In 1999, I was the executive in charge of member relations at a health plan with 88,000 members. I'm sure that much has changed since then. However, then, we conceived of services and marketing in terms of the right combination of high-touch and low-touch contact with members. The same approach has held true for the non-profit boards on which I've served.

In our context at the Alliance, high-touch would be phone calls, personalized invitations to events or to serve, and perhaps hand-written thank-you notes for significant contributions or in-kind services (yes, snail mail). Low-touch is broadcast emails announcing events, or updating our members, etc.

Just one example of a high-touch activity that I think would be worth your while, Craig and Bonnie, is to hand-pick (1) high profile members, (2) high-profile non-members, and (3) members in distant parts of the world to meet with via Zoom (high touch) to pick their brains about how the Alliance can support their work and any possible affiliations that might make sense. The final act of each such meeting would be to agree on "next steps" (which might be "we'll have to get back to you") and reasonable timeframes. Depending on the person or group, you would have Eva or another volunteer join you who would scribe all the ideas and be responsible for documenting a specific action plan and/or compiling the information gathered over time from all the different meetings. I say that this would be "worth your while" because such meetings would take full advantage of your stature and public identity. It wouldn't make sense for someone at a lower level to conduct these meetings. Not new to you, Bonnie--much of the stuff that you are doing now is not at the right level. But this would be.

Bottom line, we should have a member relations "plan" that outlines the finite list of kinds of "interactions" with our members, including specific goals for high-touch interactions--who will initiate them, with whom, for what reason, and by when. Stuff like that.

The risk in an organization like ours is that we are lulled into all low-touch encounters. We need to plan for high-touch things because they take precious time and are a strategic commitment. In our high tech world, high-touch makes a big difference.

Thoughts about these notions/opinions about high-touch?