278: The Essential Role of Communication in Private Club Culture w/ Shanna Bright
How pivotal is effective communication in shaping a private club's culture? Expect a profound exploration of this topic with Shanna Bright, founder of Private Club Online, in our latest podcast episode. Shana unravels the significance of communication in enhancing member experience, leading to increased participation and subsequently, a thriving club culture. She pinpoints that good communication not only enriches each member's experience but also makes them more likely to stay, spend and bring in new members.
Her experience and expertise bring you strategies to develop a winning content strategy for member engagement.
Hear her inspiring journey from alumni relations to member relations and her unique experiences at the City Club of Los Angeles. Discover how the evolving landscape of private clubs has reshaped the industry and learn why flexibility is key in such a dynamic environment.
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Hey everyone, welcome to Private Club Radio. I'm your host, denny Corby. In this episode we get to chat with another friend of mine, shana Bright. Some of you may or may not know Shana from Private Club Online, where ideas, strategies, tools and resources are shared with you to help enrich your club culture, foster member connections and, most importantly, as we all love, drive revenue. But we learned a little bit more about Shana, how she began her career in the Private Club world as the member relations director over at the City Club LA. Ooh, she bougie. She's presented at CMA-A conference, speaks to CMA-A chapters and it does work outside the CMA-A. But this is an inside chat with Shana Bright of Private Clubs Online.
Speaker 2:Did you wanna share how we met and the story that I told you when we?
Speaker 1:had our first conversation. Go ahead.
Speaker 2:As many of the listeners probably remember, in 2020, whatever it feels like, it was 10 years ago already Lynn and I Lynn Lafondaleuca of the Association of Club Catering and Event Professionals we're old club buddies, so when I was working at City Club Los Angeles, she was at Braymar Country Club, so we in the Western region collaborated a lot and were the trailblazers of Club Corp at the time. Anyway, so we put together the Friday forum. It ended up being the Friday forum in 2020, and every week we had Private Club pros get on to our webinar and we were sharing ideas. We had kind of like this living document of resources and information and event ideas and then we'd share like best practices and look what this club is doing. And it was really, I mean, I think, as much as it was helpful for clubs, it was super helpful for Lynn and I to kind of just get through and get everybody through the pandemic. And at one point very early on in our conversations, somebody said oh, great resources, denny Corby, you've got to have Denny Corby do a virtual magic show for your club. And so we're like great, you know, and the couple people chimed in in the chat, denny Corby is awesome, and so we put that on our living document. Denny Corby was a resource and so it was literally like probably every week from June and through December. Who used Denny Corby this week? Did anybody book Denny Corby? I practically every week mentioned Denny Corby and Lynn had never met you. I had never met you. And then it wasn't until this year when Sean at members first connected us or I think you that were coming on as the brand new host of Private Club Radio and I said, oh God, I got to reach out or whatever. However, we ended up connecting, finally told you that story three years later. We mentioned you every week. I feel like I know you.
Speaker 1:I had a love hate relationship with the West Coast because, very fortunate, you know, pandemic, I did Virtual shows and pivoted. But I'd be doing shows from sometimes two, three in the afternoon, eastern till 12, one in the morning Because they're, you know, it'd be like the corporate after hours things and like this and that, and so I'm like, oh so, communication directors, yeah. So I'm like what's so important about them? Why should we care?
Speaker 2:So how much time do you have, denny?
Speaker 1:18 minutes and 75 seconds.
Speaker 2:So one of the things that I think with clubs and in fact I just talked with someone who doesn't have they don't have a communication director in their club and their general manager doesn't feel it's really necessary. And what I always feel like with clubs is that we have we spend so much time planning and preparing for every other department right, we go through a budgeting process, we go through a strategy process, we have strategic plans for the board, but nobody spends that kind of time around the member communication and it is as I always say and kind of open. Most of my webinars is that it is a key component of the total member experience. So when a member is joining the club, we are promising them the world. You are gonna have the best time of your life right At this club and you're gonna be able to experience this and do that and whatever, and we're gonna exceed your expectations and la la, la right. And then what do we do? We pile on the emails in their inbox. They're receiving five emails a day at some clubs, or inconsistent posts on Instagram. They never know what's happening or they tune out because it's just too overwhelming. And so it's the one area where, if members aren't receiving good, effective communication. They're not connected to the club. And the reverse is that when members are experiencing on the receiving end, they are on the receiving end of strategic, effective communication in the club. They're more connected to the club. Because they're more connected, they're more involved with the programs and events and anything that the club wants the members to participate in. They're golfing more, they're playing tennis more or pickleball, or they're at the events or they're just dining or whatever you've got going on at your club. And those members, the more involved and active members, are the members who stay and spend and sponsor new members and grow the club and enrich the club culture. And so that all starts we can bring that back to effective communication. And so I would love for every club to just realize the importance of good, effective, connected member communication where members feel the same level of experience in their email, in their newsletter, when they see the club on Instagram or Facebook or wherever on the app, they're experiencing the same level of satisfaction with the club as they do when they're actually at the club through the communication. Does that make sense? Yeah, yeah. So, you know, it's kind of just heartening that even in 2023, there are some clubs that don't have communication directors and don't focus Kind of like you know we're good, we're okay, or lump it under, oh, we'll just have that person do it, whether it, you know, maybe in its executive assistant or whenever somebody who's not really hate to say qualified, but not really qualified to build a strategic member of communication plan. So I would love to see every club put a little more focus on communication and have a solid communication plan, because it will benefit their club greatly.
