Building Strong Clubs

  Introduction

At the typical club or association:

• 5% of members run the club and show up for almost every event;
• Another 15% of members regularly participate;
• Another 20% occasionally participate;
• The remaining 60% never show up for anything!

Many clubs have a turnover rate of 15-20% per year. People leave because they lose interest, they have health or financial problems, they move away or pass away, or because they are no longer being served by the club and the "product" it offers. Some clubs lose people because they cannot even get renewal notices sent out reliably, so members have no idea that it's time to renew.

Some clubs just don't market themselves very well, figuring that "passion" alone is enough to keep people interested and paying their dues. But most of the time it isn't!

With these statistics in mind, how do you build strong and vibrant clubs and associations that actually grow and survive more than a few years? People get disillusioned or tired out and others need to step in and take up the mantle of responsibility. Running a club can be a huge amount of work, with the only compensation being the complaints of other members.

And yet as we all know, being a member of club and participating in its activities has enormous rewards. We get to share our passion with others who have the same passion. We learn new things all the time and make new and lasting friendships. We get to do good deeds, strengthening our communities and the environment, and building bonds with other communities, sometimes across the country.

So the question that all boards of directors ask is: how do we create a strong club or association, one that members want to join and renew, one with a strong and growing core of active members, one with a "virtuous cycle" of people who get involved, which in turn generates more events and discussion and knowledge-exchange, which in turn gets more people to join and renew.

Building a strong club or association is like building a strong business. You need to focus on the fundamentals:

An attractive product

at a good price

that people want to buy!

Marketing professionals talk about the 4 "P..."s (or 5 or 7; they can't seem to agree!) of building successful brands and growing businesses, and we can adapt those to this discussion. Each of these topics is discussed in more detail on the following pages:

1. Product & Positioning
2. Promotion
3. Price
4. People
5. Process
6. Passion

Next: Product and Positioning