Association Leaders Pleasantly Surprised by Membership Retention in 2011

By Association Adviser staff

Are associations staying relevant in these challenging times? Last month’s Association Adviser

reader poll indicated yes, as nearly half (42.2 percent) of respondents told us that they’ve been surprised by their ability to grow, or at least maintain, their membership bases through the economic downturn.

Not surprisingly, just one in five (20.7 percent) respondents said they had better than expected bottom line results this year; however, just 19 percent said they were pleasantly surprised by their social and mobile media initiatives, and just 18.1 percent said they were surprised by the success of their member communications programs overall.

What was the most important (positive) surprise for you in 2011?

Source: Association Adviser enews and Naylor, LLC 2011 | N=87

The latest reader survey results seem to build on the findings we detected in January’s 2011 Association Communication Benchmarking Report. In that report, just nine percent of the 700 responding associations rated their member communications programs “best in class” and overall, gave their mobile media offerings a self-rated 3.1 out of a possible 5, and their social media programs a 3.3 out of a possible 5.