As I have worked with associations over the years, I have often been asked questions such as, "What email should we send?" What ad should we run? What incentive should we offer?
Marketing tactics remain critical to acquiring and retaining
members. However, the world is changing. Growing membership requires a more
focused strategy than ever before. Here is the challenge. According to the
annual Membership Marketing Benchmarking Report, the share of
associations reporting membership gains has gradually declined over the past
four years. In 2026, only 38 percent of associations reported an increase in
membership, down from 49 percent. Acquiring, engaging, and retaining members is
more challenging today than in the past.
To meet these challenges, I share many strategies to
increase the effectiveness of membership marketing in my book, Membership Marketing from A to Z. A
major theme that runs through the book is connecting what behavioral science
has learned about decision-making with the marketing programs associations use
to recruit and retain members.
Behavioral science asks a different question from the
tactical questions that often dominate marketing discussions. Instead of
beginning with what email to send or what offer to make, it asks: What is
happening inside the prospect's mind? Once we begin to answer that question,
our marketing choices become much clearer.
Understanding How
People Make Decisions
The first step is to understand the mindset and needs of
prospective and current members. Research is obviously an important component
of this process. Qualitative and quantitative research can help associations
identify the needs of prospective and current members. After all, some define
marketing as finding a need and meeting it.
But we can take that knowledge a step further by considering
the decision-making process people go through when they contemplate joining,
engaging with, or renewing their membership.
Psychologists and behavioral scientists have studied
decision-making extensively. In his widely used text, Persuasion: Theory and
Research, Daniel J. O'Keefe discusses the Transtheoretical Model (TTM),
which can offer a useful framework for understanding a prospect's or member’s
decision-making process. The model outlines five stages that people move
through when making and maintaining an important behavioral change.
The Five Stages of
Behavioral Change
With TTM, the process begins with Precontemplation.
When applied to membership, a prospective member may be unaware of the
association and may not recognize a need for membership. There is little reason
to expect action because the individual has not yet seriously considered the
decision.
Once interest develops, the person enters the
Contemplation stage. The prospect begins weighing the pros and cons. Is
membership relevant? Does it provide sufficient value? Is it worth the cost and
commitment?
If the benefits appear to outweigh the costs, the prospect
moves toward Planning. An intention to join may now exist, but intention
is not the same as action. Delay, distraction, and procrastination can still
derail the decision.
The fourth stage is Action. At this point, the
prospect may need an action-oriented interaction. This might include a clear
call to action, an appropriate incentive, or simply a frictionless way to
complete the transaction.
Importantly, the model does not end once the decision has
been made. It includes Maintenance. People often seek reassurance after
making an important decision. The new behavior needs reinforcement and support
to continue.
This is where behavioral science begins to reshape how we
approach membership marketing. Membership marketing is not simply a
transaction. It is a relationship in which we help people progress through the
stages of behavior change. If we understand where someone is in that process,
we can tailor marketing strategies to them rather than relying on generic tactics.
Connecting
Behavioral Science to the Membership Lifecycle
Understanding how people make decisions is interesting, but
understanding alone does not increase membership. The practical question is:
How should associations respond?
This is where I believe behavioral science and a relational
marketing model converge. For associations, the Membership Lifecycle
offers a systematic approach to guiding prospects and members through their
relationship with an organization. It includes Awareness, Recruitment,
Engagement, Renewal, and Winback.
Viewed through a behavioral science lens, the Membership
Lifecycle is more than a marketing framework. Although the two models do not
align perfectly, TTM helps us understand where an individual is
psychologically, while the Membership Lifecycle organizes the association's
marketing response. Together, they provide a framework to help prospects and
members move toward the next decision.
Awareness:
Creating Mutual Awareness
At the Awareness stage of the Lifecycle, prospects are
primarily in Precontemplation or early Contemplation. They may not know the
association exists, may not understand what it offers, or may not recognize
that membership could benefit them. For example, the Association Member Experience Report by Higher Logic reports that the top reason prospects
give for not joining an association is “I’m not aware of one that aligns with
my industry/role/interests.”
One of the longstanding rules of thumb in marketing is the
Rule of Seven. This rule holds that it takes multiple interactions before
someone makes a buying decision. Whether the actual number is seven, more, or
less is not the important point. The principle reminds us that decisions
generally develop over time rather than happen instantly.
That is why the objective at this first stage is what I call
mutual awareness. No one joins a membership organization unless they know it
exists and believe it offers value. At the same time, an association will
struggle to recruit prospective members if it cannot identify them and capture
their contact information in its database.
Associations need to achieve both a share of mind and a
share of the database. Prospects need to become aware of the association, while
the association needs prospects to raise their hands by registering on a
website, downloading a whitepaper, subscribing to a newsletter, attending a
webinar, or otherwise identifying themselves and opting into further
communication. When you know who they are and they know you, you have the
opportunity to cultivate a relationship.
Content marketing, digital advertising, social media, and
SEO can all support this process. But from a behavioral perspective, the
purpose of these tools is not merely to generate clicks or impressions. Their
role is to help move someone from Precontemplation and Contemplation to making
a decision.
