Happy World Spreadsheet Day!

Today marks 38 years since the first spreadsheet program began and it’s hard to imagine online membership management without Excel or Google Sheet. On World Spreadsheet Day, we celebrate all that the spreadsheet has given membership management, but also celebrate the next evolution - Member Jungle.

On October 17 1979, Dan Bricklin sat in a lecture hall at Harvard Business School and wrote the first app for personal computers. An electronic spreadsheet application called VisiCalc (short for ‘visible calculator’).

In that moment, the modern world was changed forever. Spreadsheets have since been applied to everything from surgical decisions (gulp!) to billion-dollar banking decisions.

Microsoft Excel has transformed how records, plans, contact lists and budgets are kept, as well as improved tracking and management. It saved people time and revolutionised number-crunching, record-keeping and forecasting. 

For membership-based organisations - from surf-life-saving clubs to science societies, marketing institutes to medical associations - it was a game-changer in keeping track of membership and helping to save time. 

In today's society, people are even more short on time. Who has time for 25 hours on administrative tasks? Now people want instant access and up-to-date records they can access from anywhere. 

Many people are now leaving Excel behind and turning to online and cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) and corporate performance management (CPM) tools.

For membership officers that feel like the sight of grids and cells sends them cross-eyed, Member Jungle is the next evolution - also providing an awesome dashboard and interface to help make membership management easier. You only have to look at a spreadsheet if you want to.

Membership is all managed through a central point, rather than a number of different platforms like Excel, MailChimp and Eventbrite.

As it is cloud-based and mobile, it gives freedom from the PC. Even better - responsibility can be shared, with all administrators able to access up-to-date crucial data and contacts anywhere, anytime. 

If you’re interested in finding out how Member Jungle can take you to the next step, automate tasks, save time and money and change the way you run your club, society and association, visit www.memberjungle.com.au to sign up for a free trial.