Create a collaborator group
Walk through creating a collaborator group, picking a structure, and adding members from the admin UI.
Requires Siren Plus
Last updated: June 3, 2026
A collaborator group bundles a set of collaborators into a single unit that programs and distributors can bind to. By the end of this tutorial you’ll have a saved group, a chosen structure, and a roster of members, ready to wire into a program or a distributor.
Before you start
You need Siren Plus or higher to create flat collaborator groups. Linear chain and parent-child structures need Siren Pro. The screens look the same in both tiers. Pro just adds the two cascading structures to the dropdown.
You also need a few collaborators already in the system, since you can’t add what doesn’t exist yet. If you’re starting from an empty install, create three or four collaborators first (see managing collaborators) so you have something to drag around.
Step 1: Open the Collaborator Groups screen
The Collaborator Groups list lives under the Siren menu. It shows every group on the site, the structure each one uses, and the member count.
Hover over Siren in the WordPress sidebar
The Siren menu expands.
Click Collaborator Groups
Opens the list screen.
If this is your first group, the list is empty and the only thing on the screen is the Add Group button.
Step 2: Create the group
Click Add Group. The create screen asks for a name, an optional description, and a structure. The structure is the most consequential choice. It decides how cascades walk the group and which calc strategies the picker shows you later.
Click Add Group
Opens the create screen.
Enter a name
Something descriptive like "Sales Team" or "Tier 1 Resellers".
Add a description (optional)
Useful when you have several groups and need to tell them apart.
Pick a structure
Flat, Linear Chain, or Parent-Child.
Click Create
Saves the group and takes you to its edit screen.
The three structures behave differently. Flat treats every member as a peer, so there is no upline, no downline, and no cascade. Linear chain orders members top-to-bottom so that cascades walk up or down the chain, while parent-child lets you build a tree where cascades walk along the parent or child branches instead. If you’re not sure which fits, the structure comparison page walks through the trade-offs.
You can change a group’s structure later if you start with the wrong one, but the per-member ordering does not carry over. A flat group switched to a linear chain or parent-child starts with every member unordered, so you would re-set each member’s position or parent before a cascade reads it the way you intend. If you already know you will need cascades, picking the right structure now saves that rework.
Step 3: Add members
Once the group is saved, the edit screen shows an empty members table and an Add Members button. The picker opens in a modal so you can browse, search, and stage a batch before committing.
Click Add Members
Opens the collaborator picker modal.
Search by name or email
Type into the filter at the top of the modal.
Check the collaborators you want to add
Multi-select. The count updates as you check rows.
Click Stage
Closes the modal. The staged collaborators appear in the members table with a pending indicator.
Click Save
Commits the staged additions to the group.
Staging is deliberate. Until you click Save, nothing is persisted. The staged list is a preview of what will change. This lets you stack several edits (add some members, reorder them, set a parent) and commit them as one save. If you navigate away with pending changes, the UI warns you first.
Step 4: Arrange members (chain or tree)
If you picked Flat, skip this step. Members have no order in a flat group. If you picked Linear Chain or Parent-Child, the members table includes drag handles and the parent dropdown so you can shape the group.
Linear chain: drag to reorder
Each row in a linear chain group has a drag handle on the left. Grab a row and drag it up or down. A drop indicator shows where the row will land when you release. Position 1 sits at the top of the chain and is the most upline. The bottom row is the most downline.
The position values are recomputed on save. You don’t pick the numbers. Siren assigns them based on the visual order. If you drag chain-three above chain-two, chain-three becomes position 2 and chain-two becomes position 3.
Parent-child: drag to reparent + dropdown fallback
Parent-child rows have a drag handle too, but they respond to both vertical and horizontal motion. Vertical drag places the row next to a different sibling. Horizontal drag changes the indent depth. Drag right to nest under the row above, drag left to outdent and become a sibling of the current parent.
The same row also has a Parent dropdown. The dropdown is the deterministic path: pick a parent from the list and the tree updates without any drag math. Use the dropdown when you want a screen-reader-friendly path, or when the drag delta isn’t reading the depth you wanted.
Siren prevents cycles. If you try to set a collaborator’s parent to one of its own descendants, the dropdown grays that option out and the drag refuses to land.
What you’ve done
You created a collaborator group, picked its structure, added members, and (if you picked linear chain or parent-child) arranged them into the shape you want. The group is now a reusable unit any program or distributor can bind to.
The next step is wiring the group into a payout. Head to configure cascade payouts to bind this group to a program and pick a cascade calc that matches its structure.