As the old ad stated, “this is not your father’s oldsmobile," chambers have a challenge today being like the chambers their fathers knew. Or their grandfathers.

As a general rule most chambers of commerce have not adapted and are trying to do things the way they’ve always been done. That does not work in any business anymore and I tell many of our clients that they can discard any rule book from before 2005 since it will never be applicable again.

Over the past several years I have worked with dozens of chambers of commerce and most of them lose money as well as lose members and have challenges with retention. Mixers and wine tastings are great, but that may not help you in your business life. With that said, I offer four easy tweaks to improve chambers.

• It’s about programs, not mixers. In all the chambers I have worked with- or tried to work with- most of them offer the same thing. Once a month they have a mixer of sorts and do a ribbon cutting for a new business.  Sometimes they offer a speaker or workshop, which is great, but business owners need direction and on-going education not just singular talking head workshops.
• It’s about programs, not mixers, part two. Rarely do I see a chamber that has a greater than 10 percent penetration of available business owners as members. If you have a business populace of 5,000 businesses, it’s unusual to have more than 500 chamber members. That means 95 percent do not care about or know about the chamber. That also means 95 percent of the businesses are not available to refer business, or be referred. I have done countless surveys of chamber members as well as NON chamber members. The ones that are not nor ever have been members are very telling and consistent. After you see the same people month after month and always give them a card is not going to work most of the time.
• Play well with others. It’s not just about membership numbers, chamber leaders, and you should be open to having programs and offerings from those that may not be chamber members. I have seen chambers reject money making and valuable programs that can double membership, but it was prefaced by the requirement of chamber membership. Short sighted.
• Offer membership pricing that has flexibility and offer some features a la carte. Also consider monthly fees instead of annual. Not everyone can afford or justify an annual commitment.

There are several others ideas that would also help to increase membership including, making everyone an Ambassador and the absolutely #1 game changer: offer undisputable value.  As business owners are watching every outgoing dollar they need to justify if that $300, $500 or even more expensive annual fee will add to their bottom line.

Do you agree? Disagree? I’d like to hear your thoughts.