09/02/2021

Determine Whether You’re Building Community—or Just Doing a Transaction

There is a significant difference

Associations hope to grow their membership and strengthen their bottom line. But that’s not all they exist to do.

As nonprofits, their missions are intended to serve a broader group of people. Financial success can help serve that mission, making it a key performance indicator worthy of focus. But if the transactional nature of an association’s business endeavors takes precedence over building a strong community, it can threaten both.

For-profit communities, which face more direct ROI requirements, also have to deal with these issues—so associations can learn by watching how they balance community and commerce. David Spinks, the founder of CMX, an online platform for community managers owned by the virtual event platform Bevy, said that for-profit communities often lean toward transactional interactions just by nature of needing to support themselves.

Please select this link to read the complete article from Associations Now.