How St. Johns Regional Audubon Doubled Its Membership With Join It

St. Johns Regional Audubon, a volunteer-led conservation chapter in Northeast Florida, grew from around 500 members to more than 1,000 active members in under seven years using Join It as its membership database. Join It gave the chapter one place to manage both nationally assigned and local-only members, automated dues payments and newsletter sign-ups, and kept the current, alphabetized membership list the organization is required to maintain.

At a glance

Who is St. Johns Regional Audubon?

St. Johns Regional Audubon is a grassroots conservation organization protecting birds and their habitats across St. Johns County and parts of Putnam County, Florida. Founded in 1979, the chapter runs bird walks, educational programs, field trips, conservation initiatives and advocacy work throughout the year.

Everything is run by volunteers. That single fact shapes every decision the chapter makes about software: whatever it adopts has to be learnable by a rotating board and maintainable in a few hours a month.

The chapter has used Join It since 2019 to manage its growing and increasingly complex membership operations.

What problem was the chapter trying to solve?

Short answer: the chapter had two kinds of members arriving through two different routes, and no single place to see them. That produced duplicate records, out-of-date data and regular manual cleanup — on top of a membership list the organization is required by Florida nonprofit record-keeping rules to keep current and alphabetized.

Two membership routes, two sources of truth

As part of the wider National Audubon Society network, the chapter receives members who are assigned to it nationally. It also signs up local-only members who join directly. Before Join It, those two groups lived in different places, which meant membership records were fragmented, data went stale, and someone had to reconcile it all by hand.

If you have ever tried to keep this kind of split membership current in a spreadsheet, the shape of the problem will be familiar — it is the same one we cover in our guide to building a membership database in Excel, and the point at which most organizations start looking for something else.

A membership list that has to stay accurate

Florida nonprofit regulations require the organization to maintain a current, alphabetized membership list. With members spread across different categories and records managed in spreadsheets, keeping that list defensible became a real administrative burden for a volunteer team.

Growth made it harder, not easier

The challenge grew as the chapter expanded into an additional county and updated its organizational structure. More members and more categories meant more manual reconciliation — the classic point where an organization either finds better tooling or quietly stops growing.

How did Join It solve it?

Join It became the chapter's central membership management software: one source of truth across local and national membership records. The team used it to upload and manage existing spreadsheets, track overlapping membership categories, automate communications and cut out repetitive manual work.

Amy S. Koch, President of St. Johns Regional Audubon, relies on Join It heavily for data management and segmentation.

"I probably use Join It more than any of our other software programs. I'm on it 10 to 15 hours a month, cleaning things up and slicing and dicing the data for different reasons."

— Amy S. Koch, President

The Mailchimp connection removed a duplicate step the team had been doing for years.

"That saves a tremendous amount of time. I'm not doing two functions anymore. I'm only doing one."

— Amy S. Koch, President

If newsletter sign-ups are a manual job at your organization too, our walkthrough on syncing a membership database with Mailchimp covers how the connection works.

What results did the chapter see?

• Membership participation grew from around 500 members to more than 1,000 active members
• The chapter now manages a combined database of more than 2,300 current and past members
• The Mailchimp integration removed duplicate data entry for volunteers
• Membership records stay current and organized, supporting the list the organization is required to keep
• Volunteers spend more time on conservation and community programs, and less on spreadsheet management

"To grow an organization like this, you've got to have software that keeps up with you. Join It does that."

— Amy S. Koch, President

That pattern — steady growth once admin stops being the bottleneck — shows up across our other customer stories, including how Washington Clay Arts scaled from 400 to 950 members.

What this case study tells you about choosing membership software

If you are a volunteer-led organization evaluating options, the useful takeaway is not "buy this." It is that a small number of criteria decided the outcome here. These are worth taking into your own shortlist.

For a wider view of the market, our roundups of the best membership management software and the best software for nonprofits compare options side by side.

Is Join It the right fit for your organization?

Join It is usually a strong fit if you are a club, chapter, association or nonprofit between roughly 100 and a few thousand members, your admins are volunteers or a small staff, and your main goals are getting off spreadsheets, automating dues and renewals, and keeping accurate member records. Plans start under $29 a month, which keeps it realistic for organizations funding software out of membership dues.

Join It works particularly well for charities and nonprofits, professional associations and hobby and social clubs, and it supports multi-chapter organizations that need local and national records in one place.

Another solution may suit you better if you need deep accreditation or credentialing workflows, complex committee and governance management, an integrated learning management system, or a full CRM built around major-gift fundraising. Those are the territory of heavier association management systems, and it is better to know that before a trial than after. If that is you, the honest answer is that a simpler platform will feel like a constraint.

The fastest way to find out which camp you are in is to run a real membership cycle in a free trial — sign up as a member yourself, take a payment, and see what your own renewal reminder looks like.

Frequently asked questions

What membership software do nonprofit chapters use?

Chapters of national organizations need software that can hold both nationally assigned members and local-only members in one database while reporting on them separately. St. Johns Regional Audubon uses Join It for exactly this, alongside dues collection and newsletter automation.

Can Join It manage members who join through a national organization as well as local members?

Yes. Both groups sit in one Join It membership database, tracked by membership category, so the chapter gets one accurate list without losing the distinction between the two groups.

Does Join It integrate with Mailchimp?

Yes. Join It syncs with Mailchimp, so members with an email address can be added to newsletter lists automatically instead of being copied across by hand.

Can we import our existing membership spreadsheet?

Yes. St. Johns Regional Audubon uploaded and continues to manage its existing spreadsheet data in Join It, so no membership history was lost in the move.

How much does Join It cost?

Join It starts under $29 a month, with pricing based on the size of your membership. There is a free trial, so you can test a full sign-up and payment flow before committing.

Can Join It help us keep a membership list that meets state nonprofit requirements?

Join It keeps member records centralized and current, which is what makes an accurate, alphabetized membership list straightforward to produce. Requirements vary by state, so check your own obligations — Join It gives you the records, not legal advice.

Is Join It suitable for an all-volunteer organization?

It is one of the most common situations Join It is used in. The platform is built to be simple enough for rotating volunteer admins, with automatic renewal reminders and recurring billing handling the repetitive work.

A trusted partner for volunteer-led organizations

For volunteer-run nonprofits and associations, reducing administrative complexity is what makes growth sustainable. Join It gives organizations like St. Johns Regional Audubon the tools to manage memberships professionally, automate routine tasks and grow without adding to the workload.

"For a small organization run by volunteers, having a software program like Join It makes our life a lot easier. We've been very happy with it."

— Amy S. Koch, President

If your organization wants membership software that cuts admin time, keeps member records accurate and supports steady growth, book a demo or start a free trial with Join It today.