The Joy of Membership Podcast

A lot of people think that member experience is comprised of the specific member benefits that an organization offers. While that is indeed part of it, member experience is more about the sum total of all interactions a member has with your organization. This includes everything from the moment they first hear about your program, through the joining process, into participating in what you offer, a...

Joining Joy on the show this week is Karen Knight.  Karen is a consultant and volunteer leadership expert. After years of filling various roles in the public and private sectors, Karen decided that there was something missing. She wanted to make a difference in the world. She moved into the non-profit sector and found that volunteers were her passion.  As District Director of Toastmasters Internat...

My guest this week is Jürgen Strauss.  Jürgen is a podcaster, speaker, podcast strategist, marketing strategist and connector of Amazing Humans. His business, Innovabiz, partners with thought leaders to enable them to build sustainable visibility, professional credibility and a deep connection with their dream clients. As his business name suggests, he is passionate about helping businesses achiev...

This week, my guest is Rai Cornell from Cornell Content Marketing, a full-service marketing agency specializing in building powerful long-term relationships between customers and subscription brands.  Rai shares my love for understanding human behavior. She has a background in psychology and she brings that perspective into every strategy she crafts and every piece of content she creates. Today, I...

Amanda Kaiser, a member engagement specialist, predicts associations will radically change how they help members connect, collaborate, and co-create in the virtual space. As a co-creator and host of the Virtual Networking Incubator , along with her partners at Matchbox Virtual Media and more than 150 enthusiastic participants, she had the amazing opportunity to explore what makes networking events...

Joining me on this week’s episode was Farhad Khan, CEO of Grype Digital. I invited Farhad to have this conversation with me about onboarding because his company specializes in building member portals for associations and other membership-based organizations, specifically using Drupal and CiviCRM. You might say he’s a tech engineer who is using his superpowers for good, helping his clients build mo...

My guest on this week’s podcast is Nicholas Kristock from KindKatch. I really love hearing origin stories like Nick’s - one in which he was trying to solve a problem in his own nonprofit and discovered that other organizations needed exactly that solution, too. I also have a deep appreciation for organizations that care for people in a way that is so clearly rooted in their values. That is somethi...

I don’t know if you’ll be able to hear it in my voice in this week’s episode, but this interview with Marjuan Canady really did make my heart happy.  I love the work that Marjuan is doing at Canady Foundation for the Arts, an organization that she founded to connect professional artists to youth of color through arts education, community, live theater, mentorship, and professional development. In...

This week’s episode is the perfect follow-up to last week’s in which we talked about member feedback. There are similar themes running through this conversation with Stacy Sherman. Stacy is the Founder of Doing Customer Experience Right. She is an award winning speaker, author, and podcaster who takes pride in helping brands differentiate in ways that extend beyond price. Stacy says that, as a con...

Everyone loves hearing positive feedback when it comes to the efforts and processes within your organization. But what happens when that feedback ISN'T so positive? Today's podcast guest is Barbara Khozam, an internationally recognized speaker and trainer. Barbara is the founder of Barbara Khozam Speaking and Consulting, and has delivered over 1700 presentations on Customer Service, Pati...

Board members, committee chairs, and volunteer leaders are all important pieces to helping make your organization run smoothly. In this episode, I’m chatting with Denise Cagan, president of DCA Virtual Business Support. Her company has been providing behind-the-scenes administrative support for many years. If you’ve been wanting to implement or increase the support and education you offer your mem...

In this week’s episode, I’d like to introduce you to my friend, Jerry Gitchel.  Jerry is the founder of Leverage Unlimited, Inc. Long before the pandemic forced all of us to starting thinking about virtual events, Jerry was producing such events and making technology work for a range of clients from fortune 500 companies to small business organizations to Solopreneurs. I had the opportunity recent...

