The Micro-Permission Method: Turning Maybes into Members
A first-time attendee comes to a chapter event. She seems interested, but then POOF! She never reappears.
Why do some new members, first-time attendees, and new online community members stop engaging so quickly? Maybe because a crucial link in the engagement chain broke.
Engagement isn’t a once-and-done event. Joining, registering, or logging in isn’t engagement. Instead, engagement is emotional buy-in that ideally builds. People are not wrong when they say, “engagement is a journey.” Many little things have to go right for a member to be engaged.
A few members take the engagement journey into their own hands. They might have prior experience with a chapter or association and know that the best way to get involved is, well, to get involved. But most everyone else, and by everyone else, I’m guessing this is 98% of all members, their engagement journey is more haphazard. They don’t even know they are on an engagement journey; they are just trying to answer the question, “Is this for me?”
When a member is really engaged, they have answered the “is this for me?” question affirmatively hundreds of times.
In the beginning, the journey might look something like this:
A new member joins, and emails start trickling into their inbox. They are curious, so they open a few.
Those few emails are so warm, well-written, and helpful that our new member becomes open to reading more.
Soon, they read an invitation to a local chapter meeting and RSVP.
On the day of the event, they are swamped by work and considering not going, but they get a call from another chapter member and decide to attend after all.
When they arrive at the venue, a sign in the lobby makes it easy to find the meeting.
Once they arrive at registration, a small group of welcomers exude kindness and hospitality, putting a spring in our new members’ steps as they walk to the room.
Entering the room, another member starts a conversation….
At each of these seven steps, the new member said a little mental “Yes, this seems like it is for me.” When a member organization does one thing well, it creates the opportunity for members to say “Yes!” and experience a second thing. If the second thing goes well, they might be open to the third thing, and so on. In the example of the seven steps above, each step is like a link in a chain.
Consider what another very common journey can look like:
A new member joins, and the emails start trickling into the inbox, and they open a few.
One email is a receipt/invoice, another is about advocacy efforts, which doesn’t seem to apply to them at this stage, and another is a long, long, long, dry welcome (not so welcoming) letter. No, this is not for me. This member stops reading emails and lapses in a year.
Oh-no! The chain of engagement broke at link #2.
Imagine that the chain is skinny and fragile while your members are new. It is easy for the chain to break. However, after a series of little yeses, the chain becomes sturdier, thicker, and more durable. A minor upset, a tiny doubt, a mini-no won’t break the chain.
Okay, so how do you help keep all those fragile chain links intact?
Adopt the mindset of micro-permissions. Your organization is trying to earn a micro-permission for each link in the chain. Or put another way, each link is an opportunity to gain a “yes, this community seems like it is for me.”
A well-written email can earn permission to read another email.
A warm welcome at registration can earn permission to have a happy and open mind during the first session.
A quick and kind response to a question in the online community can earn permission for future posts.
Micro-permissions are especially important with each new experience. Got new members? How do you earn micro-permissions until they are engaging on their own? Think about all the links in the micro-permission chain for first-time attendees, new web or app users, first-time members of your online community, readers of research or white-papers, people seeking certification, and more.
Think about using a micro-permissions mindset in your new member onboarding program. Want more new member onboarding tips? Take the New Member Engagement Study and learn your peers' strategies and tactics for engaging their newest members.
