Resource attraction and marketing by associations

Resources for a nonprofit are understood to mean money, people, plant, technology, and brand/reputation. Unless otherwise stated, nonprofits are here taken to include the full range from volunteer-run/volunteer-led, small grassroots associations through to very large, paid-staff-dominated nonprofit agencies (cf. Smith 2015a, 2015b). Handbook Chapters 38, 40-44, and 46-50 consider major input and process issues of membership associations operating in the nonprofit sector, with some attention also to volunteer service programs as departments of larger, parent organizations (cf. Handbook Chaxspters 15 and 16). All are challenging, but resource attraction and maintenance are particularly crucial issues, given the intense competition for resources among associations, as for all nonprofits. This chapter looks at resource attraction through a marketing theory lens. The resources of nonprofits are finance, people (paid, partially paid, and voluntary/unpaid), physicals (buildings, plant, etc.), and reputation/brand. For most nonprofits, the first three resources are in short supply, and the last one is ambiguous in its meaning to different stakeholders and is costly and time consuming to manage.