TRADE ASSOCIATIONS, ARE THEY FOR YOU?
by Alan J. Zell, Ambassador of Selling

One hears lots of excuses why people and firms do not want to join professional or trade associations. Some rebel at having to attend another meeting: there are not enough hours in the day, days in a week, weeks in a year to give up valuable time to attend a meeting when one's priorities should be spent running the business. Others do not join, or if they coerced to join, do not participate because they believe associations have little to offer.

These attitudes are not attitudes of successful business people. Successful business people derive maximum use of their memberships. Memberships are seen as "inventory" or assets rather than expenses. Joining and not participating in association activities is passing up opportunities to be better at one's business. It is tantamount to leaving one's inventory sitting idle on the back shelf. Idle money does no one any good.

A business should join only those professional and trade associations that offer activities in which someone from the business will participate. That does not mean that the firm or the firm's representative has to stop day-by-day duties and let the association become their life. A person or firm should select those associations in which they believe membership will help return a multiple of the dues by furthering knowledge and/or showing the way to new and more profitable business.

There are four benefits professional and trade associations offer. Availing oneself of these benefits helps get maximum value for the dollar.

The first benefit is at the local level. Rather than thinking that competitors will discover "our/my secret formula," a member will learn that others have similar attitudes and problems. An association acts as a forum to bring people together. The purpose is to raise the level of expertise and quality of service for the good of the industry and, more important, for the good of each business's customers and clients. In addition, by keeping one's eyes and ears open one will find that there is much useful information floating around. When talking and meeting with one's competitors, "listening between the lines" is a very important skill to nurture.

The second benefit comes from attending regional and national meetings. Here one can talk about business problems without the fear of letting secrets out of the bag. In some cases, successful business people set regularly scheduled discussions with their counterparts from other cities to discuss problems and ideas without hurting their local advantages. Because there is no threat to one's business, each is more open to talk about their successes and failures.

The third benefit associations offer business is by acting as a watchdog over legislative and regulatory bodies that make laws and rules that could be detrimental to their industry. Most associations have taken on the role of being the eyes and ears of its members.

The fourth benefit businesses derive from their associations happens when the association disseminates pertinent industry information. Most associations have newsletters that keep their membership up-to-date on the latest methods, solutions to problems, products, and services.

Belonging to trade or professional organizations is as important to a business as developing products and services for their clients and customers. The money invested in the inventory of trade and professional organization memberships can return much more than the annual investment of dues.

This article was written to help you and your business. If you believe some of these articles will be helpful to your business, please e-mail me your comments on how you will apply them. ajz

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Copyright © 2000-2007 Alan J. Zell, Ambassador of Selling, Portland, OR. All rights reserved.

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