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The User Group Challenge
Treat the user group as a business and remember members are customers.
Promoting new Members (here's how I brought them in)
Give or sell newsletters to local news stands
Slip newsletters on bookracks at bookstores (with or without permission)
Visitors get two months of free newsletter mails
Send postcard showing what they missed in the last 6 months.
Local computer store: Certificate for 3 months free membership (include membership card) for each full system purchased. (show certificate)
Local computer stores: If above didn't work, I'd say: send us your dummies
Local computer stores: Provide newsletters and "welcome" sheets
Existing members recruiting new members
Encourage members to pick up extra newsletters for work and friends
One month free for every new member joining
Five one year free for every ten members joining
Give recognition: Thanks to members who've recruited at the meeting
Special meeting for one vendor only —Intel, for example.
They help subsidize cost of membership
Intel pays $5 towards any new member
Send postcards to their database of registered users
Make sure to collect the postcards at the door. Then send newsletter and promo material
They pay fee for your extra mailing of reminder postcards.
Send to current and expired members in the chance you might get them back.
Maintain membership: It's critical membership knows they're valuable and you're going to bat for them constantly—and everywhere you can. (Here's how I kept them in)
Hustle for discounts at local shows, computer stores, bookstores
If possible, assign to volunteer
Give members highest priority over non-members or visitors at every event
Make sure members (and non-members) hear it by announcing it at the presentation
Cordon off front row seating; put RESERVED FOR MEMBERS signage.
Two types of giveaways: members and non-members (blue and red tickets.)
Give members membership badges at 5- and 10-year membership milestones
Provide freebies for members only
Collect t-shirts and giveaways at trade shows.
Hustle for leftovers at trade shows
Sample business card from PIBMUG
Contact computer magazines as ask for free copies of old issues.
Postcard reminders one month in advance of expiration.
Postcards to expired telling them what they've missed in terms of giveaways, newsletters, and presentations.
The goal is to give the vendor everything possible to make him/her look good and make the presentation an enriching experience. Remember, the better the presentation, the more members will get from it… (Here's how I got vendors back.
Determine the goals of the vendor:
Product exposure only?
Onsite sales?
Discuss deepest discounts (keep your members/customers in mind). Use negotiating skills—always ask for more.
Small vendor: If multiple products, suggest bundling
Large vendor: Remind the goal is not for profit but seeding the market. MS's IEUs — one person influences 10 others.
Explain setting the fee in advance and negotiating onstage.
Provide volunteer to help with sales
Provide suggestions for order forms Goal: Make sales possible and easy.
Send vendors an orientation sheet
Usual stuff: Maps, directions, equipment available
Provide accurate stats of audience composition: corporate buyers, small/medium businesses, hobbyists, dorks.
Explain the group's dislikes: PowerPoint presentations, asking "how many people do…" more than a dozen times.
Prepare vendor with your expectation of their presentation
Provide bass "how to present to user groups" white paper (see Section I, Alternate Meetings)
Prompt them to know how to, say, use the special keys on the notebook so they can see the screen and projected image.
Send members an e-mail after the meeting to provide feedback to the vendor, which can be anonymous. (Vendors love this.)
Let vendors know when officers and (especially) the program chair changes. Supply new contacts. The number one complaint I hear from vendors is keeping track of who's current.
Help audience understand the vendor needs feedback: oooh and ahhhs.
Volunteers get special STAFF badges.
Other members must know that volunteers are treated special
Two giveaway tickets
Yearly giveaway: Volunteers get choice of any product
If group doesn't provide free help, volunteers get first referrals; major job referrals always go to volunteers.