BETTER
PRACTICES
Money Back
Guarantees
Associations that have deliver value and
good customer service should consider offering a money
back guarantee for membership and some
products/services.
The offer removes the risk from the
purchaser, and makes a decision to join easier to make.
As noted above, this is not suggested for
associations that have significant value and customer
service problems. However, once the organization has
addressed those issues, a guarantee will be a good
incentive to lure former and prospective members back in.
Although some members may be tempted to
request a refund, anecdotal evidence from associations
that have adopted this approach suggests that few if any
do act on the request.
And this practice is not limited to
lower-fee individual memberships, but trade associations
with large corporate fees have also used this practice to
appeal to former and prospective members.
It is good idea to put some restrictions
in place to qualify for the rebate program, and
not to deal with refund requests. If you offer a
money back guarantee, then live up to the promise.
What restrictions should you consider for
membership money back guarantees? Here are some
examples?
-
restrict it to first-year members
-
require that the member attend a major
meeting or event of the association, such as a
conference or regional meeting (and consider including a
coupon for a reduced registration fee to sweeten the
pot)
-
require that the qualifying member must
participate in a major study or research initiative
(e.g. industry benchmarks or compensation surveys), and
preferably one where the recipients get the results free
or at a significantly reduced cost
-
require one purchase from a selection of
association publications, products, etc. with an
emphasis on those that have widespread relevance to the
membership and are considered valuable by members.
-
require that they get involved on a
committee, etc.
When is the major risk period for members
to drop their membership? For most organizations it
is within the first three years. The challenge is to
get members to access association services so that they
experience the value available from the organization.
This is an innovative approach to an
ongoing association challenge. Give it some
consideration! It will likely be a very hard sell in
your organization ("That's too risky...what
if all the new members ask for a refund"),
so you may want to start with a test.
A final note - the presence of
the guarantee should make everyone in the
association work a little harder to retain new
members....and that's a good thing!
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