We've very consciously shifted our website to match our focus on the club (with a clubhouse) model, though I've been learning new ways to say it since our first couple of years: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2008/09/the-importance-of-a-clubhouse/
Most recently, we adjusted our membership page and introduced our flagship membership - a community membership - as both the precursor to Coworking and a "feature" of our Coworking memberships: http://www.indyhall.org/membership It's still early to tell the long term effects, but June 2014 (2 months after quietly rolling this out) was our best June for growth in *our entire history*. June 2013 we shrank by a little less than 1% (typical of our June/July growth historically, given summer vacations). This year, we grew by almost 9% in June. We normally see that kind of growth reserved for seasonal spikes like January/February, and September/October. The really interesting part is how many of these new members "got it". We had an uptick in new member intros on GroupBuzz, one of our earliest KPIs for new members being more likely to see beyond the desk. One of the big takeaways for me, especially during our last 2-3 years of growth, has been to REALLY embrace the old copywriting cannon "show, don't tell." It's better to talk about purpose than not at all (and it's definitely better to talk about purpose than features), but it's even BETTER when you simply DO your purpose so that members can see it and say it in their own words. ABC - Always Be Communicating. If the only time your purpose is mentioned is when it NEEDS to be mentioned, you'll find that you NEED to mention it more often :) Bake your purpose into your website. Your tour. Your events. Your partnerships and collaborations. Use them as ways to demonstrate your purpose, even if the purpose goes unsaid. And don't worry if you feel like a broken record. It's just as important for every new member to see and hear it for the first time, even if you've said or done something 1000 times. -Alex -- /ah indyhall.org betterwork.co On Fri, Jul 4, 2014 at 11:22 AM, Alicia Hurst <aliciainbrook...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hey Tony! > I loved it when you first told me about the analogy of something like, "We > are a club. The place where the members of the club most often congregate > is in our clubhouse, which is called New Work City." So, being a member of > NWC is really being in this club, that gives you access to the fab features > of NWC. > How about A/B testing the copy and layout of the website to use wording > that emphasizes the benefits of coworking in general and how NWC's "club" > is specifically, and maybe the space part could be like, "and check out our > sweet coworking space, which has xyz features"? > I just thought of the South American Explorers http://www.saexplorers.org. > They have clubhouses, but that's not the main feature; I felt that the > members themselves may be the best resource. > My sense is, bottleneck and control the flow of information so that > prospective members aren't even able to get the sense that this is merely a > space for rent. > Don't know if this is helpful or not! > -Alicia > On Monday, June 30, 2014 5:42:38 PM UTC-4, Tony Bacigalupo wrote: >> >> Hi coworkers! >> >> I was thinking recently about an issue I've noticed locally and in other >> regions, where friendly neighboring coworking spaces sometimes struggle to >> develop good ways to collaborate. I believe the issue stems from a lack of >> a well-articulated higher purpose that people from multiple spaces could >> rally behind. >> >> I think about this phenomenon also in the context of how we communicate >> with prospective members. The majority of people who express interest in >> New Work City are, at first, looking for workspace, and think we're in the >> business of renting workspace. While we can use that as a starting point >> for educating prospective members about the deeper values behind and >> benefits of coworking, I'm thinking about how we can do a better job of >> connecting with prospective members in a way that's about something more >> meaningful. >> >> Have any of you experienced something similar? Have you witnessed or >> participated in the development of an ambition in your space or region that >> gives coworking space managers something higher to shoot for than simply >> getting enough members to pay the bills? >> >> Cheers, >> Tony >> --- >> Blog <http://happymonster.co> // New Work City <http://nwc.co> // Coworking >> Community NYC Meetup <http://meetup.com/coworking-nyc> >> >> > -- > Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Coworking" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. -- Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to coworking+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
