What’s stopping you from adding external expertise to your team?
- Is it because YOU believe you need to be the organization’s “expert”?
- Is it because if you do, your leadership might think you are somehow inadequate?
- Do you think your staff will think you’re sending a message that they aren’t up to the job?
- Is it a money issue? Do you believe you’ll get more “bang for the buck” by hiring staff instead of “renting” expertise?
- Do you (or your staff) lack the experience in a certain area to even know you need outside expertise?
As experts in the art of membership acquisition, retention and engagement, we certainly hear (or sense) these sentiments from prospective clients.
But the interesting thing is, when we work with actual clients and they see results from the engagement, these myths are dispelled.
Why Hire Membership Marketing Experts?
If you asked our clients, they would say it’s because we’re all better when we work together. Hiring experts is a way to “rent” specific expertise that leads to getting more done, achieving improved results faster, and developing better trained staff members (and satisfied leadership).
Another reason is because they trust us to have answers backed up by experience—in all categories related to acquisition, engagement and retention—and we know how to adapt past learnings to their unique opportunities.
And because it’s a smart use of resources. Our clients understand the power of having a fractional asset with skills and abilities that they don’t need 100% of the time.
Experts are shortcuts to your membership marketing success
Hiring expertise in a specific area can help you avoid a long learning curve that can frustrate and delay success. Specialists see more tests (wins and losses) than a single organization will be able to execute in a much longer period of time. There’s no magic solution, but there absolutely ARE shortcuts to success when you tap into the experience bank of experts.
Experts are flexible resources; expand or contract as needed
When you choose to add outside expertise to your team, you determine the duration of that working arrangement. Unlike hiring a staff person, experts are hired for a particular need, not as a part of your organization. While we’ve certainly had long relationships with clients, our goal is to augment your team, not completely replace them. Sometimes the need is tactical, with a deadline. Sometimes it’s as a bridge until you can reorganize and hire. Sometimes it’s as a trainer to make sure your current and future team speak the same language and that institutional knowledge is passed on.
Caveat: beware of experts who are focused on tying you up in a long contractual engagement. You want experts when you need them. Your relationship is healthiest when it’s based on continued value, not a signature on a piece of paper. We live by the mantra, “Life is long.” Our engagements fit our clients’ needs at the time. Budgets, goals—even bosses—change. “Three-peats” (multiple intermittent projects) are not uncommon with our clients.
Using the right experts make YOU look good.
Experts want to be appreciated, certainly. When we come in with knowledge that leads to better results for you, everyone wins. But we know that wins don’t happen automatically. They happen when you mix experience with institutional knowledge and openness to trying new things.
When our clients win, it’s because we were able to meld all the right ingredients together to persuade more members to join/renew/engage. Credit belongs to the leader who brings the right materials together (including expertise).
Who really wins in the end? Your members.
When you are an organization that relies on continuity, you need people to join, engage and renew. Your organization thrives when more people say “yes” and then “yes” again each time they are asked to renew or engage in some way. They do that not because they are tricked into joining by some clever campaign, but by genuine, relevant work that creates satisfaction and delivers on the promise you make at acquisition.
Of course, you want to be a good steward of your organization’s resources. You want your membership acquisition marketing budget to be as effective as possible, your renewal efforts to produce, and your satisfaction scores to head up. You don’t want to over spend on inside or outside resources.
The truth is you couldn’t justify having the kinds of experts you can “rent” on your payroll every day. And you don’t need people like us all the time. But when you need to move the needle on acquisition, retention and engagement, there’s no one better to have (fractionally) available.
If you’re reading this, you already have a sense that you would benefit from having a conversation with a membership marketing specialist.
So why wait. Let’s start creating some wins for you.