How to Future-Proof Your Club: A Guide to Building a Resilient Organisation

Building a resilient organisation requires a proactive approach to future-proofing your operations. A key strategy involves consistently attracting new members, particularly younger demographics, by leveraging modern digital systems and a strong online presence. This commitment to technology adoption, including the strategic use of AI, alongside a clear plan for gathering member feedback, is essential for ensuring your organisation's longevity and adaptability in an ever-changing world.

Predicting how the future will work out is pretty tricky. In 1876, Western Union’s president refused to purchase Alexander Graham Bell’s patent for the telephone, dismissing it as “impractical” and “idiotic”. His prediction that no one would ever want to use phones turned out to be just a little wide of the mark. 

Fun fact: After inventing the telephone, Bell suggested that the standard greeting when answering the phone should be “Ahoy-hoy”. In a better universe, that would have been adopted by everyone; think of all the treasures we have missed out on. 
 

 

My point is that none of us know what the future holds or what will or won’t be popular in the years to come. Nonetheless, we still have to prepare for it. So today, we will discuss how you can ensure your membership organisation thrives no matter what the future holds. 

In this article, we will cover:

• Attracting new members 
• Ensure that you don’t rely on only one person
• Have good digital systems in place
• Have a plan in place to get member feedback
• Embrace new technology 

 

Attracting New Members

Attracting new members is crucial for any organisation's long-term success. As existing members eventually step back, a consistent stream of new members is essential to maintain your numbers and ultimately grow. While all new members are good, attracting younger members is particularly vital for securing the future of your organisation. At the risk of sounding like a vampire, nothing rejuvenates a membership organisation and sets it up for a bright future quite like an influx of fresh blood.

 

To do this, ensure your club or association is easy to find online and appealing to visitors when they do find it. A modern marketing strategy can take a variety of forms, including actively marketing your organisation, maintaining a strong social media presence, sponsoring events, hosting events that are open to the public, and having a high-quality website with diverse events and activities.

The role of technology in attracting these younger generations cannot be overstated. According to Greg Cunningham from the Street Machine Association of South Australia, the first question he often hears from new members is, “Do you have an App?” 

Younger generations are far less likely to join organisations that still rely on manual, outdated systems. Therefore, having a strong online presence is crucial. This includes an aesthetically pleasing website, an active social media account, and an app that is easy to use and navigate. By keeping up with the latest technological trends, your organisation can remain relevant and attract new, younger members to secure its future.

For a much deeper dive into how best to attract younger members, check out Why You Should Focus On Attracting Younger Members To Your Club Or Association.

Ensuring Your Future Doesn’t Rely On One Person

Before joining Member Jungle, many clubs and associations faced the unfortunate problem of having only one person with access to the website, social media, domain, DNS, and sometimes even the literal keys to the club. If this person quits, falls off the radar, passes away, or simply goes on a holiday, it can cause chaos, as no one else has the necessary access to keep the organisation running. On more than one occasion, we’ve encountered an organisation that had a falling out with this person in control, only to have them delete all the data, take down the website, and leave everyone else high and dry.

Maintaining the security and continuity of your organisation is paramount to its continued survival. This is why having more than one trusted individual with access to vital login credentials and information is so crucial. 

By using a membership management system such as Member Jungle or one of our competitors, you can help solve a lot of these problems before they arise. At Member Jungle, we provide training to you and your administrators, allowing you to give a small number of trusted people keys to the kingdom, rather than pinning all your hopes on a single person. This way, we can ensure that you will never be locked out of your system and that there will always be someone who knows how to use it.

For details on how you can ensure all of the administrators have the right level of access, read Share The Administrative Load With Your Committee Using Member Jungle.

Having Digital Systems In Place To Ensure Your Future

We have already briefly touched on it, but having good digital systems in place is now crucial for any organisation. These systems, including your website, sign-up and renewal processes, online communication, and social media, have become increasingly vital for the survival of membership organisations over the last decade, and that trend is very unlikely to change. Not only do you need effective digital systems today, but you also need to ensure those systems will continue to update and improve with you and with future technological advancements.

Having A Good Website

Having a good website for your club or association is very important in helping you prepare for the future. It can do this by attracting new members, facilitating clearer and easier communications with your members, and working well with membership management software to make sign-ups and renewals more streamlined. 

Your website will be the main way you communicate with your members and will likely be the first impression new members get of your organisation. So, it is very important to ensure that it is visually appealing and has all the functions you need, including news, event management, member login, etc. 

For more info on ensuring your website is as good and helpful as possible, check out Why Your Club Needs A Well-Designed Club Website. 