Speaker 1:So I don't know. You know, here I am, you know Joe Malone, you know general manager, I'm part of a club and I work for a club and just don't have the budget, just cannot make having a communications person happen. What can clubs do? What can I do as like a club, like you know what steps could be made to at least fill that gap a little bit more. It's like, hey, listen, we know we can't and we know we can't give it. You know a thousand percent, but we can give it something. What's that something?
Speaker 2:So in that case I think it's important to remember. So you may or may not have one person that is the gatekeeper and is the is the person who plans the strategy, who actually pushes the messaging across the variety of channels that the club is active on, but it's good to remember that communication is a team sport, as I like to say. Everyone in the club has a role in member communication. So if you're the golf pro or the tennis pro, or the food and beverage director, or the general manager or the catering director, you all have a target goals that you're trying to reach. You know whether it be participation levels or revenue targets or whatever it is that you're trying to do in your department In order to meet those goals. You need to have members to do X, y or Z in order to be able to meet your department goals. Therefore, it is your job to create messaging that is relative to members, to get them to participate in your department, whatever you're doing. So when we have a club that doesn't have like a communication director, then what we want to consider is okay, everyone needs to be able to contribute their departmental messaging, whatever that might be for for members, and there still needs to be a gatekeeper. It should be somebody who's more of a retention officer than a sales role. So I would say, like a member relations director if you have a member relations director or member services, is the person that then takes all of that content and tweaks it a little bit and polishes it up and sends it across the the variety of communication channels. We have to really kind of change that language of oh, that's not my job, it's everyone's job. Communication with members is everyone's job because we need our members to do something in order to achieve our departmental goals. So we want them to be more involved in the club and and certainly the golf pro doesn't want the catering director to talk about golf tips, or chef doesn't want the tennis pro to talk about how to you know, julianne, some carrots.
Speaker 1:Unless they have, unless that's their specialty, you know right like they're.
Speaker 2:You know they secretly have been to chef school, but yeah, so you know, having a little bit more of a team spirit around communication and making that you know in our staff meetings and things like that are weekly staff meetings, what are? What's your message for next week? What do you want to put on Facebook? What do you want to put in the newsletter? What's you know, instead of having it be this burden, which I feel like a lot of department directors feel like it's a burden oh God, I've got to get that article for the newsletter. Oh God, I've got to get something for, you know, instagram. It shouldn't be a burden. You should be delighted to share what's going on in your department. You should be enthusiastic to tell members you know what new benefit they can take advantage of or what new amenity you're offering. You know pickleball or whatever, or introducing them to something new, or what have you. So that's why I like to say communication is a team sport because, especially in the clubs, it's not. It is one person's job to kind of be the gatekeeper and to manage the communication, but it is definitely everyone's job to contribute to the overall messaging.
Speaker 1:Are there any good like softwares or tools or apps that are good for people to use? You know whether you're a solo person and doing it yourself a whole, you know. Communication director. Are there just cool like tips and like cool apps or anything softwares out there that can really help save time for people who like it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know well one canva is always a great tool to produce content, produce flyers, produce video. You know, you can drop in your own photos and videos. You can use some of their stock images, which actually are not too bad. I mean, some of the sites have really horrible stuff.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:But it's bad right. But canva is actually pretty decent. I always recommend that the club use their own photos, that you want it to look and feel like the club, so use your own photos. But canva is pretty good in terms of content creation. And then I like to use later. Later is a great scheduling tool. It gives you some analytics. You can, you know, do things through LinkedIn, through Facebook, through Instagram, on your professional site, of course, you know, just like you know it has to be your business site. You can't have your club be a personal Instagram account. Another one that I've heard that clubs like to use is Monday, I think it's called so. and then of course there's the Hootsuite and Buffer and Sprout Social and kind of the oldies, the goodies that are still really super effective scheduling tools. But I think some of the well Hootsuite does it too. They have a lot of education around social media. I find that the later media is kind of nice in the sense that I feel like they're really up on the trends. They really take the time to investigate things and kind of share a lot of news. So once you're on later they really kind of take care of you. So I like that.
