In a previous post, Nothin’ Good About Good-Bye, I mentioned you should give your dropped members some space and time to realize how much they really love you and then try to bring them back into the association. Now is that time for one of my clients. But, what to offer to get these members to come back to the association? Let’s take a look.
Last year we offered a crazy special of 50% off membership for 2013 PLUS 50% off every meeting the new member attended during the year – from the annual conference to the local regional meetings – 50% off. I think it’s telling that very few new members took us up on the meeting registration reduction, but I digress. We did see quite a few new members come into the association last year, though.
When you run a crazy special like this, it’s a good idea to contact your new members prior to the first round of invoices that go out to remind them their dues for the following year will be higher than what they paid this year. Otherwise, they will probably forget and then have sticker shock when that invoice reaches their desk. Sticker shock is bad – it makes them think you pulled a fast one or it immediately turns them off and they decide right then to not renew. We called all the new members last year in late September to let them know their invoices would be mailed to them soon and reminded them of what their dues would be for 2014.
But, lo and behold! The majority of my dropped members this year were new members from last year and I can only assume (since none of them returned the exit survey I sent) it was due to the fact their dues were full price this year. So, what to offer these dropped members to get them to come back? The team threw around some ideas – everything from giving them 50% off again this year to… nothing. We settled on $100 off the annual conference registration fees (excluding golf, of course – why is golf always so expensive anyway?).
“Brief is Better” is the name of the e-mail marketing game so we whittled down our plea for the member to re-join using bullet points and “I’ve got a deal for you” language. We told the dropped member if they re-joined the association they could take $100 off their annual conference registration fees. I created a little “coupon” as a JPEG and attached it to the e-mail along with the registration brochure and their membership invoice.
- Always give them a way to pay easily
- A coupon (printed or electronic) gives them something tangible and increases the perceived value of the discount
- Personalize, personalize, personalize – do not use “Dear Member”
- Don’t squeeze everything in the letter or body of the e-mail – give them just enough teaser so they click on the link or open the attachment
Now we wait and see if anyone takes us up on the offer. I’ll admit that I have my doubts. This group is going through some major changes and a lot of the dropped members were suppliers who may not be interested in continuing on with the association. Still, it’s a fun experiment and something we haven’t tried before. I’ll let you know how it goes!
Membership Mutiny 