Try Now

Sioux Falls Area Running Club

How this club can focus on running instead of running its organization

330+ contacts

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Statistics 1

75% membership growth after 3 years of using WildApricot

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Statistics 2

175+ active members

Connecting runners in Sioux Falls

Sioux Falls Area Running Club (SFARC) is a local nonprofit running club, encouraging running and walking for everyone in the Sioux Falls community and surrounding area. SFARC runs a variety of activities, including connecting runners and walkers in the community through organized group runs and social events, hosting races, putting on free youth cross-country races to introduce youth to the sport, volunteering at races, and giving back to its community through volunteer work.

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Connecting 1

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Connecting 2

I love how my job is constantly changing. I get to work with people from coast to coast, not only in Canada but also on an international level. Everyone is united by a common goal, which is to support job seekers and help employment specialists to do their job better.

– Nicole MacDonald, Director of New Initiatives

Challenges prior to using WildApricot

An Excel nightmare

SFARC was relatively small, and one person was managing everything. Membership was tracked on an Excel spreadsheet but managing membership information that way long term was unrealistic. The club had some turnover and computer problems and lost a lot of membership data — and decided that it needed to automate the membership process.

Solution

Tracking and engaging members

Tracking membership is the most used WildApricot feature for the running club. Other frequently used features include emails for sending out newsletters, promoting events, and recruiting volunteers.

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Solution 1

Using the automated email features

With WildApricot’s automated email features, members are notified a few days before their next renewal date. Before WildApricot, members likely had their memberships lapse simply because they didn’t know when they needed to renew and didn’t think about it.

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Solution 2

Giving away membership cards for discounts

SFARC also provides membership cards through WildApricot. It partners with local stores, who give members a discount when members show them their membership cards.

Sioux Falls Area Running Club - Solution 3

Top Features:

Member management
Email management
Event management
Online payments

Results

Running events with ease

By improving its management and reducing the admin work thanks to WildApricot, the running club can now host monthly social events with ease. The turnout for SFARC's events has been consistently strong: around a dozen participants for smaller events and between 20-40 people for larger events.

With WildApricot, we have been better able to keep track of our contacts—before we had them on spreadsheets and often lost contacts. Improving our management helped increase our membership, as we can accomplish more and allocate more resources to promoting our club and events.

Before using WildApricot, Sioux Falls Area Running Club had around 100 members. After three years of using this platform, the running club reached over 175 active members, with 300 contacts in its database. With its membership growth, the club could generate more revenue and do more for its community.

Any advice for other nonprofits?

When we asked SFARC for advice, one takeaway was the importance of reviewing your membership levels to optimize operations; this is especially important for volunteer-run nonprofits like SFARC, where having a manageable and affordable process is essential for it to remain self-sufficient.

Try to increase your membership and bring in more than your expenses. It's worth reviewing your membership levels. You don’t want to lose touch with people that may renew their membership. For us, if the revenue coming in from memberships at least covers our expenses, then we can be self-sustaining.