Best advice to keep/get coworking space to full capcity

Marketing/Communications
1

I wanted to get some feedback from people working within the industry. I just started working at a coworking space in NYC, at a smaller space. My job is sales related and entails me getting the space filled and keeping it filled, as the office is now expanding from about 70 people enjoying our space to close to 250 in the next few months. My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now, so what would everybody recommend about getting it filled to 70 and then trying to get it to 100% capacity when we expand to 250. Thanks for any advice you can pass on how you all got people to sign up for memberships.

Quick note, I was told to do mass emails with a ton of small businesses.

Justin

2

An important question to ask is “what is the benefit that people get from coworking?”, and then sell that. Coworking by itself doesn’t sell.

Example: A big part of what we’ve done in a “sales” position at LaunchHouse is organize events that are of interest to the type of people we want in our space (developers, startup types, remote workers, etc). We’ve also focused on attending events where our customers gather and spreading the word that way.

  • James
···

On Monday, June 6, 2016, Justin Baron [email protected] wrote:

I wanted to get some feedback from people working within the industry. I just started working at a coworking space in NYC, at a smaller space. My job is sales related and entails me getting the space filled and keeping it filled, as the office is now expanding from about 70 people enjoying our space to close to 250 in the next few months. My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now, so what would everybody recommend about getting it filled to 70 and then trying to get it to 100% capacity when we expand to 250. Thanks for any advice you can pass on how you all got people to sign up for memberships.

Quick note, I was told to do mass emails with a ton of small businesses.

Justin

–

Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

–

  • James
    216.206.9338
3

Hey Justin, welcome to the list!

You’re in an interesting spot, here. Squishing “community management” and sales together might have a lot to do with why the previous people didn’t work out, so I can’t help but wonder exactly what expectations you’ve been given. Is it all about putting butts in seats? Does it matter whose butt? :slight_smile:

Most valuable thing you can do right now - before this big upcoming growth spurt - is to spend some time really working to understand why the community that already exists is there. Are they willing to be helpful to each other, ore more focused on their own work? What drew them together, besides needing a place to work? What stories of success can you learn?

Use what you learn to reverse engineer what makes this community tick, and what the members might want to see out of the upcoming growth. Make sure that aligns well with what your boss wants…and then, while you’re growing, focus all of your energy on encouraging the community to play an active role in that growth in ways that you know they’re already interested in (which you know, because you spent time working to understand them).

Just be careful - growth spurts can be extremely difficult on existing communities. Too often, growth becomes the goal that overshadows the community itself. Grow smart.

One of the most consistent HIDDEN patterns I’ve seen in the coworking spaces I’ve studied is that growth spurts are almost always followed by disproportionate increases in attrition. If the ratio of relationships to strangers lands out of whack, that generosity and willingness to help out is likely to be impacted.

In a lot of cases, this goes unnoticed (or is ignored) but over time creates a vicious cycle of turnover. New York, of all cities, is probably the easiest city to weather attrition because of the constant demand…but be prepared for this to impact the community that sets you apart from the others.

Growth is great, but make sure that everyone (new and existing) is still sharing goals and expectations. Keep your edge by keeping your community involved in the growth.

-Alex

···

On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 2:58 PM, James Gifford [email protected] wrote:

An important question to ask is “what is the benefit that people get from coworking?”, and then sell that. Coworking by itself doesn’t sell.

Example: A big part of what we’ve done in a “sales” position at LaunchHouse is organize events that are of interest to the type of people we want in our space (developers, startup types, remote workers, etc). We’ve also focused on attending events where our customers gather and spreading the word that way.

  • James

On Monday, June 6, 2016, Justin Baron [email protected] wrote:

I wanted to get some feedback from people working within the industry. I just started working at a coworking space in NYC, at a smaller space. My job is sales related and entails me getting the space filled and keeping it filled, as the office is now expanding from about 70 people enjoying our space to close to 250 in the next few months. My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now, so what would everybody recommend about getting it filled to 70 and then trying to get it to 100% capacity when we expand to 250. Thanks for any advice you can pass on how you all got people to sign up for memberships.

Quick note, I was told to do mass emails with a ton of small businesses.

Justin

–

Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

–

  • James
    216.206.9338

–

Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.

Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com

Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast

4

This:

My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now

bothers me. You are supposed to sign up something on the order of one a day, every day, for a couple months without any kind of support?

I am also a little curious also about the hard number: is that 250 irrespective of level of use of the physical space?

Anyway, the only way I know of to achieve 250 in a couple of months is to set up a sales funnel and move them on through. What’s your closing rate? I mean at 10% which is a nice round number, you have to have 250 (sales)/ .1 (success rate) = 2500 prospects X .25 (3 months selling cycle) = 625 prospects in funnel at any given time.

Those kinds of numbers require discipline and data. Not just for the sales but as Alex says, for the onboarding and integration into the existing.

It is an interesting challenge, really, but what kind of budget and/or resources do you have to work with?

5

Unfortunately things did not work out. As you all made mention, there was not anything that would done to help me succeed. As the trial finished up today and I was informed by my boss that things would not continue, she finally explained what the expectations were. Apparently without being told I was supposed to get at least 10-20 people in a two week span to come and tour the office space. My open rate for mass mail merges was not what she was looking for, and she stated other bs. All in all, it was a role that was not really an easy place to succeed in. I still really want to work for a coworking space in the NYC area, so onto the next one. But thank you for the advice as it was useful for me.

···

On Friday, June 10, 2016 at 8:24:35 AM UTC-4, Jeannine van der Linden wrote:

This:

My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now

bothers me. You are supposed to sign up something on the order of one a day, every day, for a couple months without any kind of support?

I am also a little curious also about the hard number: is that 250 irrespective of level of use of the physical space?

