Without a doubt, the last two years has grown interest in private clubs nationwide. Clubs that, prior to covid, had been moving in the direction of attracting younger families and meeting the demands of local markets, reaped the benefit of this interest.
But let’s admit it. Those of us in membership roles at these successful clubs are ecstatic with the growth in membership (my club has seen a 45% increase in membership totals!), but also a little exhausted from the membership boom. A vacation is definitely in order.
Before we all hop on a plane to the Bahamas for a week, let’s get a game plan in place that will help us not only retain our new membership, but continue to recruit new members at a pace we can successfully handle. Here are three things we should all be considering: delight your current members; mentor your new employees; and take a good look at the waitlist.
Don’t aim to meet expectations – exceed them.
If you attended the PCMA Annual Conference in 2021, you heard Michael Crandall tell us our clubs should rewrite our mission statements to read: “Our members very favorite place to be.” To me, this means I want to encourage my club and all of its departments, to continue to do what we do best, but to also infuse an extra few ounces of delight – also known as overdelivering — in both big and small ways.
Infusing delight in small ways may mean offering cold towels to golfers and tennis players on hot days; congratulating a member publicly in the newsletter for an accomplishment; surprising members at an event with an added dessert or feature; or even seeing on social media a member is celebrating something, and then mentioning it to them when you see them at the club. It’s a small, but personal, gesture that makes someone feel seen, heard, understood or recognized.
Infusing delight in large ways can mean focusing on projects that continue the trajectory of modernizing our clubs and meeting the needs of the community surrounding us. Perhaps a big way clubs convince its membership that we are their favorite place to be is with social events. It’s not enough that our facilities and amenities look and play exceptionally. A healthy – doable – events calendar with gatherings that impress and leave members looking forward to the next event helps to increase retention. One of the tools I use to stay on track with promoting these events to my membership is my Content Strategy Workbook, an Excel file from the American Marketing Association that I’ve adjusted to fit my needs. Here is a link to the file. I hope you find it helpful.
Mentorship Matters – for Member Retention
An unfortunate side effect of the past couple of years that has affected the private club world is the worker shortage. Once known for our outstanding member service, we now find ourselves struggling through daily operations with an entirely new crew on board who don’t understand our history, traditions and member expectations. As the “new elders” of our clubs, it’s our job to mentor these new employees. In fact, I would argue that mentoring new club staff at all departments and all levels may be a new item in the membership director’s job category in order to protect our club’s brand and excellence.
In this American Marketing Association article on why mentorship matters — https://www.ama.org/marketing-news/mentorship-matters-now-more-than-ever/ — Alan Middleton makes the point that mentorship is more than the older generation mentoring the younger generation on traditions and techniques. We should keep in mind the younger generation has value to offer us as well. Maybe it’s in the latest social media marketing technique, or learning what Gen Z’s favorite menu items are. The point is mentorship should be a two-way street with both participants gleaning valuable information.
In the article, Middleton writes, “Organizations that encourage informal and formal, internal and external mentorship programs also benefit in numerous ways. These types of mentorship programs foster a corporate culture that encourages personal and professional growth through the sharing of information, competencies, values and behaviors. Establishing an environment where leaders are building leaders helps the process of identification, development and retention of talent for key managerial and professional roles.”
It’s entirely possible that our newly-hired staff doesn’t understand the level of service offered at private clubs. And it’s on all of our shoulders to ensure they learn the service techniques that our members expect and that impress and delight them.
Will they really wait? Really?
In the latest podcast episode of “Crushing Club Marketing,” podcaster Ed Heil interviewed Golf Life Navigators’ Jason Becker on his recent study of private club waitlists. The study, which ran on ClubEssential’s website here — https://www.clubessential.com/blog/What-Wait-listed-Club-Members-Want — surveyed more than 550 potential private club members and asked them about their potential actions if placed on a waitlist. Becker wrote:
Retaining membership momentum
This was a surprising finding for me personally, because, while my club does not have a waitlist, I’ve always been told having one is “a good thing” (no pun to Martha Stewart here). It appears from this data, that this may not be the case for all clubs anymore. I suspect what is really important to understand with this is one thing – your audience. Does your community perceive your club as worth a year or longer wait, or is there another local club that will suit their needs just fine?
Regardless, how a club handles its waitlist will affect membership momentum. Careful consideration should be given to what type of access waitlisted members have while on the list (and Becker says more than 90 percent expect golf access); and this consideration should always be married to current club traffic. Our waitlisted applicants/members should be marketed to and entertained in a way that ensures when it’s their turn to officially join, their decision to do so is a no-brainer for them.
No waitlist? Becker contends this should be included in your club marketing, almost as an added feature. Especially if another club in your market is enforcing theirs.
Now that we have our game plan to delight our members, practices in place to mentor our staff and a solid footing on how we can also market and intrigue our waitlist, we can move on to more important topics.
Like which resort we are vacationing at first, and is it all inclusive?