Good Resource for Industry News/Articles/Discussion

I’m a big fan of Reddit (www.reddit.com). I’ve been lurking around their nonprofit subreddit reading and trying to answer questions/help where I can. But, I was sad to see there wasn’t a subreddit for Association Management. While there is a good amount of overlap between associations and nonprofits in general, there wasn’t anything about associations that I could find.

What do you do when something you want doesn’t exist yet? Why, you build it yourself! So I did – www.reddit.com/r/associationmgt

Come Back!

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.

Nothin’ Good About Good-Bye

At last the time has arrived and we must now part with our unpaid members. There is nothing “good” about saying good-bye to members. Not only are they helping to fund the amazing programs we offer, they literally are the reason the association exists in the first place. Still, there comes a time when the relationship must end – at least for a while. Here are some suggestions of what you can include in a drop notice letter to your unpaid members: