen partners and low sensitivity, this is often the genuinely right answer, and a supplier who says so before quoting is one to keep. Its limits arrive with scale: link sprawl, permissions nobody remembers setting, and no way to present updates alongside documents.
2. Password-protected pages. A few hours of work. WordPress can protect any page with a password out of the box: no plugin, no licence, nothing to renew. One shared password gets partners into a resource area on your own site, presented your way. The honest weakness is the word "shared": one password means no record of who is in, and no way to lock out a single organisation that leaves the network. Fine for low-sensitivity libraries; wrong for anything confidential.
3. Real logins with WordPress users. The proper simple portal. WordPress has accounts, roles and permissions built into its core, free. Each partner gets their own login. Access is revoked per person, the day they leave. Staff upload documents and post partner-only updates through the same editor they already use. Built alongside a new site, this adds modest cost, typically in the hundreds rather than thousands, because the machinery already exists; it is configuration and care, not construction. This is the option most "simple secure portal" briefs are actually describing.
4. A membership system. Thousands, plus subscriptions. Paid membership plugins earn their fees when you need payments, tiers, renewals, or gated content people buy. A network sharing documents with known partners needs none of that. If a quote for your simple portal includes a membership plugin with an annual licence, ask what specifically requires it. There is usually no answer.
The two things every option needs
A structure partners can navigate. A portal with a heap inside is a locked heap. Organise the library by type and topic from day one; our piece on fixing a buried resources library applies doubly behind a login, where search engines cannot help anyone find anything.
Someone minding the door. Partner accounts are personal data: names and work emails, held under GDPR. Keep the fields minimal, delete accounts when people move on, and make user management part of a named person's job. And a portal holding anything sensitive sits on a website that must itself be kept updated and watched; we have written honestly about what that upkeep involves.
What to put in your brief
Describe the need, not the technology: who needs access, roughly how many organisations, what they collect, what they must never see, and who on your staff will manage it. Then ask suppliers which of the four levels they recommend and why. A supplier who recommends level one or two is showing you how they think about your money, which is worth knowing before you spend the rest of it.
If your network is weighing up a portal, book a free 20-minute call. We will tell you which level fits, including the level that costs nothing.
