Memberships & Donations: How to Add Value and Excite Your Supporters
May 21, 2020
Cultural and Arts institutions are rapidly preparing to re-open their doors as policies and regulations are changing daily and both visitors and staff are eager to get back to a state of normalcy with caution. Why are people yearning to get back to these sacred spaces? Because your institution serves far more purpose to your visitors than you may even realize. For some, it provides a much-needed escape, it keeps them mentally stimulated and engaged, it offers a sense of comfort and inspiration. Your institution serves as a sanctuary for your visitors, so invite them to become members of your cherished space, especially during this time of uncertainty, and give them something to look forward to in the near future.
Current Members
First and foremost, you want to thank your current members for supporting you through this difficult and financially straining time. As you prepare for reopening, start communicating with your members about all of the new safety precautions, policies, and procedures you are putting in place. This will ease their minds of any uncertainties and make them feel confident about coming back to a place they love. When thinking about reopening, start slow. Consider things like opening up the first week for members only. Memberships are all about relationships – and giving meaningful value to members, so make them feel like they have exclusive access, and that they are the first ones you want to see after these challenging last few months. This will simultaneously give you the chance to test run your new operational procedures and safety measures on a smaller group of individuals while providing them a much-deserved perk.
Since members have not been able to take advantage of their benefits while your institution was forced to close, consider offering a membership term extension – this small gesture will go a long way. Extending a membership term out even a month or two will allow your members to feel as if they still received the full benefits and value of their membership. They will greatly appreciate this action of gratitude, and most likely take full advantage of it.
ACME provides a very easy and straightforward solution for Membership and Membership management where you can easily extend a membership via the ACME Back Office, or your CRM.
New Members
In an effort to retain current members as well as reach potential new ones, membership departments of cultural and arts institutions are developing creative initiatives to draw people in.
For those who are not yet members, start an outreach program, and offer membership packages at a discounted rate. It will immediately boost revenue and lock in what is hopefully a lifetime affiliation. Not only can you offer discounted memberships, but also upgraded packages for lower fees as well as extended terms at no extra cost. Another thing you can do to drive membership sales is to add exclusive member benefits and perks. Things like a “re-opening party” for members only, something exciting and exclusionary for them to look forward to. Additionally, you can offer vouchers for free guest passes, parking, etc..
Donations
Similar to memberships, you can also offer perks and rewards for Donations. Donations will greatly help your institution get back up and running in the near term, and you can thank your donors in several different ways. For example, some perks you can offer for different levels of donations are:
- If they donate $20 maybe they get a free 1-day pass that can be redeemed at any time.
- For $50, they get a free 1-day pass and one of your most sought after souvenirs.
- And for $100, maybe their name can be listed on a plaque highlighting their donation.
ACME ticketing offers built-in functionality to support and manage donations to your institution. With ACME donations, you can provide an extremely customized and easy-to-use online experience for your donors.
- Institutions have the ability to create a custom stand-alone donation page on ACME e-Commerce which:
- Provides custom messaging to potential donors
- Allows for direct deep linking
- Offers a streamlined flow for donation-only orders, taking users directly to payment after selecting their donation amount
- The ability to have custom messaging for every use case and audience
- The ability to define the appeal, fund, campaign
- Confirmation Email customization
During downtimes and interruptions to regular operations, everyone has experienced the impact of lack of visitation. However, this is an opportunity to build and focus on other areas of your institution. We recommend using the above strategies to find new ways to generate revenue and create lifelong relationships. Make sure to see a demo of ACME today to learn how our best-in-class platform can help your institution easily manage ticketing, memberships, and donations.