Online Support Groups

Lesson 3: Getting Members To Join Your Group

Don't Forget Your Members

Your group members can be a good source of gaining new members. Each of your group members have family and friends that might be interested in joining the group. Word of mouth advertising is a great tool and should be used whenever possible.

Encourage your members to add a link to the group on their personal web site, in their email signatures, and to just mention it to others. You should be careful how you ask your members to do this. You do not want to pressure or demand that they do this.

One way to approach getting your members more involved in recruiting other members is to ask them how they heard about the group. You can ask by either posting or sending a message asking, or by creating a group poll with possible answers. Once you have brought up how they found out about the group, you can then ask if they have told anyone about it and if they have, how they have done it (word of mouth, a link, etc.).

Depending on the topic of the group, you may want to ask about having a 'membership drive'. Offering small prizes to the top 'recruiters' can encourage everyone to get more members involved in the group. There would need to be rules about how this would work, such as the recruited member would need to remain a member for a certain amount of time to 'count'. Whatever rules you decide are needed for a membership drive, be sure to get input from your members.

If a membership drive just will not work for your group, then open a discussion with all of your current members on ways they think would be good to let others know about your group. This will give them a chance to suggest that they help bring in new members that would benefit from the group, and add to the support base, which benefits everyone.

If your members don't mention it, suggest it yourself. You can suggest it by asking your members if they know of anyone that might want to join the group. You can encourage them to let others know about the group. A suggestion for how to word such a message:

After discussing how we all found this group, I was wondering if any of you knew of others that might want to join us. I want everyone to feel free to give their friends and any family members, that might be interested, our group's web address. You can also tell them that they can email me with any questions they have about our group that you are not sure how to answer.

By letting your members know that you value their input and their judgment, you will be developing a stronger group. Members will not only feel better about inviting others to the group, but also will realize that their input and suggestions are helpful to you and help make the group the best it can be.

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