The seminar, hosted by Advanced Computer Software Group NFP division, was attended by the Royal College of Paediatrics, Child Health, the Fostering Network, and the Royal British Legion amongst others, to consult with each other on the challenges that face them regarding data acquisition and analysis. All the attendees acknowledged that they needed to make efforts to offer members value for money, despite a great deal of information being made freely available on their sites.

The managing director at Advanced Business Solutions, Simon Fowler, said: “Membership organisations rely on support from the public in the form of subscription or membership fees to survive. Many, however, report membership erosion, resulting from increased choice and ‘member fatigue’. This is made worse if inaccurate or out-of-date contact data means irrelevant content is sent to the wrong member – or doesn’t get there at all.”

Recent research on more than 300 UK not-for-profit organisations has shown that 96% of them collect so much data on their members that they are unable to effectively manage it. Of those 96%, 80% blamed non-centralised systems for being unable to provide consistent reporting on members and they all agreed that they needed to adapt their membership offerings to suit the individual rather the masses.