NRL boss Dave Smith has outlined his plan to double club membership numbers by 2017 as part of what he has called a ''massive cultural shift'' across the code. ''It's the biggest single thing the game's done, in terms of members, ever,'' Smith told Fairfax Media on Thursday. ''And it won't just be a one-off.''

The plan, which has the backing of the 16 clubs, comes in two parts; a short-term push for a membership spike in 2014, before the longer-term effort; doubling the current number of roughly 220,000 members across the clubs would create, he estimated, about $50 million.

Dave Smith is planning a "massive cultural shift". Credit:Anthony Johnson

''I'm more ambitious than that, but I think that doubling the membership base in three or four years is a big enough task, so that's where we'll start,'' Smith said.

''It's a significant shift in the way that culturally we think about it. Fans and members - we want them to feel a real part of what we do, to understand what we do and have feedback on what we do. Members are really important to us, and that'll permeate across the game. If you keep doing the same thing, you keep getting the same results.