Remember that movie back in the day (circa 1993) entitled Indecent Proposal? The story centers around a billionaire played by Robert Redford offering a married couple played by Woody Harrelson and Demi Moore a million dollars to sleep with the wife? I always wondered why it was $1 million that he offered. Could he have gotten away with offering just a half million? What if he just offered $10,000? How do you determine what’s “indecent?”

If you surveyed your members and asked them to rate the value of their membership and the benefits it offers, would they rate it as decent or indecent? As a membership professional, I’d want my members to perceive the membership value proposition as indecent. Maybe obscene. Indispensible.

Maybe it’s inappropriate of me to use the word, indecent. You certainly don’t want your members perceiving your membership offerings as unseemly, dirty, or bawdy (I love using a thesaurus.) Yet I think the word decent may be even more disturbing than the word indecent. If my members perceive the value proposition as decent it makes me think they see it only as adequate, mediocre, or maybe even average. That is not going to cut it when I’m trying to recruit new and keep active members in the current marketplace.

When it comes to attracting new members and retaining active members you better be offering an indecent amount of value in return for the membership dues you are charging. There’s way too much competition for their attention and their share of wallet these days and it’s just getting more competitive.

If you’re leading an association today and you haven’t looked at the rise of online membership sites and industrial subscriptions and how they are taking over niches in accelerating speeds…

If you haven’t heard of the formulaic presentations like The Perfect Webinar that are driving huge sales for online entrepreneurs when they show “sick” value while making such attractive offers that no decent person could refuse…

If you can’t believe how wildly successful the marketing and sales strategies at the core of infomercials and the home shopping networks are…

…then your association will only be growing at a decent rate, while you watch your competition experience indecent growth.

Offering the same value proposition for many, many years is not going to drive membership growth. You may see a decent annual growth of 3%. The value proposition must be improving, increasing, and building year after year if you want to get anywhere near a double-digit growth pattern regularly.

There are competitors with deep pockets preparing to approach your members, drop to one knee, and propose with a ring 10X the size of the ring you’re offering them. Remember, your membership agreement is nothing like a marriage. Your members can leave you anytime they want and hook up with someone else better or more attractive while you’re left with a sense of rejection and nothing to show for it.

Your call to action after reading this blog post is to get your membership value proposition in order. Look it over. Analyze it. Tally up the value you offer. Now double it! Find more value and build their desire to levels far above the amount of dues that they will shell out to join.

Make your membership proposal (i.e., value proposition) indecent and watch your membership grow.