Association
Members Must Become Evangelists
By Ed Rigsbee, CSP
(874 words)
If you expect your trade
association or professional society to serve you well; you must become an
actively engaged evangelist for your association. You must bellow it from
the rooftops; the value you receive from your membership. You must tell
all your colleagues, competitors, and suppliers why they too should become
members. It is your job to drive a continual membership recruitment
campaign. More members, among other things, mean a louder voice in
legislative matters, more programs to help you improve your business, and
better affinity programs.
A
trade association or professional society should be a wonderful, industry
wide strategic alliance enabling all stakeholders to harness the
collective strength and thereby receiving the value they need. The members
that are actively involved as functionaries in their industry should be
the ones driving an association, not the paid staff and not the suppliers.
Your paid staff members already get their benefit—a paycheck. Not to
diminish the roll of paid staff however, there is a different dynamic
between the persons that ”pay-to-play,” members and associate members
verses the ones that are “paid-to-play,” the staff. The times
when the paid staff experience this “pay-to-play” dynamic is mostly if
they participate at ASAE, MPI, PCMA, etc. where they too are a paying
member.
The
suppliers always get a huge amount of value from
participation—networking with their customers. However, it is you, the
functionary member that stands to gain the most through participation. At
this point I must stop and be clear to you on the idea that I firmly
believe suppliers, or affiliate members, should be able to participate in
your association and should hold board positions. But, too many
associations are currently addicted to the opiate of having their
suppliers do all the work of driving their industry’s association. It
is not their job—it’s yours! Your suppliers will happily do all
the work, but by relinquishing your responsibility, you will only weaken
your association.
What about the paid
association staff? Sure, their job is to enable, support, and encourage
the membership. If a prospective member calls or emails an inquiry, they
are to instantly jump on it, get out some membership marketing materials,
and then forward the inquiry to the volunteer membership committee to
close the deal. If staff does their job and does not function as a
stumbling block or impediment, then there is no excuse—every inquiry
should be converted to membership.
However, if the paid
staff is too busy doing the work that the volunteer leaders and their
committees should be doing, then they will not instantly jump on
membership inquiries, and another potential member is lost.
Remember, more members mean a louder voice in legislative matters, more
programs to help you improve your business, and better affinity programs.
Association board members
always receive a higher level of value from their association membership
by virtue of their increased engagement. This is the reason that I refuse
to conduct my member value process for determining the yearly sustainable
real-dollar value at board meetings in contrast to conducting the process
at member meetings. Board member numbers will always be higher. To become
an evangelist for your association, you must truly understand your
return on investment (ROI). When you are clear on the yearly ROI you
receive from your membership investment of time and financial resources,
you will want to shout from the rooftops.
For over a decade I have
been traveling
North America
conducting my proprietary member value process at association and society
meetings. I have NEVER found an organization to deliver less than a 2X ROI—many
deliver 10X. One, the American Society for Quality, delivers 50X. While
there may be an exception, my belief is that the collaborative efforts of
association members will always deliver value—the challenge is that most
associations really cannot quantitatively document the actual value they
deliver. Unfortunately, that can leave the perception in the minds of some
members that their trade association or professional society is falling
down on the job. While some organizations might, in fact, be falling down
on the job—most deliver value quite well.
I have always advocated
that business is about results, not excuses; and as such so should
associations and its members. To get results, become an evangelist for
your association. For squeezing even more value from your
association or professional society membership, my recommendation to you:
1. Learn more about the
services your association offers and pledge to take advantage of the value
for which you are already paying. Admit it; you’ve been throwing money
away.
2. Attend your
association’s annual convention this year—no excuses.
3. Volunteer at the
convention to do something for the following year.
4. Get to know your
association’s paid staff as they can be a stellar resource in times of
need.
5. Commit to yourself
that two days a week you’ll take only a 45 minute lunch rather than your
usual hour and a half. With that extra time, you’ll call non-association
members that are involved in your industry and ask for the order—invite
them to participate through membership.
6. Do more year-round
networking with the members of your association. They truly are an
invaluable resource in both good and bad times.
Copyright
(c) 2008 Ed Rigsbee
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Ed
Rigsbee, CSP is the Chief Member Evangelist at Grow Your
Association, a consultancy organization that helps trade associations and
professional societies to grow. He is the president and executive director
of Cigar PEG Educational Institute, a 501 (c) (3) public charity that
serves to improve the industry of professional speaking. Ed is the author
of four books: PartnerShift, Developing Strategic Alliances,
The Art of Partnering, and Brian Gets to Play.
He has over 1,500 published articles to his credit and is a regular
keynote presenter at trade association and corporate conferences across
North America.
He can be reached at
805-498-5720 or www.rigsbee.com/association.htm
To
access helpful additional information from Ed Rigsbee at no charge, please
visit www.rigsbee.com/downloadaccess.htm.
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Ed
Rigsbee says what many people are thinking but afraid to say. He is the
author of several hundred articles and a number of books on business
topics. Ed travels internationally to share his business growth expertise
through consulting, training, and keynote presentations. He has been an
adjunct professor for two
California
universities, yet he prides himself, a practical business thought leader.
Additionally, Ed’s avocation is serving as CEO & Executive Director
for a non-profit public charity.
You
may contact Ed through: http://www.Rigsbee.com,
805-498-5720, ed@rigsbee.com
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