Designed to Stay: Designing Member Experiences to Drive Retention

Retention isn’t a renewals problem—it is an experience problem. Members decide whether to stay based on the moments they have with your association all year long. Learn how to intentionally design those moments so they create value, connection, and loyalty. Using the Five-Star Experience framework, we will explore the five elements that matter most to today’s members: delivering on your promise, designing moments of surprise and delight, creating personal connection, making members’ lives easier, and building the kind of experience people want to talk about. Assess one of your current member touchpoints, identify where the experience may be falling short, and redesign it using practical, real-world examples. Whether you are focused on first-year members or long-term loyalists, leave with concrete ideas to strengthen retention, deepen engagement, and create a member experience people return to again and again.

Learning Outcomes


Diagnose a key member touchpoint by discovering where friction, unmet expectations, or gaps in the experience are weakening retention
Prototype small, high-impact improvements you can implement immediately to strengthen member connection and increase renewal likelihood
Revise that touchpoint by applying the Five-Star Experience principles to construct a more engaging, valuable, and loyalty-building interaction