How the Kiwanis Club of Woodland Boosted Their Membership with WildApricot – Case Study

For a membership organization that’s all about connecting people, the Kiwanis Club of Woodland, California needed a way to reach them in the first place. Built by communities, for communities, Kiwanis International is a global network of clubs that empowers members to serve the needs of children and seniors including fighting hunger, improving literacy, and offering support in times of need. Through Kiwanis, members work together to form friendships, serve others, and build stronger communities.  

Bob Young has been with the Kiwanis Club of Woodland since 1983. And since then, technology—and the club’s needs along with it—have come a long way. As their community grew, their needs expanded to include a new website, online payment capabilities, a user-friendly database to house member data, and ways to increase member out-reach and meeting attendance. As we’ll explore in this case study, with WildApricot on their side, Bob and the team were able to not only meet but exceed expectations in these three key areas.  

New Website, New Volunteers  

At its heart, Kiwanis seeks to bring people together. While the Woodland location was able to achieve this in person, Bob expressed the need for a platform where members could gather virtually. Using WildApricot’s website builder tool, Bob and his team were able to craft a visually compelling website featuring photos of the club’s activities and advocacy work. As the public’s first impression of the club, the site also served as a recruitment tool for new members, showing up in searches related to “volunteer,” and featuring a layout users can easily navigate to find information on joining and connecting with other members.  

“I’m no software wizard,” Bob said, “but I was able to create a fun, attractive website using WildApricot.” Without any experience in web design, Bob leveraged drag-and-drop modules and professionally designed, mobile-friendly themes to create a welcoming and visually appealing site.  

Online Payments Made Easy  

The new site also proved useful in meeting another of the club’s needs: online payments. With WildApricot’s easily deployable online payment tools, Kiwanis Club of Woodland can now securely accept and track all online payments and automatically generate receipts and invoices–all in one place.  

“The ability to charge credit cards for our last fundraising event saved us a lot of time dealing with checks and we netted over $12,000!” Bob said.   

On the member side of things, WildApricot’s online payment processing proved just as useful. The new software enables members and donors to pay online for membership fees, registration fees, or donations from their computer or mobile device, as well as set up recurring payments to save time and hassle.   

Email Collection and Enhanced Communication  

Perhaps most significant for a community-based organization like Kiwanis, WildApricot helped the club connect with a new wave of members and volunteers. By collecting and storing the email addresses of event participants in a single database, WildApricot enabled Kiwanis to massively increase attendance, sending out reminders about future events to the entire database with ease. The increase in fundraiser attendance also, unsurprisingly, led to a significant increase in donation funds.  

Along with invitations, WildApricot allowed Kiwanis to send out three successive reminders before meetings and events, significantly impacting turnout. As Bob reported, the Woodland Kiwanis location used to see about 15-20 members per meeting, but now sees around 25-30— with a turnout rate of almost 100%.

As meeting attendance increased, membership rates rose alongside it. Bob attributes the rise in membership to a number of factors, including the SEO capture of the new website and a whole new breadth of information about the club’s activities not previously as within reach to would-be volunteers. Since the integration of WildApricot, the club’s mission has reached more volunteers and changed the lives of more people than ever before, perhaps more than some members even thought possible.  

“Before WildApricot, we hadn’t had a new member in years,” said Bob. “But it has not only increased the turnout at our meetings significantly, but we’ve also gotten five new members to join in the last two months through our new website.”   

The member database also made it a cinch to pull member information and send it off to Kiwanis International, a necessary but often time-consuming process for the small, local division of a major international charity. With WildApricot, all of Kiwanis Woodland’s membership data is safely stored in the cloud, allowing staffers to easily search, update, and share information with teammates from any device.  

WildApricot has proven to be a transformative tool for the Kiwanis Club of Woodland, empowering the team to build a stronger online presence, streamline financial transactions, and greatly enhance communication. The integration revitalized the club’s mission and brought about a surge in membership, underscoring the importance of member management software not only in running a nonprofit, but in building a stronger community.  

If you’re looking to make a lasting impact for your club, like Bob did for the Kiwanis Club of Woodland, try out WildApricot! Start your free 60-day trial here.