Personalisation has quietly shifted from being a “nice to have” to something members simply expect. Most of us experience it every day. Our banks anticipate what we need, online streaming services suggest content that feels uncannily relevant, and retailers remember what we’ve bought to recommend exactly what we need next. Against that backdrop, many membership organisations are still communicating in broad, generic strokes. "Spray and pray" sounds unfair... but is it really?
The real challenge is that members don’t compare their experience with you to their experience with other membership bodies. They compare it to the best digital experiences they already have. When communications feel generic or poorly timed, it’s not just a missed opportunity but can actively erode perceived value.
There’s also good evidential reason for concern because research consistently shows that personalisation works. McKinsey has reported that organisations that get personalisation right can drive revenue increases of 10–15%, while also improving engagement and satisfaction. In the membership world, where retention is often more valuable than acquisition, even small gains in relevance can have an outsized impact - and imagine what you could do with 15% more income in 2027.
What personalisation really means for membership organisations
It’s worth being clear about what we mean by personalisation. It's definitely not simply using someone’s first name in an email. Nor is it creating dozens of fragile segments that no one has time to maintain or service. For membership organisations, personalisation is about recognising the meaningful differences between members and responding accordingly.
That might mean:
- Recognising career stages, roles, or grades, and tailoring communications to reflect where someone is in their professional journey.
- Treating highly engaged members differently from those who rarely interact (without penalising either group).
- Acknowledging context, such as location, regulatory environment, or specialism, and adjusting content, events, or support appropriately.
In short, it’s about making members feel understood, not marketed to.
Why so many organisations struggle
Most membership organisations want to do this better, so the problem is rarely intent.
Common barriers include fragmented data across CRM, events, finance, and websites, heavy reliance on manual processes, and a lack of confidence in data quality. Many teams worry about “getting it wrong” - in particular sending the wrong message to the wrong person at the wrong time - and so default to safer, blunter communications.
There’s also a perception that personalisation requires a wholesale technology overhaul. In reality, many organisations already have far more data and capability than they realise. It’s just not being brought together effectively.
Making personalisation practical (and manageable)
At its simplest, personalisation starts with a unified view of your members, bringing together membership status, engagement history, transactions, events, and communications into a single, trusted profile. This is where modern platforms and AI can definitely help if used sensibly. From there, relatively small changes can make a big difference.
For instance, AI tools can support this in very practical ways:
- Helping staff draft clearer, more tailored communications based on member context.
- Surfacing insights about engagement patterns that would otherwise be missed.
- Supporting “next best action” thinking and suggesting what might be most relevant for a particular group of members, rather than simply guessing.
Crucially, AI amplifies what’s already there. If data and processes are sound, it can save time and improve quality. If they’re not, it simply scales inconsistency. The organisations seeing real value are those that treat personalisation as an operational capability, not a marketing gimmick.
What good looks like in practice
When personalisation is working well, the results are often subtle but powerful.
Members receive fewer communications, but find them more relevant. Portals surface content and services that reflect genuine interests, not generic catalogues. Staff spend less time searching for information and more time supporting members meaningfully. Leaders gain clearer insight into what drives engagement, retention, and revenue, and what doesn’t.
Importantly, this doesn’t require doing everything at once. The most successful organisations start small. Improving a single journey, refining a particular set of communications, or personalising one key service. Confidence grows as capability grows.
A final thought...
Personalisation isn’t about perfection. It’s about progress. For membership organisations, the goal is to be more relevant, more timely, and more human in how you support members. Done well, personalisation reinforces the value of membership itself, reminding people not just why they joined, but why they stay.
...and a practical next step: map one member journey
Not all members need better personalisation everywhere. Trying to fix everything at once usually leads to complexity and inertia. Instead, pick one high-value journey for example:
- a new member join journey
- a renewal cycle
- promotion of a key event.
Then do three simple things:
- List the touchpoints
What emails, letters, portal content, or reminders does a member currently receive during that journey? - Define relevance
For each touchpoint, agree one or two factors that should influence the message, such as member type, career stage, engagement level, or location. - Check whether you already have the data
Most organisations discover they already hold 70–80% of what they need in their CRM, but aren’t using it consistently.
This task doesn’t require new technology or AI. What it does is create clarity. Once teams agree what “relevant” looks like for a specific journey, tools and automation can be applied with confidence, and personalisation stops being abstract and starts becoming real.