Improving the Member Experience with Data Analytics

By Brian Sugarman, Senior Marketing Manager, Association Analytics

A recent Aberdeen Group report, entitled “Getting Ahead in Customer Analytics: Which Technologies Do You Need to Succeed,” outlined how many organizations struggle because data is captured and stored in disparate, disconnected systems. The problem is that the association tech stack includes numerous tools designed to meet the needs of members that collect data including AMS, websites, email marketing platforms, learning management systems, etc. and these resources are rapidly expanding. On top of these tools, networking and social media services that collect data such as Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter are also being used to connect with members.


The problem today is not a lack of data, but rather the expanding volume of data and ensuring you have the skillset and resources to manage it all. Many organizations still find it hard to use data to inform decision-making and to drive strategy. They’ve made good investments in the data and the technology, but it’s difficult to see the true business impact when data lives siloed across various functions in the organization. 

In response, many organizations have started to invest in robust data analytics platforms to help connect data from different source systems and create a 360-degree view of members. 

By using data analytics platforms, organizations can improve the member experience and make informed, more confident decisions that improve business efficiency and operations. Let’s explore some of the ways associations today are using data analytics to grow revenue, reduce costs, and improve member experience. 

Personalizing Content Based on Member Segments 
It’s no secret that when content is personalized and relevant, we’re more likely to engage. A top leader in marketing automation, Hubspot, concluded, based on their considerable data, that personalized calls-to-action perform 202% better than all others. Corporations are cashing in on this, with companies like Amazon recommending the next purchase based on expressed interests from customers. But it’s not just corporations that can benefit from this, associations can capitalize on this approach, too. 

So how can you get started? The first step is to integrate data into a central repository, so you are looking at a complete and consistent view of your members. Once you have integrated data, you can see the full picture of member behavior, allowing you to perform deeper analysis and segmentation. 

Let’s say you decide to segment members by geographical region and discover that members on the east coast have completely different interests than members on the west coast. Or maybe you look at members by job type, to better understand what topics Managers are searching for compared to Executives. This type of segmentation will depend on the data you collect from your members and what is relevant for your association. The outcome of this type of analysis is that you can drill down into member segments, allowing you to better personalize marketing content and outreach to those segments. 

Social platforms and online communities are examples of where you might find this type of member engagement data. By performing deeper analysis, you can learn more about what your members like or dislike and use that information to create a better experience for them. This can drive more revenue, improve retention and lower costs by improving your marketing effectiveness. Instead of blasting the same message to all members, you can deliver the right message, to the right member, at the right time. 

Improving the Event Experience
When planning and looking to increase the value in events, it is important to draw on what worked and what was less successful in the past. In order to successfully do this, more association professionals are looking to perform deeper analysis on the member experience at events. If you can identify ways to improve the event for members, while spending less money, the result is a much higher profit margin for your association. Here’s a few key ways associations are using data to improve events:
  1. Reduce Waste, Increase Conversions
    Marketing effectiveness is dramatically improved when using data to influence strategy. One example of this is employing predictive analytics to examine which member segments are most likely to register for your event. This enables you to target your marketing resources to your best prospects and avoid expending effort on those that are unlikely to attend the event. For example, using predictive analytics associations can segment members that have a very high percentage to attend this year (based on historical data) and therefore, might need to see different advertisements than those who are on the fence about coming to an event. Likewise, if a member is in a segment that has a very low percentage of attending, you should allocate marketing spend on segments with a higher conversion opportunity. Associations want to find the segments in the middle, those who have the highest likelihood of being influenced by advertising to come to the event. This strategy has helped associations to reduce their marketing spend, while increasing event registrations.
  2. Improve content relevancy
    How do we know which content is most relevant to our members? The best way is to look at the data and see which topics are most relevant to each of our member segments. Associations are using things like sentiment analysis from channels like Twitter to better understand which event sessions or topics are well-received by their members. They’re using this data to then improve on the member experience by providing more targeted and relevant information.
  3. Improve the registration experience
    Is your organization performing deep analysis of the event registration process? Another way to grow more revenue for your event is to analyze data on the registration experience to better understand where members are frustrated in the process. Associations have found that by analyzing this information they can make changes to the registration process to reduce friction and increase participation.
What’s next? 
This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to analyzing data and you’d be surprised what insights and value you’ll discover when you dig a bit deeper. Think about how you can utilize organized and complete data to lower operational costs, drive revenue, improve the member experience and engagement and then begin to explore what systems are best for your organizational needs. 

Not sure how to get started? Association Analytics has created a free assessment -- the Data Analytics Maturity Model -- that can help you benchmark your organization and provide actionable next steps and recommendations. We’re here to help – we work with leading organizations and can help you get started on your data analytics journey.
Share this post:

Comments on "Improving the Member Experience with Data Analytics "

Comments 0-5 of 0

Please login to comment