The Best Places to Recruit Members in the Digital Age
Ah, recruiting. Like engagement and churn, it’s the thing you never stop thinking about.
Nothing beats an enthusiastic word-of-mouth referral, of course, but living in the digital age, we have more options for recruiting today than ever before — it’s just a matter of knowing where and how to look.
If you’re finding that your usual options aren’t yielding a high number of prospects, stepping up your digital and online recruiting might be the way to go.
Surveys suggest that members who sign up or renew online tend to lead to more engaged membership overall.
Respondents to the Advanced Solutions International 2016 Global Benchmark Report on Membership Performance certainly think so. Of the organizations that processed more than 50% of their new member joins or renewals online, 67% grew their overall membership base and 48% increased overall engagement.
Credit: 2016 Global Benchmark Report
So how can digital recruiting help you solve the new member puzzle?
Set Yourself Up for Digital Recruiting Success
Let’s say that you’ve done all the groundwork, figured out some great places online where potential members like to hang out, figured out how to engage with them and convince them to check out something you wrote or posted.
Let’s follow that path to its end. A potential member likes your Facebook post of a YouTube video showing a recent talk by a prominent speaker at your executive luncheon. They get curious and click on the link in the description to a similar upcoming event and they end up on your website.
Is it a soft landing? What are they going to see when they get there?
Every piece of your online presence is part of your overall brand, and if that potential member is on their phone and your website looks really weird or loads slowly, you’re probably going to lose their interest quickly.
In short: make sure your website and all your digital channels are prepared for digital recruiting.
In the Benchmark study, of the organizations w/ 90% retention rates, 65% had redesigned their website within the last two years, and 43% used responsive web design, which automatically reformats your website to fit whatever device your member or prospect is using.
For example, our website is built to be responsive to different devices, so it appears consistently (and legibly) no matter how it’s accessed:
If it’s been a few years since you redesigned your website and you know it’s not mobile-friendly or responsive, it might be time to take a look at your budget and schedule your next digital overhaul.
Tap Into the Power of Your Member Network
Just like nothing works better than word-of-mouth referrals, you can work for the digital equivalent.
Asking your existing members to promote and engage with potential members online can help you secure an online “referral” of sorts. Prospects who see your existing members regularly promoting your organization will form a more positive opinion and see more of your content.
Give your members an incentive to work on your behalf. No matter how engaged and active your members are, they’ll still be more likely to promote the organization if there’s something in it for them.
Try offering discounts to members on things like event registrations, renewals or courses if they get a non-member to attend with them or sign up. Referral programs can be a strong part of your recruiting mix if you’re incentivizing your membership well.
For instance, the Portland Business Alliance offers the chance to win Alaska Airlines tickets for every new member referral.
Create Great Content for Online Audiences
One of the best ways to attract an online audience is to give them something worth their while — something valuable that people can get in exchange for giving you information.
Lead magnets, as they’re called, make great tools because people first express interest in what you’re offering, then decide they want it enough to offer up their email address. That gives you a way to stay in touch and further communicate your association’s value proposition.
A few examples of lead magnets you could use:
- A detailed report with proprietary data from surveys of your membership
- Discounts on non-member prices to a future event (which also incentivizes them to attend)
- A series of resources (articles, white papers, eBooks, videos and more) featuring exclusive insights from your board members or other prominent members
You can subtly add information and branding from your organization to these pieces, including a “call to action” to contact you for more information.
Stretch Your Social Media Muscles
As mentioned before, recruiting on social media isn’t the right answer for every organization. That said, social media can be a great tool for maintaining a strong member community for many orgs, and any prospect who is personally active on social media usually checks out your social presence before deciding whether or not to join.
Even if you’re not getting signups directly from social media, it can be a great way to share the lead magnets and offers we talked about earlier. Plus, incentivizing your existing members to post and share information about your organization on social platforms can quickly multiply the reach of any of your posts.
Here are some key facts to keep in mind when you’re evaluating which of the major social platforms makes sense for your efforts (all statistics from the Pew Research Center):
- Who uses it: 62% of the entire adult U.S. population. That’s right — and the age breakdown makes it pretty clear that pretty much everyone uses it: 82% of adults ages 18–29, 79% ages 30–49 and 64% ages 50–64.
- What does it make sense for: Everyone, quite honestly. Even if you’re not ready to put in a lot of effort on engagement campaigns or drawing people to your website via advertising, maintaining a Facebook presence is a bare minimum for the digitally connected organization today. Keep an eye on our blog space in future weeks for articles about how to start and succeed at Facebook advertising for member orgs!
- Who uses it: 23% of all Internet users and 20% of the adult population. 30% of online adults under 50 (compared with 11% of online adults 50 and older).
- What does it make sense for: If your organization lives more in the business and tech worlds and recruits from there, Twitter is a great bet. We break down using Twitter for recruitment and engagement pretty thoroughly in this post. It makes a great platform for sharing and aggregating news, and for creating engagement around live events like conferences or Twitter chats with hashtags.
- Who uses it: 22% of the U.S. adult population. 46% of users have a college degree or higher, and 41% earn an income of greater than $75k a year.
- What does it make sense for: If you’re a business-oriented association or membership org, LinkedIn can be a perfect platform to grow your base awareness levels and promote lead magnets. People generally expect businesses and organizations to be active on LinkedIn, and would hardly bat an eye at your members discussing professional events or your benefits in their newsfeeds.
- Who uses it: 28% of adult Internet users and 24% of the U.S. adult population. 47% of Black, Non-HIspanic Internet users and 55% of 18–29 year olds.
- What does it make sense for: Instagram may seem like a surprising choice for a lot of member organizations, but Facebook and Instagram users are the most engaged of all social users. If your memberships skews younger (or if you want it to), or if you’re best-served by a highly visual online presence, Instagram can be a viable option. It’s also easy to add to your social mix even if your org isn’t based on compelling visuals — be creative! You can Instagram pics of social events, landmarks in the cities where your chapters are located and more.
Final Thoughts
The same concepts that have always applied to in-person member recruitment apply to digital recruiting as well. We know that a member’s word-of-mouth referral is like solid recruiting gold, and we can apply the same idea to digital referrals. We know that clearly communicating the value of membership always mattered in print materials, and we can apply the same clarity to our digital messaging.
Recruitment and engagement take up a lot of brain space for member org leaders. The beauty of digital recruiting is that you’re able to amplify your reach in ways that would have been impossible just a handful of years ago. So start thinking about incentivizing your members to share their experiences online, and start looking beyond the usual places to find your prospects’ digital hangouts too.
Interested in learning how membership management software can help you communicate recruitment incentives to existing members and promote more social interactions? Try out MemberMan’s free beta today!
