Membership Dip Tied to Events -

Over one-third of respondents to a recent survey have seen a decrease in their membership numbers.

In August, Marketing General Inc. released a mid-year update of its Membership Marketing Benchmarking Report, which tracks association membership trends. According to the new report, as reported by ASAE’s Associations Now, more than a third — 36 percent — of associations said their membership size has decreased, a 10-percent increase over the January edition of the report.

In addition, the percentage of associations reporting that that their membership renewal rates have increased went down 11 points — from 25 percent in January experiencing higher renewal rates to just 14 percent in the new survey.

Marketing General’s senior vice president Tony Rossell told Associations Now that the membership marketing and communications firm decided to conduct its first-ever mid-year survey after hearing stories from association leaders that membership growth was slipping.

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Rossell said that while the mid-year survey has a smaller sample size and a shorter response window, the findings may indicate a decrease in membership, especially in fields that rely on international travel to conferences, or federal employees whose funding was cut or position eliminated in the new administration. “One of the challenges for people who rely on conferences for new member generation, which is typically one of the top ways people get new members, is government cutbacks and international travel limiting people coming into the United States,” Rossell told Associations Now.

Open-ended survey responses highlighted those concerns, like this one: “We do believe the current political climate will affect our 2025-2026 membership/renewal year. It will also affect our annual meeting attendance and forecast a 10-percent loss due to loss or lack of travel funding. We did lose a federal grant for waived annual meeting registration for individuals belonging to minority populations.”

Michelle Russell is editor in chief of Convene.

Read the full story in Associations Now.