Puzzle Project Membership Guide

"Journalism needs solutions to its trust and revenue problems. Membership is one of them."

This guide offers step-by-step advice that is designed to help newsrooms develop and implement a membership strategy. It also offers case studies from around the world that highlight some of the lessons people have learned as they have built successful membership programmes, including some of the mistakes and pitfalls to look out for. The guide was published as part of the Membership Puzzle Project, which was designed to collect and share knowledge and operational advice on how membership can help sustain independent media (see Related Summaries, below).

The Membership Guide recognises that journalism faces both a trust crisis and a sustainability crisis and views membership as answers to both. It defines the membership model as "a social contract between a news organization and its members in which members give their time, money, energy, expertise, and connections to support a cause that they believe in. In exchange, the news organization offers transparency and opportunities to meaningfully contribute to both the sustainability and impact of the organization. It is an editorial orientation that sees readers and listeners as much more than a source of monetary support. Members actively contribute. In its deeper forms, it is a two-way knowledge exchange between journalists and members. It is an opportunity to identify your strongest supporters, and enlist them in your quest for impact and sustainability. In many cases, membership is an agreement to keep access to journalism free for all. Many members don't want a gate around the journalism they're supporting. They are advocates for that journalism, and advocates have an interest in exposing as many people as possible to their cause."

The guide has two parts: (i) a handbook with step-by-step guidance and (ii) 34 case studies, which include United Kingdom (UK) co-operative The Bristol Cable, German-engaged journalism publisher Krautreporter, Hawaii (United States)'s non-profit Honolulu Civil Beat, and South Africa's Daily Maverick. Case studies deal with marketing outreach, staffing, technology options, payment options, and community engagement initiatives.

The step-by-step guidance is divided into the following sections:

• Getting Started with Membership - covers: defining membership, knowing if a media organisation is ready for membership, defining a membership value proposition, conducting audience research, developing workflows that connect audience members to journalism and the people producing it on a consistent basis, and adopting a product mindset.
• Planning a Membership Move - covers: staffing a membership strategy, making the business case for membership, and building a membership tech stack (set of required technology, tools, and software).
• Developing and Launching Membership - looks at designing and launching a membership programme (including a launch checklist).
• Growing a Membership Program - focuses on setting objectives in line with one's membership strategy and measuring progress toward those objectives with both metrics and markers.
• Making Membership Stick - looks at retaining members and developing a member-focused culture.

The guide can also be accessed as a self-guided newsletter course that takes users through each section of the Membership Guide and tells them what is most important in each section.