Lapsed member win back calls are an important part of The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) member retention strategy. The RSC is the UK’s professional body for chemical scientists, supporting and representing members and bringing together chemical scientists from all over the world. With more than 50,000 members, it is also an international publishing and knowledge business.
The Challenge
RSC membership year is from January to December with membership payment due by the 1st January every year, for all member categories.
To maximise member value and retention:
- Members are given a six-month grace period and are considered to have lapsed at the end of June if they have not made payment.
- 80% of members pay their fees by February. This means that typically 20% are still unpaid in March.
- Unpaid member calls are made by Chord in May.
- Lapsed member win back calls take place in July/August.
RSC has commissioned Chord to deliver win back calls to:
- Engage with lapsed members and encourage them to renew by effectively reinforcing membership benefits and answering questions.
- Establish and report back on the reasons why lapsed members have decided not to renew and provide actionable insight.
The Solution
Each year, following extensive re-briefing on RSC’s membership benefits, categories and fees and having gained approval for a detailed campaign brief, Chord set to work.
To date, contact with a total of 10,972 lapsed members has been entrusted to Chord by the RSC for win back calls.
Chord agreed to:
- Optimise win back telephone call reach during office and early evening hours, leaving tailored voicemail messages with a specific signposting and call to action.
- Send tailored emails to lapsed members not spoken to or to follow up on telephone conversations had.
- Offer a dedicated 0808 phone number handled by Chord for lapsed members to call in response to voicemails and emails, so that no additional pressure was put on RSC.
- Obtain payment details for lapsed members wishing to renew by direct debit and securely share this information with the RSC.
- Transfer lapsed members to the RSC membership team, who wished to renew by credit/debit card.
- Transfer lapsed member calls to the RSC membership team in real time when questions fell outside of the scope of the campaign.
- Suppress records from calling, as and when instructed by RSC.
- Record and securely return data for lapsed members not renewing with details of their reasons and all updates made to the contact data supplied. This enabled the RSC to update its membership CRM database.
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Win back members
The Outcomes
To date 1,152 members have returned to RSC membership due to a win back call from Chord.
In addition, a further 1,323 lapsed members expressed their intention to re-join in the future. To achieve this, Chord:
- completed 153 telemarketing days
- made 21,408 calls
- spoke to 4,399 members
- converted 26% of members spoken to
- left 8,979 voicemails
- sent 14,869 emails
Value-added:
During the most recent campaign, in addition to the reasons for non-renewal being captured, Chord also established:
- whether membership helped with career development
- the most useful support or resources
- awareness of the support available, services used
- what would make lapsed members stay in membership
A significant indirect benefit of the campaign was that 17% of lapsed members’ contact data was updated
See also: How Chord supported the RSC’s team with unpaid member renewal campaigns earlier in the retention cycle.
Chord's support with win back calls has been invaluable. Significant numbers of members renew, despite the length of time since they have lapsed. Understanding the reasons for members not renewing is as important to us as those for joining. We trust Chord to represent us and complement our team. It's a great partnership.Hilary White