Speaker 1:Do you have like three steps to effective Egypt? Member communication.
Speaker 2:Three steps. Oh, if there were only three steps.
Speaker 1:I would say.
Speaker 2:Number one is your content. Your content is the foundation of your communication. You can schedule your life away if you want to, but if you have bad content, it doesn't matter what your strategy is. So content is the foundation of your communication. You have to have good content. So take the time to think about what happens in your club and kind of pick some categories of content. I know that batching your content and content columns or content categories are kind of a hot topic right now, but it is essential that you do that Kind of identify what's happening in your club and what are your pillars of content in your club. The other thing that I would say is the scheduling and strategy. Strategize your communication in terms of is this valuable, meaningful, relative content to our members? Where are they living currently? I guess that's kind of part of step three. But in terms of strategy, also determining where do your members live. If you're constantly posting to Facebook and your members are living on Instagram, you are not going to connect with your members. If your members prefer a digital newsletter on the website in the private section of the website, then by all means produce a digital newsletter in the private section of the website If your members tell you where they are living and where they want to receive content and communication from the club, then that's where you need to go. You don't want to force them to come to you to get their information. You need to deliver it to them. And then I would say consistency and frequency is key as well. So content strategy and going where they live, meeting your members where they live, online or in email or wherever their most active channels are, and then consistency and frequency. That's why a content plan is crucial, because you're planning your content in advance. It takes a little time on the front end to get everything together and to put it into that schedule, but then you're consistent with how you communicate with your members and what that does. The consistency actually builds your members' habits in communicating and connecting with the club. If you send an email every Tuesday at 10 am, they're going to start to expect that you're going to send an email every Tuesday at 10 am and by golly they want that information. They're going to be in their mailbox Tuesdays at 10 am. They're going to know that that comes. If it's sometimes on Wednesdays, sometimes on Fridays, sometimes on Thursday nights, then they never know when it's coming. So that consistency is actually more about creating member habits connecting with the club than it is just scheduling your content. So I think that's three. I've gone for probably seven more steps, but I think those are key.
Speaker 1:Oh easily.
Speaker 2:Those are key.
Speaker 1:I think three just sounds better than nine. Okay, what are your nine steps? I always laugh when it's like, really you couldn't just make it eight or 10.
Speaker 2:You got to make it nine. Well, three is the magic number, is it not?
Speaker 1:Good thing happened in threes.
Speaker 2:What's that phrase? What's that saying?
Speaker 1:Oh, everyone dies in threes.
Speaker 2:Well, not that one.
Speaker 1:Oh, I think it's always just like three who sings that song Three is the magic number. It's like a bar or something.
Speaker 2:It's a magic number Three peaches, three table legs. What's it? Oh gosh, I'll have to email you the who sings it. There's a song Three is the magic number. No, I'm going to have to Google it or something. Let's see. Three is the magic number. Yeah, it is a song, but you know what? It's schoolhouse rock. But then there's also a great blind melon Blind melon.
Speaker 1:Oh, they sing, no rain.
Speaker 2:Here. Ok, that's an advertisement, hold on.
Speaker 1:Come on, upgrade to that YouTube premium.
Speaker 2:Right, come on. Oh, that's the schoolhouse rock one. Ok, well, whatever. Anyway, I'm sure you won't use that video, you won't use that part.
Speaker 1:Oh, I just have so many other uses for it that are just going through my head.
Speaker 2:Three is magic number, but yeah, so three steps.
Speaker 1:Gotcha and you, you bougie, like you came from the city club of LA.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, I often put on my member relations director hat. It kind of has informed a lot of my positions over my career. I can't, you know, I came out of the world of alumni relations before I stepped into member relations, which is a really good transition. So in alumni relations you're bringing people together around a common experience and then in member relations you're creating that common experience in the club and and the city club of LA, was it? I have to say it was really. I'm really proud of the work that I did there and I'm really proud of having worked for that club in particular. So I remember when I was interviewing for that I saw that on monstercom, like 500 years ago, right, I don't even know if monstercom is still active Like kiss itself.
Speaker 1:You got a fax Like fax my resume. You got a fax.
