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MEMBERSHIP M ARKETING
BENCHMARKING REPORT

RESEARCH CONDUCTED BY:

Marketing General Inc.

LEAD RESEARCHER
Dr. Adina Wasserman Director of Research For more information on MGI or to discuss this report, please contact: Raylene Kershaw, Sr. Vice President/COO raylene@marketinggeneral.com Tony Rossell, Sr. Vice President tony@marketinggeneral.com Erik Schonher, Vice President erik@marketinggeneral.com Richard Whelan, President rick@marketinggeneral.com

MEMBERSHIP M ARKETING
BENCHMARKING REPORT

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The 2011 Membership Marketing Benchmarking Report marks the third consecutive year that Marketing General Incorporated (MGI) has surveyed associations nationwide to record and analyze the strategies and tactics they use to recruit and engage new members, renew existing members, and reinstate former members. Over 650 associations participated in the 2011 survey and shared their membership practices and their opinions on what works best at each stage of the membership lifecycle. The report includes data on social media used by associations, how prospective members find out about associations, the acquisition marketing channels and offers they use, and how many renewal contacts they send out. Besides cataloging membership practices, this Benchmarking Report also cross-tabulates these practices with actual membership results that associations are experiencing. Are new member counts up or down? Are renewal rates above or below average? Has membership grown in the past year? How about in the past five years?

The comparison of practices and outcomes in membership provides strong directional information on tactics and strategies that might be added or dropped to improve membership programs.
However, our readers should be aware of an important disclaimer. Because an activity or practice has a statistical correlation with a growing or declining membership or with improved renewal rates, we are not claiming that any one behavior in and of itself causes this outcome. There are literally thousands of variables that impact membership results. Nevertheless, if as marketers we see that organizations with certain behaviors are better performers, it makes sense to consider applying those practices to other organizations. The 2011 Benchmarking Report offers dozens of key findings that can provide insights and directional information for membership marketing programs. Here are highlights of the key trends that came out of this years research.

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MEMBERSHIP GROWTH TRENDS

Membership organizations reported a triple play in membership growth based on survey results gathered for the 2011 Membership Marketing Benchmarking Report. From this years survey, which included 650 participating associations, the major indicators of membership healthtotal membership, new members acquired, and membership renewalsall showed substantial improvements from the previous years benchmarking report. A total of 49% of respondents said that they had recorded an overall increase in members over the previous 12 months. This is a substantial jump over the 36% who reported membership growth the previous year. Growth in new member recruitment appears to be the big driver in membership growth. Of responding association executives, 57% report the acquisition of new members increased over the past year. These results are significantly better compared to both 2010 and 2009.

Finally, the survey results show that membership renewals had a more positive outcome this past year, with 32% of respondents saying that they have had an increase in overall renewal rates.

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THE BIGGEST CHALLENGES TO MEMBERSHIP GROWTH

But even with improving numbers, challenges still exist for many groups in growing their membership. To gain a better understanding of these challenges, this year we asked association executives to tell us what they perceived as the biggest impediments to growth. We then took their answers and crosstabulated them with the reported membership performance for their organizations over the past five years. On the other hand, if an organization said that its biggest challenge was the lack of a strategy or plan, then membership was more likely to have remained static. However, there may be hope for membership growth even if an organization is faced with insufficient staff, market saturation, an inadequate association management database, or an absence of research to understand the market they serve. Organizations reporting these problems were more likely to have seen membership growth over the past five years.

We wanted to discover which challenges hurt membership growth the most and which were painful, but tended not to impede growth. Here is what we found: The data indicates that if an organization reported weak product and service offerings, insufficient budget, or a lack of marketing expertise as their biggest challenge, then membership growth was less likely to have occurred.

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ENGAGING MEMBERS WITH PRODUCTS AND SERVICES

Engaging members is also a critical component of building a strong membership. So our research this year included a question to try to gauge the participation level that organizations have achieved in a variety of programs and services that are commonly provided by membership organizations. Beyond just the proportion of membership using an associations products and services, the data highlighted that organizations that had at least some members involved in almost all of these activities were more likely to enjoy higher renewal rates than those organizations not offering a specific program. And in general, the higher the proportion of members who participated in an activity, the higher the likelihood of increased renewals for that organization. Specifically, organizations with members in the following activities were more likely to have renewal rates over 80% compared to organizations that did not offer these programs: attendance at annual convention, attendance at a professional development meeting, attendance at a webinar, volunteering, participation in the private social network, participation in young professionals program, purchase of a book or directory, certification, purchasing insurance, and purchase of a miscellaneous non-dues product or service. Participation in a public social network and upgrading a membership were the only activities that did not correlate with renewal rates over 80%.

See next page for results

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ENGAGING MEMBERS WITH PRODUCTS AND SERVICES

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RAISING DUES LEVELS

Another new area that we added to our research this year was the practices around raising membership dues. We asked: How often does your association raise membership dues?, When was the last time your association raised membership dues?, and What was the average percentage of your last membership dues increase across all membership categories? We found that 30% of organizations report that they have or will raise their membership dues in 2011 and 71% will increase dues rates between 1% and 10%. The majority of associations raise dues as needed and do not have a regular dues increase schedule.

*The dues increase questions in the 2011 Benchmarking Research mirror questions from the 2007 Marketing General Incorporated study titled, Membership Dues Increase Study: Best Practices in the Why, How, and Outcomes of Raising Membership Dues. Despite the dramatic economic events of recent years, the frequency and amount of dues increases vary only slightly from the findings of our 2007 report.

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REPORT BACKGROUND
The 2011 Membership Marketing Benchmarking Report is the third annual study of association membership conducted by Marketing General Incorporated, and it serves as a bellwether for the association industrys fiscal fitness. The report reveals that a key indicator of the economic health of the association industry, membership growth, shows strong signs of a rebound in 2011 from the severe effects of the multi year recession. Of the 650 association executives that responded to the 2011 survey, 57% reported new member acquisition increased from the year before and showed significant improvement from two years ago as well. The Benchmarking Report also found that the major indicators of membership health total membership, new members acquired, and membership renewalsall showed substantial improvement from the 2010 findings. In fact, just under half of the respondents 49% said they recorded an increase in members over the previous 12 months, the highest percentage since the inception of the Benchmarking Report in 2009. This Benchmarking Report also examines the strategies and tactics associations use to recruit, engage, renew, and reinstate members. It then cross-tabulates them with membership results for a comparison of practices and outcomes, which might help others to improve their programs. Again, we remind readers that, while a tactic or strategy may have a statistical correlation with growing or declining membership, no one behavior in and of itself results in a particular outcome. Literally thousands of variables can impact membership results. Nevertheless, as marketers, if we see organization practices that are having greater success than others, we should explore them to discover what may be useful to us. We hope that you find the full report of value for your organization. If you have questions or would like assistance with your membership marketing, the Marketing General team is pleased to help. Our website is www.MarketingGeneral.com. Please find our individual contact information on the cover of this report.

ABOUT MARKETING GENERAL INC.

Marketing General Inc. is the nations largest marketing agency working exclusively with membership associations. During the past 33 years, MGI has helped hundreds of associations increase their membership, improve retention, enhance member engagement, grow revenue, and gain new insights through member and market research and analysis. Additional information can be found at www.marketinggeneral.com or by contacting us at 703-739-1000.

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2011 Marketing General Incorporated

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