Five Quick Tips to Boost Membership: Recruit, Engage, Retain
- RECRUIT: Encourage Attendees to Join
Encourage individuals who would benefit from FBA membership to join on-line. When reaching out to potential new members to the FBA, non-members can use this link and promo code FBASAVE20 to receive 20% off national dues. Memberships acquired now will extend through 9/30/2024. You can also reach out to current members and ask them to encourage friends and colleagues to join. The easier you make it for people to join, the more likely people will be to actually sign up. - RECRUIT: Identify non-members at all of your functions.
If you have name badges, place a small colored sticker on the badges of non-members at your events. Before the event, assign “ambassadors” or outgoing section/division members to greet everyone with a non-member sticker. This will make the non-members feel like a welcome part of your event and the ambassadors can work membership into their conversations. Another way to recognize non-members is to ask them to stand up and introduce themselves at the beginning of a function. - ENGAGE: Recognize members with tenure.
Once or twice a year, make a point to thank tenured members for their service. If your section/division has a newsletter, this can be a great column. You can list members who have been with your section/division for 1 year, 5 years, etc. If you do not have a newsletter, this can easily be done via social media or in person at a section/division function. - ENGAGE: Let your members know about everything you’re doing – multiple times.
In order to increase engagement at section/division events, you need to let members know so they can plan their schedules accordingly. The national staff can send announcements on your behalf, but you also have the great resource of your section/division webpage, which has areas to publicize events and a calendar. - ENGAGE & RETAIN: Utilize your membership reports in new and different ways.
ENGAGE: Use the monthly membership reports to call members to send a welcome email to new members. A quick “hello” from the Section/Division Chair and a notice of an upcoming event goes a long way in turning a new member into an active member. You could even have board members call new members a few months after they’ve joined, to check in and see how it’s going.
RETAIN: The membership reports sent to Section/Division Chairs and Membership Chairs have a column entitled Organization. Take a look and see which members are employed by certain firms. If you see that five of your members are employed by the same firm, but two are about to let their membership lapse – reach out to the members in “good standing” and see if they can talk to members in their firm about paying their dues.