Volunteers are vital to your association’s ability to expand its reach, deliver quality community programs, and foster a stronger professional community. Whether your volunteers are helping with event planning, member outreach, administrative work, or any other task, their contributions can drive your organization’s success in various areas.

Engaged volunteers show increased efficiency, feel more satisfaction in their roles, and are more likely to stick around for the long term. However, you’re likely familiar with the challenges of maintaining member engagement — and just like with your wider member community, engaging volunteers requires a strategic approach.

In this guide, we’ll discuss three practical ways your association can deepen volunteer involvement, which benefits both your organization and its volunteers.

1. Personalize the Volunteer Experience

Each of your volunteers’ unique motivations, preferences, interests, skills, and backgrounds affects how they serve your association. Letting them know that you see them as individuals (rather than just labor sources), and tailoring their experiences accordingly, can lead to deeper, more meaningful connections between your organization and its volunteers.

In your association’s volunteer management software, create a profile for each volunteer that lists their:

• Name (legal and preferred) and pronouns
• Contact information (phone number, email address, etc.) and communication preferences
• Employment information (company, job title, etc.)
• Current volunteer role, responsibilities, and hours served
• Other involvement with your association, like events they’ve attended or professional development courses they’ve completed
• Anything else that may help you adapt their volunteer experience to their needs and goals (e.g., marital and family status or nonprofit causes they’re passionate about)

Not only does knowing this information help you match volunteers to the most fitting opportunities, but it also allows for more personalized communication. For example, if Lauren, an event volunteer who likes to communicate via text, received an email about a membership marketing volunteer opportunity with the greeting “Dear Valued Volunteer,” she’d probably ignore it because this generic message doesn’t match any of her preferences.

But after looking at Lauren’s volunteer profile, you might instead send her a text message that reads, “Lauren, since you’ve been a loyal volunteer for our last two annual conferences, we wanted to reach out early to see if you’d like to help out again this year?” And you’d be more likely to receive a response of “Yes! Please send me the details!”

2. Provide Ongoing Volunteer Training

Too often, association volunteer training begins and ends at onboarding. However, creating opportunities for ongoing training shows your volunteers that you’re invested in their success and want to help them achieve their personal goals.

To effectively train your volunteers, your approach should include the following three stages:

• Onboarding: Provide volunteers with all of the information they need to get up and running in their roles. Explain your volunteer program’s values and culture and review essential policies and procedures with the whole group, then run breakouts for role-specific training.
• Continuous education: After onboarding, offer optional workshops and webinars to help volunteers build new skills. Also, compile a resource library so volunteers can watch tutorials or read articles on topics that interest them at their own pace.
• Advancement opportunities: Create pathways for experienced, high-performing volunteers to take on additional responsibilities, such as mentoring newer volunteers or serving in more prominent capacities.While you shouldn’t pressure volunteers to take on these roles if they don’t want to, the offer alone shows that you acknowledge their growth and strengthens your volunteer program’s leadership pipeline.

Consistent training helps volunteers feel competent, confident, and connected, which are all essential for boosting engagement within your program.

3. Regularly Appreciate Your Volunteers

You probably understand the importance of volunteer recognition, whether you send thank-you cards, give out small gifts, host appreciation events, or post volunteer shoutouts on your association’s social media accounts. However, since all of your volunteers likely serve on different schedules, you might not know when to thank them.

According to Better Impact’s volunteer appreciation guide, some of the best times to recognize volunteers include:

• After a volunteer's first time serving
• While sending follow-up communications after events
• At the end of the calendar year or membership cycle
• When a volunteer reaches a milestone or achieves a major goal
• During official observances like National Volunteer Week

Additionally, consider sending out regular surveys to get volunteers’ input on your program. Giving volunteers an avenue to make their voices heard and taking their feedback seriously shows you value them and enhances the experience for everyone involved.

Boosting association volunteer engagement doesn’t need to be time- and resource-intensive. By making small but intentional efforts to invest in and value your volunteers, your association can build a stronger, more motivated volunteer base. These strategies not only benefit your volunteers but also help your association thrive through stronger community support and member loyalty.