Association
Executive Focus—Core Membership or Financial Results
By Ed Rigsbee, CSP
(659 words)
I’m distressed. I receive about a dozen
meetings industry and association related magazines each month. With
interest, I read about “meeting ROI” and “strategic meetings
management” but…what I DO NOT read about is “member ROI” and
that distresses me. While there are scores of fabulous trade
associations and professional societies serving both North Americans and
the international community, I cannot help but sometimes wonder what has
gone wrong with so many
USA
based trade associations?
Being
an Association Executive is Not Easy
Let’s face it, to be a successful
association executive, one has to be quite an adept politician—not
that it’s a bad thing—it’s just that not every leader is also a
great politician. In leading a trade association or professional
society, business skills are not enough. Dealing with the various
personalities that span an organization’s membership is quite another
thing. Oh yes, did I mention the egos? Perhaps that focus is what draws
too much attention form the most important task at hand? No, it is not
the executive keeping his or her job; it is delivering honest
sustainable value to the organization’s membership. That is what
sustains an organization.
Association
Membership Abandonment
It has been quite a while, and a few name
changes, since the American Society of Association Executives published
an exit survey on why members do not rejoin their association or
society. My interpretation of the survey is that 73% said that they did
not rejoin because of the lack of receiving (perceived) reasonable
return on their investment—the ROI just wasn’t good enough.
Member
ROI Group at Linkedin
I administer a special interest group at www.Linkedin.com
for association executives and staff. The group is so named, “Member
ROI for Associations & Societies.” I frequently ask questions to
bring forth responses from the group members. A question I posted about
staff commissions and member incentives for member recruitment has
received quite a bit of banter. Below is a comment from one of the group
members that is very revealing:
"In
my 20 years working for a dozen associations have I[‘ve]
seen incentives for membership recruitment in practice...at least
until recently.
An association that I am familiar with pays a bonus to its CEO based
on financial results. As far as I know, there are no other performance
indicators factored into the mix to determine rewards (i.e. member
satisfaction, member engagement, program results), just the bottom
line.
As a result, a great deal of energy has gone into recruiting
non-industry members because their membership fees are the highest,
and securing as many sponsorship dollars for the annual conference
(which is suffering from dwindling attendance). But no additional
effort has gone into retaining the core membership categories
(industry practitioners) and their numbers are dropping by 5 - 10%
each year. So, while the bottom line may look like its holding its
own, membership attrition is on the rise.
The point is, the CEO is more focused on getting as many dollars in
the door to the detriment of the members and association programs and
services."
What
Do You Think?
Do you think this person’s comments are
sour grapes, or might the comments be too on-target for many to swallow?
Sometimes truth can be quite a bitter pill. I believe the exceedingly
difficult question that not enough of today’s association executives
are asking is this: Are we delivering true and reasonable ROI to our
members or are we simply perpetuating a broken association?
Here is the question that every member is
asking of their association or society: And I get what for my membership
dollars besides this monthly magazine, newsletter, or eZine?
Remember this. If you charge your members
extra for something, it is not a value added item, only the price
differential compared to what non-members pay would apply to the
member’s ROI. This might be worth considering before you charge your
loyal dues-paying members for the next webinar or white paper—just a
thought.
Copyright
2010 Ed Rigsbee
#
# #
As
an internationally recognized speaker on partnering, Ed
Rigsbee is the Chief Member Evangelist at Rigsbee Research Consulting Group and the
Executive Director of the Cigar PEG, Inc., (US Internal Revenue Service
recognized public charity). He has authored three books and over 1,500
articles on business and organizational collaborations. He travels
internationally delivering keynote presentations and multi-day workshops
on collaboration, partnering, and strategic alliances to Corporate and
Association/Society audiences. Rigsbee is frequently engaged by
associations and societies to facilitate various boards of director
meetings and his proprietary, Member
Value ProcessTM.
Ed
has received the coveted Certified
Speaking Professional designation from the National Speakers
Association, one that is enjoyed by only about 10% of the membership in
the International Federation for Professional Speakers. When you need a
keynote speaker, Rigsbee may be
contacted through www.rigsbee.com
or Ed@Rigsbee.com.
