Club Growth

Administrator D64 Blog

Retaining members – Part 1

More Ideas for Retaining Members!

These ideas for retaining members are not in any particular order. Take a moment to think about each one, and choose those that you think will work for your club, adapting them as you wish. We hope that they will help your club grow and become strong!

  • Send a thank you note EVERY time somebody comes to visit!
  • Include networking tips in newsletter or new member pack. Networking is a primary reason for joining and one of the most important benefits to offer. Produce a short article or checklist on how to use these networking opportunities more effectively. Add to a meeting or convention brochure. You could email the list (with individual member’s permission) to pre-registered attendees shortly before conference.
  • Use testimonials from some members who aren’t active but still feel membership is valuable. If members feel we understand and are trying to help them cope with challenges they are more likely to renew. Ask those who are not active but continue to renew to contact other inactive members.
  • Use Jeopardy marketing putting it in the form of a question. “Wouldn’t it be great if someone were working everyday to tell the public about….?” Or “Wouldn’t it be nice if every month someone brought to your door another form of continuing education and a place to find out about job openings?”
  • Conduct focus groups by phone. Members with varying years of experience focusing on the needs of a small segment. New member focus group. Send all participants an agenda and set of rules. Take attendance; let everyone know who is attending. Make a list of who speaks so you know who to ask for input.
Administrator D64 Blog

Magnificent Mentoring

This is a copy of the presentation from the 2016 District 64 Fall Rally called Magnificent Mentoring (download as a PDF). It supplements Toastmasters International’s mentoring presentation from the Successful Club Series.  Please feel free to use this content in your clubs.  If you want further information about mentoring or to arrange for an in-club presentation (about 15 minutes) please call Joanne McDowall, 204 284 6678.

Administrator D64 Blog

Here are the tips for treating your members well

Many club members underestimate the importance of retaining current members. There are several reasons why focusing on retaining members is critical to your club’s success. Here are a few.

Tenured members:

  • Serve as important role models for newer members.
  • Provide incentive to guests that the club has quality and experienced members that they’ll be able to learn from.
  • Prove that Toastmasters is not an overnight process but an ongoing process for continual self-improvement.

Here are several tips for how to retain your members past the first year:

  • Recruit them to be mentors for new members.
  • Publicly award members for their educational achievements.
  • Encourage their participation as a competitor in Toastmasters contests.
  • Encourage full-length advanced manual speeches. If advanced members need to perform longer speeches to continually improve their skills, you must encourage them to do so. Maybe have an advanced manual speech day every couple of months where multiple longer speeches are expected. Be creative. The important thing is to accommodate!
  • Encourage leadership outside the club. Suggest that your more experienced members serve the district by becoming an Area or other district officer. Many seasoned Toastmasters continue as members just to help others. Serving in a district capacity does just that on an even higher level.

Want more? Check out the other posts for more ideas on retaining members!

Administrator D64 Blog

Rap It Up! We’re All About The Growth!

If you were at the District meeting on Saturday, October 3, you were witness to my first rap performance. I explored my potential as a rapper. Drake and K-os don’t have anything to worry about.

If you want to try your hand at motivating your fellow members to get out there and find new members (or you just want a taste of the fun), here are the words to my Club Growth rap.  It’s a parody of Meghan Trainor’s song, All About That Bass. Before you try to perform it, I suggest you listen and sing along – lots!

Chorus:

We’re all about that growth, ‘bout that growth, no shrinking! 

We’re all about that growth, ‘bout that growth, no shrinking! 

We’re all about that growth, ‘bout that growth, no shrinking! 

We’re all about that growth, ‘bout that growth!

Yeah its pretty clear; you can’t run with too few

Let’s find new members, members like we’re supposed to do

We’ve got those great skills that employers embrace

All the right clubs in all the right places

If leadership skills are your end and all

We know our Toastmasters is the right call

If you’ve been searching, searching, just look us up!

And we’ll work on speaking skills from the bottom to the top

Yeah, a member she told me, don’t worry about our size!

When it comes to Toastmasters, that message is nothing but lies!

You know, Charter strength (20) or increase your members by five

For it’s not enough to keep a club barely alive.

Chorus: say it with me!

If you are a true sucker for punishment, there’s a little more but I spared our District leaders at the meeting.

I hope to see you all next time, November 21 at the semi-annual meeting.  A better reason to come is to find out what’s happening, how you can benefit and best of all, to hear Mike Storkey, TI’s President Elect deliver a keynote (free for all members of District 64).

Remember: growth is good.