Your Members Invest Far More Than Their Dues (940 Words)
Association executives have spent decades learning how to demonstrate that membership is worth more than the dues a member pays. If annual dues are $750 and the association can identify $3,000 in member benefits, the calculation appears compelling. The member receives four dollars of value for every dollar invested, and leadership can confidently point to excellent Member ROI.
I have been teaching this calculation method since 2000, and it became the foundation of my 2014 book, The ROI of Membership. I still believe strongly in measuring and communicating the real-dollar value an association delivers. However, my thinking has evolved because I now believe the traditional calculation can leave something important out: the $750 may not represent the member’s actual investment.
Membership Has a Hidden Cost
Dues are attractive to measure because they are obvious. The amount appears on an invoice, enters the accounting system, and becomes revenue on the association’s financial statements. The rest of the member’s investment is easier to overlook because most of it never appears on our books.
In The ROI of Membership, I recognized both time and money as member investments, but the methodology concentrated primarily on quantifying real-dollar value and comparing it with the financial cost of belonging. Today, I believe we need to widen that lens. A member who attends programs, reads association communications, serves on a committee, answers surveys, mentors colleagues, shares expertise, and travels to meetings is investing considerably more than dues.
This matters because members today are not merely experiencing financial pressure. They are experiencing what I have described as an Attention Recession. Work, employees, customers, family, other organizations, online communities, LinkedIn, free educational resources, and an almost unlimited supply of information are all competing for the same finite resource: the member’s attention.
The Investment Is Bigger Than the Invoice
When someone chooses membership, the investment can include money, time, attention, participation, expertise, relationships, reputation, and opportunity cost. Not every member invests these equally, which makes the economics of membership considerably more sophisticated than simply comparing benefits with dues.
Consider a corporate member paying $10,000 annually but requiring relatively little personal involvement from any one executive. Compare that with an individual volunteer leader paying $500 in dues while contributing 100 hours annually, sharing expertise, participating in meetings, opening professional relationships, and lending credibility to association initiatives. The dues ledger tells us who paid more money; it does not necessarily tell us who invested more in the association.
We do not need to force every hour, relationship, or ounce of attention into an artificial dollar amount. We do, however, need to acknowledge that these investments are real and that they influence how members ultimately judge their return.
We Know What Members Are Worth to Us
Associations have become quite sophisticated at measuring what members are worth to the organization. We track dues revenue, renewal rates, lifetime value, event registrations, sponsorships, volunteer participation, contributions, purchases, and other forms of engagement because leadership needs to understand the economic health of the organization.
My thinking today increasingly asks us to turn that telescope around and examine what the association is worth to the member. Instead of beginning only with what the member contributes financially, we need to consider the member’s complete investment and then examine the meaningful value returned.
That distinction should matter to CEOs and boards because sustainable membership growth depends on both sides of the exchange remaining favorable.
Benefits Offered Are Not Value Received
Associations also tend to equate the number of benefits offered with the amount of value delivered. An organization may proudly list 29 benefits of membership, but that does not mean an individual member receives meaningful value from all 29. There is an important difference between benefits available and value realized.
Utilization alone cannot determine value either. A member does not have to personally use every benefit for that benefit to create value. Advocacy is a good example. In 2014, I drew a strong distinction between member-only benefits and industry stakeholder benefits, particularly for recruitment. I still believe that distinction matters. Yet my thinking has broadened because value to an existing member can extend beyond what that member personally consumes. An advocacy victory can create significant economic value even for a member who never attends a government affairs meeting.
The executive challenge is therefore more sophisticated than counting benefits or measuring usage. We need to understand what members genuinely perceive as valuable, what value they actually receive, and what they must invest to remain part of the relationship.
Put the Member’s Side on the Board Agenda
Membership retention is frequently treated as a membership department responsibility. The board receives the renewal number, discusses whether it increased or decreased, and perhaps reviews the latest membership survey. But if Member ROI ultimately determines whether belonging continues to make economic and professional sense, the issue belongs at the governance level.
Boards and CEOs should examine what membership actually requires members to invest, what meaningful value members receive in return, and whether the total exchange remains favorable enough that a rational member would choose membership again today. Renewal alone cannot answer that question because habit, relationships, professional identity, and institutional momentum can temporarily mask declining value.
Look at Both Sides of the Equation
Return to our original example. Perhaps annual dues really are $750 and the association genuinely delivers $3,000 in member value. That may represent an excellent return, but the calculation is incomplete if we ignore the member’s investment of time, attention, participation, expertise, relationships, reputation, and lost opportunities.