Having Good Membership Management Software

It's becoming increasingly necessary to have a membership management system in place, as members' patience for manual systems is diminishing. Soon, you'll be hard-pressed to find any members willing to fill in paper sign-up or renewal forms. A good membership management system can solve many of the problems we've discussed today, from attracting new members to simplifying sign-ups and making management more efficient. Plus, most of these systems have an accompanying app, which we know is a key feature for attracting younger members.

It's worth noting that it isn't just younger members who lack patience for complicated, drawn-out processes; younger volunteers are also increasingly unlikely to put up with slow and outdated methods. Using a membership management system to make your organisation as streamlined and time-efficient as possible will help you get and keep younger volunteers.

Finally, it’s also crucial that your system continues to evolve with the times. Ensure that what is a great system today will still be a great one tomorrow. If you’re interested in how Member Jungle plans to evolve with developing technology, read Member Jungle Product Releases: What It Means For Your Club.

Have A Plan In Place To Get Member Feedback

A really important aspect of running any successful membership organisation is learning from your mistakes and listening to your members. You should be in a constant cycle of getting feedback and making improvements.

Your organisation can do this by using:

 

• Member Surveys and Polls: These are a direct and easy way to ask members what they like and don't like about your events, communication, and overall services.
   
• Data Reporting: Your member data can provide a wealth of information. By regularly checking your reports, you can see at a glance which events did well, which struggled, and which members are most and least engaged.
   
• Direct Conversations: Simply asking members for their thoughts during events or over a phone call can provide invaluable, honest feedback.

 

By having a clear plan to collect and act on feedback, you ensure your organisation is always adapting to your members' needs, which is key to keeping them happy and engaged.

For more tips on surveying your members, read Why You Should Conduct Regular Surveys of Your Members.

For more tips on data reporting, read Why Your Club Or Association Needs Data Reporting.

Why Your Club Needs To Embrace New Technology 

One thing that has been repeatedly proven is that embracing new technology is vital to the continued survival of any institution. 

A perfect example of this happened in 2000, when Blockbuster’s CEO declined an offer to buy online subscription-based DVD rental company Netflix for $50 million, citing no value in the online subscription format. As we all know, Netflix continued to embrace new technology. Blockbuster stuck stubbornly to doing this the way they’d always done them. As a result, Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy in 2010, and Netflix is now worth over $500 billion. 

Embracing new technology and taking change in your stride may be challenging. Still, it is required for your organisation to continue to thrive long into the future. It is incredibly hard to predict what technology will and won’t be popular in the coming years, but here are just two things to look out for. 

Embrace Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence is growing and improving at an astonishing rate. It might sound like hyperbole, but AI will be by far the biggest change we have experienced in our lifetime. The last time we saw changes on the scale and magnitude of AI was the Industrial Revolution, and AI may still surpass it. 

Therefore, it is crucial to adopt AI and use it to make running your organisation easier and more efficient. This is such a big topic that I’m not going to direct you to an article on it, but rather a whole blog category about using AI: AI and Future of Clubs.

Give Members Content The Way They Want It 

Did you know that 62.5% of all internet traffic is from smartphones? If someone is visiting your website, chances are they're doing it on a phone. That means you need to ensure your website is mobile-responsive and/or has a really good mobile app that your members and prospective members can interact with. Otherwise, you risk alienating a huge portion of your audience.

The mobile-first trend is just one example of how important it is to keep an eye on future technological advancements and be prepared to embrace them when they occur. You can rest assured that we at Member Jungle will always stay on top of the latest developments and will do our very best to inform you of any developments you need to know about.

The Power of Video Content

Video is another key format for meeting your members where they are. Modern data suggests that a large percentage of people prefer watching a video to reading text. A short video can quickly and effectively communicate a message, making it a highly engaging tool.

You could use video to:

• Showcase your events: Create highlight reels of past activities to get people excited about the next one.
• Introduce your committee: A brief video interview can humanise your leadership and build trust.
• Answer FAQs: A quick video answering common questions can save your team a lot of time.
• Onboard new members: A short video can walk new members through the sign-up process or show them how to access their benefits.

By offering video content, you are catering to a different learning and communication style, ensuring your message reaches more people and lands with greater impact.

Check out How To Get More Engagement With Video On Your Membership Website for more on this. 

Anything Else I Can Do To Prepare My Club For The Future?

With all that in mind, the only thing you can do is get out there and start marketing your club and preparing for whatever the future has in store for us. 

If you want to know why you need a proper member recruitment plan, have a peek at Why Your Club Or Association Needs A Member Recruitment Plan. 

For some tips on increasing your member retention, have a look at Why Demonstrating Membership Value is Key to Increasing Member Retention.