With online meetings and conferences quickly becoming the norm throughout 2020 and beyond, many organizations were faced with the challenge of how to transition their meaningful in-person events to virtual...without losing the meaningful connections and resources their members were used to receiving. Now that some in-person events are starting up again, I'm reminded how important the networki...

It’s important to maximize your connection with an interested audience. Once you've identified potential members, it's now your job to guide them on their way to determining that your membership is exactly what they need! A great way to do that is through nurture campaigns. Be sure to listen in on today's episode for resources on creating a nurture campaign that can help convert int...

The moment that a prospective member, donor, sponsor, or other stakeholder discovers you is a CAREpoint that only happens once. In this episode, we talk about how to use Lead Magnets to spark an actual relationship with your organization. My guest is Alesha Mathis, owner of Mathis Nonprofit Services, LLC. Alesha helps nonprofit founders ethically and professionally fundraise to survive, thrive, an...

After 52 episodes, The Joy of Membership Podcast is officially entering our 2nd season. To those of you who have become listeners, thank you for allowing me to be part of your weekly audio experience! The format of the show is changing for season 2, based on oh-so-many lessons learned and the aha moments that listeners shared from season 1. Here’s what you can expect, going forward:  Each week wil...

Happy Anniversary to the Joy of Membership Podcast! This week's episode marks exactly one year since the launch of Episode 1. In honor of this milestone episode, I'll be sharing a few things I've picked up from our audience, as well as a bit of the feedback I received from you all on your "aha!" moments from the show. Thank you for spending a little time each week here wit...

I am so excited to introduce you to Leona Dalavai Scott. She is a content creator, founder and president of JEP Marketing Communications in North Texas. Having worked for professional and trade associations for most of her professional career, she is committed to using content as a way to build membership value to attract, convert and retain members and customers. She recently published The C.O.N....

I am a huge fan of using personalized video to create connections with prospective members, current members, and strategic partners. In this week's episode, I interviewed Oli Bridge from Bonjoro. Bonjoro is a tool that makes it truly easy to record quick, engaging, personalized videos. Listen in on the interview and be sure to grab a copy of Bonjoro's Video Funnel Playbook here: https://...

You might want to don your finest wide-brimmed, Southern belle hat for this week’s episode. That’s because my guest this week is joining us from the Kentucky Derby Museum.  Yep, the museum that focuses on one of the most legendary race tracks in the world.  Rachel Collier Carr is Director of Communications for the museum, serving as their primary media spokesperson, coordinating press conferences,...

I am joined this week by Becky Carlton. Becky is responsible for strategy and partnerships at MAPSA, Michigan's charter school association. MAPSA is a nonprofit membership organization that advocates for 300 charter schools in the state of Michigan, and Becky describes her work as ensuring that internal strategies and programming align with member needs. She also actively looks to connect wit...

This week’s guest is Kevin Earhart Sutton. Kevin is the National Office Administrator for the Wilderness Education Association. When I asked Kevin to send me a quick bio for this intro, do you know what he put first in the very first line? That in life, he’s the full-time parent to a two-year-old and that they go on a lot of bike rides to local parks. I love that about him. For most of us, myself...

I’m so pleased this week to be able to share some time with my colleague and friend, Mary Byers, talking about a topic that I know is of special significance to all of you as membership leaders.  Mary specializes in working with volunteer association leaders and chief staff executives to help define their roles and clarify their vision through leadership conference programming, facilitating retrea...

This week’s guest is Jeanette Brown, Senior Director of Strategic Marketing and Communications, for America’s Blood Centers.  Jeanette has more than 21 years of non-profit medical marketing experience. She started her career as a blood donor recruiter at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, but over the years, she has been responsible for enhancing and growing many organization brands, as wel...

Denise Beusen retired from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Center for Scientific Review where she served as a Scientific Review Officer. Immediately prior to joining NIH, Dr. Beusen had her own business, Life Science Marketing and Communication. Other previous professional roles include Chief Operating Officer for a start-up company, MetaPhore Pharmaceuticals, and Director of Technical Mar...