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I have several consultant friends who work in the association biz. A lot of them joke about how all association executives think their members are so unique -- as if there is no group of people in the world quite like "our members." But are we really so different than the members we serve?

Two recent conversations have caused me to re-think how I perceive our association's members as different from me. A few weeks ago I was doing member visits with a man who's currently serving on our executive committee. As I drove him around the city, he told me that many of his wealthiest clients were self-made real estate moguls, buying up properties in a most unscientific manner. One client in particular evaluated properties based almost entirely on whether or not he would be willing to live there himself. If he felt he would be willing to live in that house, so too, he reasoned, would a bunch of other people.

Closer to home, I participated in a cross-departmental team meeting recently to discuss implementing an automatic dues renewal process. We had already established that everyone in the room was paying some bills on an automatic withdrawal system. As we were approaching consensus, two of my colleagues suggested that we poll our members to see if they'd be willing to opt in to the new program. At this point I chimed in, saying, "Look, if we're paying our bills in this way, why do we think our members wouldn't? I know this might sound heretical, but our members are a lot like us!"

Then it dawned on me. In our well-intentioned efforts to reduce risk, we sometimes go off on wild goose chases, trying to make absolutely certain that our memberships will accept new programs. We take the long road to our ultimate decision by trying to back up our premonitions about what will succeed with hard data. Trouble is, research can never truly eliminate this risk. Sorry to break it to you, but no matter what your data says, there's always a chance that your programs just won't stick due to sub-par implementation or factors beyond your control.

I don't advocate a retreat from research, but there are times when it's both expedient and appropriate to abandon primary research in favor of applying secondary research, and your gut instincts about it, to your membership as a short cut. Determining what kinds of content to offer your membership at the annual meeting is probably not one of those times. But determining if your members would be willing to renew their dues in monthly installments probably is.

Twelve percent of Internet users have downloaded a podcast. If your members are Internet users, then it's not a stretch to assume that approximately 12% of your members are listening to podcasts. What else do we know about your members? Well, they drive Toyotas, shop at Target, drink Starbucks, watch too much television, expect to be able to find stuff quickly on your homepage, write blogs, have downtime waiting for the subway, like to be both educated and entertained at meetings, and are more passionate about their hobbies, friends and families than they are about work. You don't have to ask them to determine this. You can extrapolate it from other research.

Members are not so different than us. So here's the question: How much effort do you expend basically verifying that your members are just like everyone else?