Speaker 2:But I saw the job posting and I thought, well, you know, it's kind of along the lines of what I, what I want to do. And so I that I kind of thought, private club, what is it? A bunch of old white dudes sitting around smoking cigars or what you know. And I went to the club and I had an interview and talked with the general manager and a few other department directors and whatever. And the general manager who's my general manager, larry? He said, well, you want to take a tour around the club? And I said, well, show you the club. And it was kind of like maybe 1231 o'clock ish, so it was still kind of high lunchtime, and and City Club Los Angeles is in downtown LA. So this is like a business, you know, heavy business club. And we walked through the, through the dining room, and it was so refreshing because it looked like Los Angeles and for that I could not have. You know that there's never been a history of discrimination at the club. It was not the club corp, you know way, and and the one of the founding, the founding board president, dear Walter Barron, he always likened the City Club to the watering hole in in terms of like in Africa. You know you've got animals that are out in the jungle, you know, have their various maybe battles or challenges or whatever, but at the end of the day they can all come to the watering hole and find peace and harmony. And it was always just kind of like how we viewed the club and kind of how we approached our marketing and you know, that kind of a thing. But we had so many great events. I mean we, you know, worked with consulate offices and, you know, had so many international kind of events, and then of course, the food and wine and all that was just so fantastic and yeah, we just had, I mean, we had a ton of fun. You know, it was a different era in private clubs. It was a different era with club corp in terms of the autonomy we had, you know, and and we just pioneered a lot of things and we kind of trailblaze through like different concepts and programs and things that we were able to do. That I know, now that club corp is invited, you know, I know that's not the point but in beginning and so much trouble with corporate policies probably. But we just, you know, we just had this philosophy like let's try anything, you know, like let's try it, sure Great. Yeah, you know, if it works, it works. If it doesn't, it doesn't, we move on to the next thing.
Speaker 1:You know, so you have to.
Speaker 2:But yeah, it was. It was so in, you know, in my role now as a consultant and still working with private clubs, you know I always I have that experience under my belt and I'm so appreciative of everyone's time and you know their busy schedules. So, you know, just a couple of days ago somebody said oh gosh, you know I, I sorry I'm not going to be able to make that call. I'm like it's okay, it's all good, I know exactly. You know, you walk into the office, you think your day is going to go one way and a member comes in your office and your day goes completely select way. So that's just the nature of private clubs and that's what we love, right? No, two days are the same.
Speaker 1:And if they are Swooping is wrong.
Speaker 2:Really really wrong yeah.
Speaker 1:It's like when all the birds and animals start going away, it gets too quiet. Exactly.
Speaker 2:Exactly the kids. You know, if anyone has kids and all of a sudden they can't hear their kids, they know that they're, like you know, using magic marker on the walls or something.
Speaker 1:I never understood that until I got a dog. It's the same thing A little too quiet.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And all of a sudden you hear the pitter-patter.
Speaker 2:Fortunately my Phoebe. She loves to be right next to me, so she's not too far out of sight. So if she's quiet it's just because she's sleeping. Or you know, if she's not quiet then it's because she's having one of her weird doggy dreams where she's like like weird, no, it's just like something.
Speaker 1:The run-run.
Speaker 2:She's running a marathon at her tree, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I was just going to ask you something else, but then I just got a I was going to say was it about dogs?
Speaker 2:or was it about dreams?
Speaker 1:Phoebe. Now it's definitely about dogs. I can't remember though. Yeah, yeah, it'll come back to me. It looks like you have a Mickey Mouse ears on it does kind of with the globes.
Speaker 2:huh, I'll sit back a little bit, but now I just look like I have Martian ears. I didn't think that through.
Speaker 1:I've been staring at that the entire time.
Speaker 2:That's now I'm not in the center of the screen. Oh, that's true, it does look like I have.
Speaker 1:Now I've got just oh, just wait till this video goes out, it's going to be so good.
Speaker 2:Oh, when I say I am tuned in, it has a. I am in more ways than one who knew. You think those are globes. They're not really glo. They're more than just a globe on a bookcase.
Speaker 1:It's where you keep your tinfoil hats.
Speaker 2:Right, right behind these books here, yeah, good storage.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm at like inside the globe. It's like crap, that's.
Speaker 2:Hey, I wasn't going to share that secret, but sure, sure.
Speaker 1:Why do you think I have that like box back there Right Boom?
Speaker 2:Hats, hats. I'm not in this room, but I actually have a. Leave it to a member relations director, right? I don't know why I have. Well, no, I know why because when I lived in San Diego I've lived in Oregon now for four and a half years and when I lived in San Diego, my niece, who was much younger at the time she would come over for Lanaya and Auntie Shana weekend extravaganza. You know, that's what we'd always have, and we love to film videos. So I have a box full of like feather bowers and lays and hats and you know big glasses and all sorts of like props, and really it's because she and I used to film all these little silly videos. So it was really fun though, but so I still have them. I don't know why. Maybe I should have prepared better and, you know, put on the big, you know goofy glasses for something. I guess I had once a member relations director, always a member relations director. Never know when you might need a flower relay or a feather boa.
