Membership: Footprints in the sand
Membership ebbs and flows in all organizations. When you don’t know why, you can’t effectively recruit new members. You have to understand from the member’s point of view WIIFM or “What’s In It For Me?” You need to know why your prospects do or don’t pick your organization over other opportunities.
When you understand WIIFM you can effectively recruit and retain members. As you grow your membership you will have more volunteers, better programs and easier fundraising. All this leads to better outcomes and is key to the survival of your oranization.
How do you figure out which WIIFM are important to your members and prospective members?
Ask yourself:
What does my organization offer that isn’t available anywhere else or that we do better than other organizations?
Ask members and prospective members:
What do you need that we could provide?
These are the unique benefits you can offer for being a member of your organization.
Here’s an example of a classic doomed-to-fail organization that doesn’t understand this.
“We are the National Association of Left-handed Chess Players. We formed to allow left-handed chess players to associate with other left-handed chess players and play chess. But…our membership is struggling a bit. We know there are left handed chess players because we talk to them at chess tournaments. You can spot them right away–they are the ones moving their chess pieces with their left hand. But we don’t seem to be able to convince them to join us.”
This organization has made a classic mistake. They decided what people would want in their organization–socializing and playing chess on the basis of handedness. Then, when they couldn’t recruit new members, they were stuck. They had already decided what they were without asking potential members what they would look for in an organization dedicated to left handed chess players.
Remember, you must ask both your current members and your potential members. Your current members have already found WIIFM, so to retain them you have to make sure they keeping getting it. And to grow the organization, you have to know what potential members want.
Your next challenge: how to tell everyone what you found out! This is marketing your organization and a topic for another day.
Photo Credit: Footprints in the sand, by Bethany L King on Flickr
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Michael,
Great photo! Your article speaks truth that although as an organizer you may see a common thread among a group of people but that it may not be enough to draw them together. People seek out things they want, need and feel a longing for.
Offer a unique value proposition (UVP) where joining the club is not about being left handed but about having fun, gaining a sense mastery, feeling a sense of belonging and experincing something that they can’t get by going to chess events alone. Plus a blog, forum, photo gallery and yearly dinner celebration would create a memorable past that members can refer back to as a great reason to join!