Here’s some ideas for you to consider. Of course, every union is different so it’s impossible to say which of these suggestions is the best suited for your union but hopefully you’ll find at least a few of them helpful:
- Make sure you constantly advertise the app. Put the QR code or link to app in all your communications. Remind members what they are missing by not having the app. At union meetings, advertise the app and do a little report on penetration numbers to help keep the app at the top of people’s minds. Feature the app prominently on your website.
- Identify a form or document that your members fill out a lot or refer to a lot. Make it only available in the app. For example, one of our clients used a safety hazard reporting form for sending in photos of safety hazards they found on the job. Members had to use the app to access the form.
- Similarly, put out critical info, statements about a controversial topic, or interesting gossip that’s only available in the app. Send a push notification out about it. Tease out information about it via your existing communication network. Tell people they have to download the app to get access to the rest of the info.
- Set up a form to do an informal poll that members can vote on. Make it about an issue everyone is interested in and cares about. Then advertise the app and tell members you are looking for their feedback and they can use the form to give it to you.
- Train your union’s leaders and stewards to ask members if they have downloaded the app yet. Show them how to use the “Share the app” feature built into the app to help share out the QR code and link to the app.
- Incentivize members to register. For example, you could buy a $50 gift card each month and raffle it off. Make being registered with the app a requirement of eligibility for the raffle.
- Set up a “Member News” group that members can join. People like reading about their peers and what they are up to. Who got married? Who retired? Who was awarded professional recognition? Send out push notifications.
- Make downloading the app part of your new member orientation.
- Emphasize to members that the app is going to be the future of how the union communicates with its members. Frame it as: “If something serious happens at 2am, the app is how you’ll find out first, not email, not Facebook.” And let them know that by getting the app they will help build your organization stronger by helping it communicate efficiently with members.
- If you have members who refuse to sign up, find out why they are hesitant and explain to them why they shouldn’t be. For example, if they are worried about privacy, remind them that we do no tracking and we do absolutely nothing with their data.
- Treat getting members registered like a campaign. Assign leaders and stewards to go talk to specific members in the union who have not signed up for the app. Set concrete goals like signing up 10 new members a month. Build a little committee to help you run the campaign. Break your membership down by department and figure out who can help you get members signed up in a particular department. Identify which shifts have the lowest adoption rate and identify key people on those shifts to help you target those members effectively.
- Make a common phone-call question “app only.” Find something your leadership gets asked about constantly. It could be pay rates, benefit phone numbers, who to call for this or that. Start answering every question like that with “that’s in the app, let me walk you through how to get it.”
So to boil it all down: think of stuff your members need or care about and put it in the app, advertise it relentlessly and try different things out to see what gets results. Once you find the hook that works, the app will sell itself and spread by word of mouth and you’ll get an overwhelming majority of your union signed up fairly quickly.
On our end, we will be introducing many great features like shared photo albums and other kinds of compelling features that will entice your members to sign up. If you have any specific ideas that you think would help, we are all ears.