Imagine if you could run every decision your association makes by your members and prospective members before you take action?

You would increase engagement in every phase of membership. Your messages and events would never miss the mark. You would fill up your programs faster and reduce wasted time and money across your organization.

What if I told you that there was a way to close that gap between this dream and the reality of your team's resources and capacity?

This is where your association's marketing personas come in.

What Is AN ASSOCIATION Marketing Persona?

Marketing personas are semi-fictional representations of your association’s ideal members, based on a combination of market research and data about your existing members. Personas help you internalize the ideal members you’re trying to attract, understand your members (and prospective members) better, and relate to your members as real human beings.

Each individual member of your target audience is a on a journey of discovery and fulfillment, spanning from personal needs to career goals. This journey begins long before they are members of your association and extends throughout their professional life.

 All of your association’s goals depend on getting people to take action.

- You need new members to apply
- You need current members to renew
- You need people to attend your events
- You need members to buy products or sign up for classes
- You need advocates in your industry to mobilize for change

Smart associations know this doesn’t happen by chance, or by simply blasting members with emails. It takes thoughtful planning and precise execution. When you hear about these core association goals, the part that is often overlooked is that most of these interactions with members and non-members begin with a landing page.

If it’s hot and humid, it must be August in DC, and if it’s August, then ASAE Annual must be around the corner. The HighRoad team is gearing up to connect with partners, clients and association executives in Chicago and this year we’re focused on sharing the cool work we’re doing with our client base when it comes to digital marketing and growth strategies.

GDPR – as regulation designed to strengthen data protection efforts and enhance the individual rights and freedoms around personal data, digital marketers need to take note. And from all the articles, webinars, whitepapers and updated privacy policies being shared right now, it seems like that’s happening. But are we paying attention because we want to avoid the alarming fines that come along with the risk of not being GDPR compliant, or because we genuinely want to interact with engaged people that really want to hear from us and this is the perfect opportunity to cull down that email list?

How many times have we heard this type of variation on the “your marketing is only as good as your data” saying? Isn’t it true though? If you’re in IT you probably roll your eyes every time a ticket request comes in from the marketing team for another list pull: “Please run a query and provide us with a list of people who attended last year’s conference, redeemed a coupon and sat on the left side of the room during the keynote address”. (It’s not that far-fetched, there’s a method to a marketer’s madness or request after all). The reality is that marketers rely on data – and it’s understanding this need which helps to facilitate in-depth discussions about data integration.