Recruitment:
Turning Intention into Action
Once prospects understand the value an association can
provide, they move into the Planning and Action stages of the
decision process. Marketing needs to adjust.
Marketers sometimes call membership a “push” rather than a
“pull” product. If you are a coffee drinker, you probably don't need an
advertising campaign to convince you to seek out your morning cup. You already
want it. Very few people, however, wake up thinking, “Today I need to find an
association to join.” Membership generally needs to be actively marketed
through recruitment.
Effective recruitment requires several key ingredients.
First, a budget needs to be established, ideally not based on initial returns
but on the lifetime value a new member will generate. Next, recruitment
requires sufficient marketing frequency and reach. One-off recruitment will not
work. Reaching as deeply as possible into the target market produces the
highest volume of new members. Finally, offering an incentive to join gives an
interested prospect a reason to act now. An incentive should not be viewed as a
bribe. Its purpose is to motivate someone who already sees value in taking the
action but has procrastinated.
At this stage in the decision process, even small barriers
matter. A confusing application, a broken link, or a difficult payment process
can interrupt Action and lead to abandonment.
Engagement:
Affirming the Decision
Once someone joins, the behavioral objective shifts again to
support and maintain the decision through Engagement.
Have you ever bought a new pair of running shoes, a car, or
even an expensive smartphone, only to later wonder, “Did I make the right
decision?” Psychologists call this discomfort cognitive dissonance. After
making an important decision, people naturally seek reassurance that they chose
wisely.
Joining an association is no different. A new member has
committed money and, potentially, time. If the member does not quickly
experience value or receive affirmation, questions about whether joining was
worthwhile can begin to emerge. TTM identifies this as the Maintenance stage.
The decision has been made, but the new behavior has not necessarily become
established.
New members need an onboarding program that confirms, “I
made a good decision.” These recent members are particularly vulnerable to
attrition. Benchmarking data show that first-year members renew at a rate 10
points lower than tenured members. Additionally, ongoing engagement marketing
supports the renewal of longer-term members, especially those who show no
behavioral indicators of usage. Encouraging interaction, whether attending a
program, visiting the website, completing a survey, making a purchase, or contacting
the association, correlates positively with renewal. The behavioral objective
of engagement is to help members maintain and reinforce the decision to belong.
Renewal:
Reasserting Value and Status
At the Renewal stage, members are not all in the same
psychological state. Some remain comfortably in Maintenance, while others have
slipped back into Contemplation and are reassessing whether membership is
worthwhile.
In addition to evaluating the association’s value, another
complication is that members are sometimes simply confused about their
membership status. In one association survey, only 85 percent of current
members correctly identified themselves as members, yet 23 percent of former
members and 15 percent of people who had never been members also believed they
were current members. The Membership Marketing Benchmarking Report has also consistently
identified “forgot to renew” as a key reason members give for lapsing.
These issues tell us something important about renewal
marketing. The job is not simply to send a renewal notice. Associations need to
reassert their value and membership status.
Given these challenges, a synchronized, multichannel,
higher-frequency campaign can help members understand their status, remember
the value they receive, and complete the renewal process. Associations can also
reduce renewal friction by offering automatic renewal, installment plans,
multiyear memberships, and other flexible payment options.
Winback: Restoring
the Relationship
Finally, some members will lapse. From a behavioral
perspective, many have reverted to Contemplation. They are again questioning
the value or relevance of membership.
There will always be bumps in the road in any relationship,
and membership relationships are no exception. But restoring an existing
relationship often makes more sense than starting a new one. The Winback stage
of the Lifecycle aims to understand what happened, address the problem where
possible, and invite the former member back. As the old proverb advises, “Look
where you tripped, not where you fell.”
Importantly, a lapsed member is not necessarily
dissatisfied. Former members frequently cite reasons for leaving that have
little to do with the association's quality: an employer stopped paying dues,
they changed jobs, they lacked time, experienced a family emergency,
encountered difficulty with the renewal process, or simply thought they had
already renewed.
These circumstances can change. That is why successful
membership organizations continue to communicate with former members rather
than assume the relationship is permanently over.
Marketing to the
Member's Mindset
When membership is static or declining, associations
naturally seek an explanation. They may conclude they have a value problem or
that their marketing simply is not working. Sometimes that is true. But another
possibility deserves consideration. The marketing may be misaligned with where
prospects and members are psychologically.
An association may ask prospects to join before they
understand the value of membership. Conversely, after establishing value, it
may fail to make a clear ask and provide a reason to act. Once people join, the
organization may neglect the cognitive dissonance that follows a decision and
fail to affirm that the new member made a good choice. At renewal, it may assume
the member understands both the ongoing value and the current status of the
relationship. And when a member lapses, it may give up on a relationship that
could still be restored.
Combining the psychology of decision-making with the
Membership Lifecycle offers a different approach to membership marketing.
Instead of starting with a tactic, start with the individual. Ask, “Where is
this prospect or member in the decision-making process?” Then determine which
marketing tactic will help that person take the next step.
Viewed this way, the Membership Lifecycle is a marketing
process that supports people's decision-making. Each stage aims to help people
advance in their relationship with the association.
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