This does not invalidate what I wrote in The ROI of Membership in 2014. It expands it. I still believe associations should quantify, prove, and communicate the value they deliver. What has evolved is my understanding of the other side of the equation.
Associations have spent decades calculating what a member is worth to the organization. Perhaps it is time we became equally rigorous about calculating what the organization is worth to the member.
Executive Q&A:
1. If dues are no longer the member’s complete investment, what else should association leaders consider?
Association leaders should consider the full range of resources members commit to belonging, including time, attention, participation, expertise, relationships, reputation, and opportunity cost. The objective is not necessarily to assign a precise dollar amount to each investment. It is to recognize that dues represent only the most visible portion of what membership requires from the member.
2. How can we measure Member ROI if time, attention, and relationships are difficult to quantify?
Do not allow the difficulty of achieving mathematical precision to become an excuse for ignoring meaningful member investments. Begin by identifying what members must contribute to access the value you provide. Measure what can reasonably be measured, such as time spent traveling, attending programs, volunteering, or participating in association activities. For less tangible investments, qualitative member research can reveal whether members believe the value received justifies what they are putting into the relationship.
3. Are we suggesting that highly engaged members could actually experience lower Member ROI?
Potentially. Engagement requires investment. A highly engaged volunteer may receive substantial value from leadership opportunities, relationships, access, and professional visibility, but that member may also contribute significant time and expertise. Associations should not automatically assume that greater engagement equals greater Member ROI. The important question is whether the value received remains favorable relative to the member’s total investment.
4. Should we try to reduce the amount of time members spend with our association?
Not necessarily. The objective is not to minimize member time; it is to make that time worth investing. A two-hour program that produces an important business relationship, solves a costly problem, or delivers knowledge a member can immediately apply may generate excellent Member ROI. The danger is consuming member time without delivering sufficient corresponding value.
5. If a benefit is rarely used, does that mean it has little member value?
No. Usage and value are related, but they are not the same. Advocacy demonstrates the distinction particularly well. Members may never personally participate in the association’s advocacy work while receiving substantial economic or professional value from its results. The appropriate question is not simply whether members use a benefit, but whether they recognize and receive meaningful value from it.
6. How should this change the way we communicate our membership value proposition?
Move beyond publishing a long inventory of available features of membership. Members need to understand the benefit outcomes they make possible and the value those outcomes can create. Rather than telling members only what they receive, help them recognize what the association saves them, earns them, protects for them, makes easier, or enables them to accomplish.
7. Does this mean our current Member ROI calculations are wrong?
Not necessarily. Comparing real-dollar member value with dues remains useful because both sides of that calculation can be quantified. The evolution is recognizing that the calculation may be incomplete. Dues tell us what the member invested financially, but they do not capture the member’s entire investment in the relationship. The next level of Member ROI thinking requires examining both.
8. Why should the board be concerned with this rather than leaving it to the membership staff?
Because the issue goes beyond retention tactics. Member ROI affects the sustainability of the membership model itself. Boards make decisions about strategy, dues, programs, resource allocation, technology, events, volunteer structures, and organizational priorities. Each can increase either the value members receive or the investment required from them. That makes the member’s side of the equation a governance issue.
9. What is the most useful question we can ask members to begin understanding their total investment?
Start with something broader than, “Are you satisfied with your membership?” Ask members what they must invest—in addition to dues—to receive meaningful value from the association, and whether what they receive justifies that investment. Follow-up questions can explore time, attention, participation, and opportunity cost. The purpose is to understand the exchange from the member’s perspective rather than asking members to validate the association’s existing benefits.
10. What should association executives do differently after recognizing the member’s complete investment?
Begin evaluating important programs, services, communications, events, and volunteer activities from both sides of the exchange. Determine not only what each delivers but also what it requires from the member to obtain that value. The executive objective should be to increase meaningful value without unnecessarily increasing the member’s burden of participation. The strongest membership proposition is not simply one that delivers more benefits; it is one that produces a return members believe is worth everything they invest to receive it.
Ed is the Founder and CEO of the 501(c)(3) non-profit public charity, Cigar PEG Philanthropy through Fun, and president at Rigsbee Research which conducts qualitative member ROI research and consulting for associations and societies. He has been called “the dynamite that broke up our log jam” by association executives—rarely politically correct and almost always provocative—and from a dozen years as a United States Soccer Federation referee, Ed calls it the way he sees it. Exceptional resources at www.rigsbee.com.
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