Beyond Transactions: Building a Thriving Supporter Community with Salesforce

How Attractions, Zoos, Museums, and Aquariums Can Foster Deeper Engagement and Loyalty

The Loyalty Illusion: Why Members Might Not Be Your Most Engaged Supporters

It’s the first Saturday of the month, and your parking lot is packed. Ticket lines stretch outside your entrance. Members flash their passes and rush through, eager to start their visit. You should feel great about this, right? Revenue is flowing, attendance is strong.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth: Most of those visitors will come and go without a second thought. Sure, some will re-up their memberships next year, but are they really engaged? Do they feel a deeper connection to your institution’s mission?

For years, zoos, museums, aquariums, and attractions have relied on a transactional relationship with their visitors, selling tickets, memberships, and (hopefully) securing a few one-time donations from the masses. It’s predictable. It’s straightforward. But, organizations can and should be doing.

In a world where brands can cultivate fierce loyalty with personalized experiences, exclusive content, and community-driven engagement, institutions like yours can’t afford to treat their most passionate supporters like anonymous customers.

That’s where Salesforce and a digital-first engagement strategy come in.

The Problem: Transactions Don’t Build Communities

If you’re relying on ticket sales and memberships alone, you’re missing a massive opportunity.

Consider these industry-wide challenges:

• Low renewal rates. How often do you see members vanish after their first year?

• One-and-done donors. If someone contributed once but never again, was that really a success?

• Missed advocacy potential. Passionate supporters want to do more than visit, they want to share, contribute, and champion your cause.

When your focus is on selling things, you optimize for short-term revenue instead of long-term relationships. But the institutions thriving today aren’t just pushing transactions. They’re building communities.

It starts with a shift in mindset: Your most valuable audience members aren’t just visitors or donors. They’re advocates, ambassadors, and insiders,if you engage them strategically.

Step One: Use Salesforce to Actually Know Your Biggest Fans

The difference between a casual visitor and a lifelong supporter - Engagement.

Salesforce gives you the tools to track who is engaging with your institution, how they’re engaging, and what will resonate with them next.

A basic CRM (customer relationship management) platform collects email addresses and tracks donations. But a system like Salesforce helps you understand your audience at a deeper level by:

✅ Segmenting visitors based on behavior. Are they attending events? Downloading educational resources? Volunteering? Salesforce can show you patterns.

✅ Predicting future engagement. If someone visits quarterly and donates twice a year, odds are, they’re primed for deeper involvement with the right nudge.

✅ Personalizing outreach. A one-size-fits-all email blast feels impersonal. But a tailored message, offering a conservation enthusiast a behind-the-scenes look at your animal care program, creates a true connection.

Most institutions don’t use their data effectively. They collect tons of it but fail to translate insights into action. By not going deeper into the data, you’re leaving massive value on the table.

Step Two: Ditch the Generic Membership Perks, Give Them Something Meaningful

Most membership perks are, well...boring and under utilized. Discounts on gift shop items? Free parking? Is that it?

If you want to forge genuine loyalty, offer experiences and access that feel exclusive and high value.

Here’s how to leverage Salesforce to curate VIP experiences for your most engaged supporters:

🎟 Invite-only events. Use CRM data to identify high-potential advocates and offer them behind-the-scenes tours, conservation meetups, or artist Q&As.

📩 Surprise-and-delight moments. Send a personalized video message from a zookeeper to a donor who contributed to an animal’s care. Automate this in Salesforce for scale, without losing the personal touch.

🌎 Community-driven groups. Tap into Salesforce Experience Cloud to create special-interest forums (like an ocean preservation group for aquarium supporters). Give them space to connect and contribute year-round.

The goal isn’t just to keep members renewing, it’s to make them feel like insiders. If your best supporters feel like they belong to something bigger, their loyalty will extend far beyond an annual pass.

Step Three: Help Supporters Contribute in Meaningful Ways

People don’t just want to be passive visitors. They want to participate in something impactful.

Too many institutions treat fundraising as an afterthought when, in reality, your biggest supporters want to contribute if you give them the right opportunities.

A Salesforce-powered engagement strategy can help by:

🔁 Making donations part of bigger missions. Don’t just ask for money, connect contributions to specific initiatives (e.g., "Your $50 donation funds a week of food for our rescued sea turtles.")

🙌 Turning visitors into ambassadors. Use peer-to-peer fundraising tools to empower supporters to fundraise for you. With Salesforce, you can track which campaigns are resonating and provide automated encouragement.

🤝 Streamlining volunteer programs. Let’s be honest, volunteer management at most institutions is still an administrative nightmare. Salesforce automates scheduling, reminders, and engagement tracking, making it easier to keep your most committed supporters involved.

The best part? The more someone contributes, whether through time, money, or fundraising, the stronger their emotional connection to your institution becomes.

Step Four: Build a Digital Space for Your Most Engaged Supporters

Most institutions rely too much on email marketing and social media to engage their audiences. While these tools are useful, they don’t foster deep, lasting community connections.

Instead of fighting for attention in a crowded inbox, why not create a dedicated space for your most engaged supporters?

With Salesforce Experience Cloud, you can build a digital hub where:

📢 Superfans can connect. Give your biggest supporters a place to engage, with exclusive discussions, mission updates, and peer-led conversations.

💡 Ideas flow both ways. Want feedback on a new exhibit? Looking for input on conservation initiatives? Use community forums to let engaged members feel heard.

🏆 Rewards keep people active. Gamify contributions with participation badges, milestone recognition, and real-world perks for active community members.

The key here? Make engagement habitual. If supporters log in regularly, even when they’re not physically visiting, you’ve built something powerful.

Step Five: Measure, Adapt, and Scale What Works

Building a thriving supporter community isn’t a one-and-done effort. It requires constant iteration.

With Salesforce dashboards and analytics, you can track:

📊 Engagement trends. Are event attendees returning? Which emails drive the most action?

📈 Loyalty indicators. How many members are upgrading to higher tiers? How many donors contribute annually?

🔄 Optimization opportunities. Noticing a drop in volunteer participation? Identify where engagement is slipping and refine your outreach.

Data is only valuable if you act on it. The institutions that use Salesforce best aren’t just collecting metrics, they’re adjusting strategies based on what the numbers reveal.

The Challenge: Stop Selling, Start Building

The institutions that thrive in the digital era won’t just be the best at selling tickets. They’ll be the ones that excel at fostering real, lasting relationships.

Salesforce won’t magically build your supporter community, you have to be intentional. But it will give you the tools to understand your audience better, personalize engagement, and turn casual visitors into committed advocates.

So here’s my challenge to you: Stop thinking in transactions. Start thinking in connections.

Your visitors already love what you do. Now, invite them to be a part of something bigger.

Are you ready?