Among the many reasons members may join your association, “access to volunteer opportunities” may not be the most common. However, your organization is in a great position to offer various volunteer positions to members, whether they’re helping you run events, engaging other members, or serving a charitable cause related to your industry.
Because volunteering isn’t core to the association experience, recruitment can be challenging. However, one way to make the process easier is for your association management team to make members aware of the potential benefits of participating in your volunteer opportunities. After all, if members know what’s in it for them, they may be more eager to become volunteers to experience those advantages.
In this guide, we’ll review four benefits of volunteering that your association can promote to its members to drive participation. Let’s dive in!
The most natural perk of volunteering is the opportunity for association members to help your organization achieve more or support a worthwhile cause. However, the personal benefits they can experience go even further. By volunteering, members can:
Association members can also grow professionally by volunteering, specifically through:
To that last point, Double the Donation’s volunteer statistics report explains that individuals who volunteer regularly have a 27% higher chance of finding employment. This statistic encompasses all volunteer organizations, not just associations whose primary purpose is to help professionals advance their careers. So, if your members are looking for new job opportunities in the industry, volunteering with you may be a great starting point!
While volunteering may not be a common reason professionals join associations, career advancement and networking opportunities are. By volunteering with your organization, members can network in a new way, increase their visibility in the industry, and advance their careers.
Your association can facilitate these benefits for volunteers by:
To streamline these activities, Protech recommends leveraging an association management system (AMS) with built-in member management capabilities. This way, volunteer engagement data is also consolidated alongside all of their other touchpoints with your organization.
To further incentivize volunteering, your association could offer exclusive perks to volunteers in exchange for their hard work. This is also a great way to show appreciation for your volunteers—and when volunteers feel valued, they’re more likely to continue supporting your association long-term.
There are various perks to choose from depending on your volunteers’ preferences and your association’s budget. Some top ideas include:
Promote these perks alongside your volunteer opportunities, and get existing volunteers involved in marketing them to encourage other members to participate and earn the perks. For example, you could ask volunteers to post pictures of themselves wearing or using your exclusive merchandise on social media or your association’s community management platform with a specific hashtag to add a user-generated element to your promotion efforts.
Your association may also choose to open up leadership positions to your more experienced volunteers. For example, you could have these members:
Offering leadership opportunities to volunteers is a win-win for them and your association. Through leading, volunteers can develop even more transferable skills, add a new title to their resumes, and get to know their fellow volunteers better to build both personal and professional relationships. Plus, they’ll likely feel more fulfilled in their work if they grow in these ways.
On your organization’s end, leadership opportunities can boost volunteer retention rates since volunteers are less likely to become complacent or bored in their roles. Additionally, if you’re trying to fill other leadership roles in your association, such as board openings or management positions, volunteers who step up to lead may be a good place to start looking.
While the benefits above are strong selling points to start with when promoting your association’s volunteer program, the best way to understand what advantages it actually provides is to go straight to the source. Survey your volunteers periodically to ask how they feel they’ve benefitted from volunteering and what they’d still like to experience. From there, adjust both your promotion strategy and your program offerings to align with members’ needs and expectations.