Anyway, the only way I know of to achieve 250 in a couple of months is to set up a sales funnel and move them on through. What’s your closing rate? I mean at 10% which is a nice round number, you have to have 250 (sales)/ .1 (success rate) = 2500 prospects X .25 (3 months selling cycle) = 625 prospects in funnel at any given time.

Those kinds of numbers require discipline and data. Not just for the sales but as Alex says, for the onboarding and integration into the existing.

It is an interesting challenge, really, but what kind of budget and/or resources do you have to work with?

6

Thanks for the update, Justin! Look out for a coworking space that seems to have more of a passion / mission focus; you’ll be less likely to encounter people wanting to treat it like a machine there.

Best of luck!

Tony

···

On Jun 15, 2016, at 1:39 PM, Justin Baron [email protected] wrote:

Unfortunately things did not work out. As you all made mention, there was not anything that would done to help me succeed. As the trial finished up today and I was informed by my boss that things would not continue, she finally explained what the expectations were. Apparently without being told I was supposed to get at least 10-20 people in a two week span to come and tour the office space. My open rate for mass mail merges was not what she was looking for, and she stated other bs. All in all, it was a role that was not really an easy place to succeed in. I still really want to work for a coworking space in the NYC area, so onto the next one. But thank you for the advice as it was useful for me.

On Friday, June 10, 2016 at 8:24:35 AM UTC-4, Jeannine van der Linden wrote:

This:

My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now

bothers me. You are supposed to sign up something on the order of one a day, every day, for a couple months without any kind of support?

I am also a little curious also about the hard number: is that 250 irrespective of level of use of the physical space?

Anyway, the only way I know of to achieve 250 in a couple of months is to set up a sales funnel and move them on through. What’s your closing rate? I mean at 10% which is a nice round number, you have to have 250 (sales)/ .1 (success rate) = 2500 prospects X .25 (3 months selling cycle) = 625 prospects in funnel at any given time.

Those kinds of numbers require discipline and data. Not just for the sales but as Alex says, for the onboarding and integration into the existing.

It is an interesting challenge, really, but what kind of budget and/or resources do you have to work with?

–

Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

7

Justin man!
That sucks!

Thanks for sharing - you are a better person for taking the time to ask advice and trying it out.

“mass email” is a wanky term to have to work with anyway - sounds like something out of a late 20th Century sales play book.

Best of luck in your next move :+1:

···

Have a remarkable day

Bernie J Mitchell

0777 204 2012

Are you listening to my podcast? www.berniejmitchell.com

Sent from my mobile device

*Unless we agree otherwise, this email conversation is confidential.

On Wed, Jun 15, 2016 at 8:39 pm, Justin Baron [email protected] wrote:

Unfortunately things did not work out. As you all made mention, there was not anything that would done to help me succeed. As the trial finished up today and I was informed by my boss that things would not continue, she finally explained what the expectations were. Apparently without being told I was supposed to get at least 10-20 people in a two week span to come and tour the office space. My open rate for mass mail merges was not what she was looking for, and she stated other bs. All in all, it was a role that was not really an easy place to succeed in. I still really want to work for a coworking space in the NYC area, so onto the next one. But thank you for the advice as it was useful for me.

On Friday, June 10, 2016 at 8:24:35 AM UTC-4, Jeannine van der Linden wrote:

This:

My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now

bothers me. You are supposed to sign up something on the order of one a day, every day, for a couple months without any kind of support?

I am also a little curious also about the hard number: is that 250 irrespective of level of use of the physical space?

Anyway, the only way I know of to achieve 250 in a couple of months is to set up a sales funnel and move them on through. What’s your closing rate? I mean at 10% which is a nice round number, you have to have 250 (sales)/ .1 (success rate) = 2500 prospects X .25 (3 months selling cycle) = 625 prospects in funnel at any given time.

Those kinds of numbers require discipline and data. Not just for the sales but as Alex says, for the onboarding and integration into the existing.

It is an interesting challenge, really, but what kind of budget and/or resources do you have to work with?

–

Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

8

Justin, that your open rate for mass mail merges was too low, would be a reccommendation in some places. :slight_smile: Look for those,

It is never fun when things don’t work out, but in the long run you know are better off somewhere else. Thanks for coming back and keep us posted!

Best,

Jeannine

···

On Wednesday, June 15, 2016 at 9:41:20 PM UTC+2, Justin Baron wrote:

Unfortunately things did not work out. As you all made mention, there was not anything that would done to help me succeed. As the trial finished up today and I was informed by my boss that things would not continue, she finally explained what the expectations were. Apparently without being told I was supposed to get at least 10-20 people in a two week span to come and tour the office space. My open rate for mass mail merges was not what she was looking for, and she stated other bs. All in all, it was a role that was not really an easy place to succeed in. I still really want to work for a coworking space in the NYC area, so onto the next one. But thank you for the advice as it was useful for me.

On Friday, June 10, 2016 at 8:24:35 AM UTC-4, Jeannine van der Linden wrote:

This:

My boss hasn’t given me any advice necessarily on how she got the space filled to full capacity now

bothers me. You are supposed to sign up something on the order of one a day, every day, for a couple months without any kind of support?

I am also a little curious also about the hard number: is that 250 irrespective of level of use of the physical space?

Anyway, the only way I know of to achieve 250 in a couple of months is to set up a sales funnel and move them on through. What’s your closing rate? I mean at 10% which is a nice round number, you have to have 250 (sales)/ .1 (success rate) = 2500 prospects X .25 (3 months selling cycle) = 625 prospects in funnel at any given time.

Those kinds of numbers require discipline and data. Not just for the sales but as Alex says, for the onboarding and integration into the existing.

It is an interesting challenge, really, but what kind of budget and/or resources do you have to work with?