Lifelong learning organizations are always challenged convincing their central administration to invest and provide resources to help the lifelong learning organization grow participation and/or revenue.
The following are the three industry benchmarks having the greatest impact on generating central administration support:
1. Staff Productivity Number. By dividing the fee-based revenue you generate by the number of full-time equivalent staff supporting revenue generation (for example, $500,000/4 = $125,000) you can demonstrate the impact adding another staff person would have on revenue growth. The industry benchmark is $125,000 with successful organizations are between $150,000 and $250,000. Some smaller or more rural lifelong learning organizations have a staff productivity number ranging between $75,000-$125,000. If your staff productivity number is for example $195,000, you certainly can recommend that adding another staff person will increase revenue by at least $195,000.
2. Promotion Monies and Print Promotion Ratio. Successful lifelong learning organizations budget 10 percent of their budget for promotion (monies used to generate registrations and revenue, such as print and digital marketing expenses). So for every dollar spent on promotion you want to generate $10 in revenue. They also strive to get the best ratio possible for their print promotions to the number of registrations generated. Ideally a lifelong learning organization with a diversified catalog of offerings strives for a ratio of 50:1 or less. If you are getting 10:1 on your promotion dollars and/or your print promotion:registration ratio is less than 50:1, you can recommend spending more money on promotion will generate more participation and revenue.
3. Repeat Rate. Successful lifelong learning organizations have a repeat rate of 30-50 percent. You determine your repeat rate by dividing the people who registered in one period of time (normally a year) and repeated into a second period of time (normally a year) by the total number of people who registered during the first period time (300/900 = 33%). A repeat rate of 30-50 percent demonstrates participants are pleased with quality, customer service, and offerings. A strong repeat rate normally means more revenue and a better bottom-line. If you are generating a repeat rate between 30-50 percent, you can recommend spending more money for marketing, staffing and new offerings will increase participation an/or revenue.
Central administration responds better to numbers, so going forward use one or more of the above numbers to justify your need for additional resources.