How to attract younger members to your association

Young professionals represent a huge pool of potential members for your organization. Here’s how to attract new members to your association by appealing to younger members.

As some number of your members fail to renew each year, you must attract new members to your association to backfill them. Then, you must recruit even more members to grow your organization. In short, the ongoing success of your association depends a great deal on your ability to continually attract new members.

How do you increase membership in an association?

One great way to increase membership is to appeal to younger members. Young professionals in your industry represent a vast pool of prospective members for your association.

According to Pew Research Center, Millennials were the largest generation in the U.S. labor force starting in 2016. And according to an article from Forbes, Generation Z’s impact on the workplace continues to grow.

What’s more, most members join an association as a student or early in their career. In fact, association industry research by Momentive Software shows that most members join as a student, a new graduate, or within the first five years of employment.

Many of those early in their careers fall into the Millennial and Gen Z groups.

How can you get more young professionals to join your association?

Let’s look at five easy, yet effective, ways to attract younger members to your association:

1. Offer the benefits younger professionals care about to attract new members.

Keeping a steady stream of new members coming in your door means providing the next generation of members with the content and benefits they care about. The 2023 Association Trends Study by Momentive Software shows that members who are early in their careers are more focused on benefits including training, help advancing their careers, and job opportunities.

Here are some ways to give them the professional development benefits they want:

• Offer continuing education opportunities – Early careerists are looking for training to help them grow professionally. Offering valuable online learning content is a great way to give younger members a convenient and cost-effective way to get the professional education and credentials they seek.

Consider partnering with universities so that you understand what training and certifications are most relevant to students and recent graduates. This approach can also build a pipeline of young professionals who will want to join your association.

Also, make sure you have the right tools and processes in place to deliver continuing education content efficiently. For example, YourMembership Learning is a learning management system (LMS) that helps you organize content and deliver a modern online continuing education experience.

• Provide a robust online career center – A career center is critically important for attracting new members – especially those early in their careers. A robust career center offers a huge member benefit by connecting members with job opportunities through an online job board. It can also help first-time job seekers with professional development through resources that help them to:
  • Learn how to develop résumés, prepare for interviews, network, and build a personal brand
  • Understand the best career path for their goals so that they can get their careers started in the right direction
  • Connect with coaches and mentors who can provide ongoing support by sharing experience and advice
  • Your organization can use this appealing member benefit to attract younger members.

It’s also important to optimize your job board for visibility and access to non-members to help increase membership. One great way to do this is to integrate your job board with your AMS. For example, YM Careers online job board software integrates with YourMembership AMS. With this integration, non-members who visit your job board and sign up as job seekers can be automatically delivered to your AMS as a list of new member prospects for your to use in member acquisition efforts.

• Connect younger members with mentors – Mentors can help your younger members grow professionally. Students and new graduates often seek a mentor to help them as they enter the workforce.

Giving your members access to mentors who can guide them in their careers is an invaluable member benefit. So, offer an online mentor board for those members who are just starting out. For example, YM Careers includes a Career Planning Portal with every job board that allows you to give members the ability to connect with a potential mentor.

• Put your online community to work – Your association’s online community is a highly effective tool for helping your members connect, share, and learn. Use your online member community to give younger members access to information that matters most to them, such as details about your organization’s professional development opportunities.

Giving members access to the content they seek makes them feel part of a group and benefits them professionally. Plus, housing key content in your online community is an impactful way to create conversations around your content, get feedback, and improve member engagement.

Another approach is to create a group in your online community for early careerists in which these members can ask questions and discuss topics with each other. Ask one of your association staff members or board members to participate in the group to help answer questions and direct members to helpful resources.

Also, recruit younger members as community leaders. Asking these current members to become community leaders can help them to feel more engaged. And people often feel a fast connection with their peers, so the more your association’s younger members see members like them participating, the more likely they’ll be to join in.

A simple thing you can ask them to do is to get conversations started by posting in the community several times each week. These posts might include industry news, a call for suggestions about how to address a challenge, and questions to engage members.

Learn more about online member communities

YourMembership AMS includes online member community functionality that can help you build a thriving online community. If you don’t have an online member community, learn how to get started: Read The Small Association’s Guide to Getting Started with an Online Community.

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2. Ask younger members to help recruit new members.

People often feel more connected with their peers. They’re more likely to be interested in joining your organization if they hear about a great member experience from another young professional. So, consider asking your younger members to help your association recruit other young professionals.

Here are some ideas:

• Ask for member testimonials. Ask younger members who recently joined your organization why they joined. Invite them to share a quote about how being a member has helped them so far. Or ask them to share a piece of advice with other young professionals who might be thinking about joining. Record these testimonials as short videos or written quotes, and then include the testimonials in your recruitment campaigns, including emails, social media, and your website.

• Create case studies. Find a few young professional members who have become highly involved with your organization within the first year or so of membership. Ask if they’ll share the full story of when and why they joined your organization, how they have been involved, and how their membership has helped them grow professionally. Interview these members, and write up their stories or capture the stories on video. As with the testimonials, include these longer case studies in your recruitment campaigns.
• Offer leadership opportunities. Ask younger members to become involved as committee members and committee chairs, and even consider appointing a board seat for a young professional. Seeing their peers in leadership roles will signal to other young professionals that your association values young members.
• Use your online member community to reach non-members. If your online community allows you to provide limited access to non-members, invite young potential members to join the community to help recruit members. Start a discussion group for young professionals, and ask some of your more involved younger current members to participate in the group. They can share tips, resources, and benefits of joining the organization to inspire other young professionals to join.

3. Connect with potential members from Generation Z.

As Gen Z enters the workforce, getting them to join your organization will require connecting with them the way they like to engage. Here are some tips:

• Engage them on their favorite social media platforms. The 2023 Association Trends Study shows that Facebook and LinkedIn are the top social media platforms used by all members. However, other research from Momentive Software shows that for Generation Z specifically, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat are more popular platforms.
• Listen to them in your online community. Here’s another chance to put your online community to use. Create groups for young professionals to network with each other as they join your association. Ask someone from your association staff to participate in the group and listen to what they’re saying. Then, that person can provide periodic updates to your association staff and board about what’s most important to that group.

• Ask for their feedback. What better way to know how best to connect with Gen Z than to ask them? Send your younger current members a periodic survey to capture their feedback on their professional challenges, communications preferences, and experience with your organization.

4. Offer scholarships to grow your membership.

Offering scholarships to students and those getting started in your industry is another great way to provide a benefit that attracts new members. Scholarships can help younger members to:

• Finish their education so they can begin working in your industry
• Gain training, continuing education, and certifications they need to start their careers
• Pay for additional education that can help them to move forward professionally

To optimize your scholarship offerings for member recruitment, be sure to get the word out. Promote your scholarship opportunities in multiple ways. For example, post about them in your social media channels. Highlight them on your association’s website. Publicize them in member email communications and in your online community. Provide details about them at your annual conference. Ask your board of directors to spread the word about them as well.

Also, give your scholarship recipients industry exposure by promoting the winners in multiple ways. For example, announce scholarship winners in a press release, on your website and online member community, through your social media channels, in your member newsletter, and at your organization’s events.

5. Offer attractive pricing options to recruit members.

It might seem like a small thing, but price can be a big barrier to joining your association, especially for those just starting out professionally. Consider offering a student, recent graduate, and/or new member package with discounted pricing. Even if offering a discount isn’t feasible for your organization, think about offering a budget-friendly monthly payment option.