I don't disagree that geographically dispersed members are valuable to the club.
The point I was trying to make was that the FFA were banging on about how our membership numbers were much lower than other clubs and how we need to improve but that membership numbers by themselves aren't a useful gauge of anything. Case in point is the introduction of new membership categories like the NSW or northern options - if we get an extra 500 members for example we can say that we've had a 10% increase in members, but if every one of those new members was already engaged with the club and attending games then nothing has fundamentally changed at a commercial level. You've just changed the label for a group of fans who already existed. Likewise, comparing membership numbers across the league doesn't tell you anything if membership categories vary wildly.