Speaker 1:Actually, the same can be said about magic too.
Speaker 2:Do you travel everywhere with your prop box?
Speaker 1:So I don't really have props. My props are like the audience, so I use like one or two tricks, like a deck of cards, books, just items all around, money, stuff like that.
Speaker 2:Do you keep? The money that you take from the.
Speaker 1:And I give to the no.
Speaker 2:Thank you for your donation this evening.
Speaker 1:I pretend to Right yeah.
Speaker 2:So you know, over this past year or so, I have taken a lot of the private clubs online programs and I have put them online so that they're kind of on demand you enroll and then you have access to all of the lessons. I've done that because I know that the private club pros are just so busy. You know it's really hard for people to find an hour to attend a live webinar or, you know, do a course, like through drip content or whatever. So I Last year launched the member communication masterclass, which is 10 core lessons and two bonus lessons. The member retention masterclass also 10 lessons 10 core lessons, two bonus. I just recently launched the Instagram masterclass Same thing, 10. We got a pattern here 10 core lessons and two bonus lessons. And then I have two mini courses create engaging content, which is that foundation we were talking about earlier, and strategic member communication and events, which helps. It walks you through how to plan your communication and then gives you just a ton of event ideas that you can easily execute in the club. And I'm about to launch I'm not exactly sure the schedule, it's a matter of getting it done is the food and beverage promotion mini course. Might not call it that, but along those lines, food and beverage. But the Instagram masterclass, yeah, it's really wonderful. It's for everybody. Really, even if you're a regular user, you feel like you're an advanced user of Instagram. You're still going to learn something new. If you're new to Instagram or you don't feel super confident using the platform, you're going to definitely learn a few things. It's really more geared toward. Here's some things that maybe you didn't know about Instagram, especially like analytics. Well, what should we look for in analytics? Or what does engagement mean on the Instagram platform? Like photo apps or video apps can I use to help create my content, something other than PANVA? So what content is best on this particular platform? So it's a really helpful masterclass. It's a really helpful course to polish up your skills, and then I always feel it's there. Once you enroll in the course, you're enrolled, you always have access to it. It's on demand, so take it when it's convenient for you. And then, listeners of Private Club Radio. If you use the code PCR23, yeah, you get 10% off your enrollment and that's for either individual courses or the bundles that I've put together. So I thoughtfully put together different courses that go together. So, like Instagram and create engaging content goes a little bit more in depth into the types of content that's great for clubs. So that's what I've got going on and I'm really it's going really well. I'm really excited to welcome folks. I'm excited to collaborate this year with them, with members first in our webinar series. It's been really wonderful. Sean and Katie are just a delight to work with and I'm just looking forward to helping clubs in whatever way I can, especially when it comes to member communication, member engagement and member retention. I just love it. So I know that clubs struggle in those areas a little bit, and put on my member relations hat and let's go.
Speaker 1:It's a big hat.
Speaker 2:It's a big hat with.
Speaker 1:No, because I watched how you put that.
Speaker 2:It's a big hat.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was a big Well, I guarantee you that the member relations directors or member events or member services.
Speaker 2:Folks are going heck yeah, it's a big hat. Now it's resonating.
Speaker 1:No, it's a very particular hat. I think it's a big hat but stiff and sturdy, because the way you held it and for the how far it was out your hands it's not a ball cap. I could see it was not a ball cap, but you can tell, because even just doing this, this is cowboy.
Speaker 2:Yes, no, this is the hat, and it is definitely stiff and sturdy and it has a bazillion decorations all over it because we'd bring the fun.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's where you lost me, but okay, the strategy and the fun, the event planners.
Speaker 2:Well, it's engagement, it's member engagement.
Speaker 1:The event planners mullet.
Speaker 2:I like that. The event planners mullet Too fun, too fun.
Speaker 1:I don't know if I'm going to use that for this episode. I don't know if that's a product that we're going to come out with, but the event planners.
Speaker 2:That would be great if you could fit that on a mug. Somehow have a member relations mug. That's the event planner mullet mug. I don't know where you would drink out of it.
Speaker 1:Hope you all enjoyed that. If you did, make sure you like subscribe, share with somebody who you think might also enjoy it. It really goes a long way. Check out Shana Bright on LinkedIn, as well as her website, privateclubsonlinecom. That's this episode. Until next time, catch you on the flippity flip.