YourMembership
NOVEMBER 2, 2012
Categories: Membership Management Tags: database , Friday Fix , member data Membership, marketing, volunteer center, donor management — whatever your titles are, whatever areas you target or serve, do your organization a favor today and share your list. Take the time to create one list, housed in one database to maximize your reach and minimize member inconvenience.
Wild Apricot
NOVEMBER 7, 2012
If your organization is just getting started with fundraising event planning, here are some fresh ideas to ensure your event is effective in raising awareness and funds.
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Association Leaders
NOVEMBER 6, 2012
I recently came across an online article about, what else, leadership. This wasn’t the typical leadership article however. This article focused on the five behaviors great leaders typically have. Instead of focusing on values in these leaders or on actions these leaders commonly take, this article focused on behaviors. I was very interested in this concept and wasn’t disappointed in the result.
Thanks For Playing
NOVEMBER 26, 2012
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to present on the topic Attention Doesn't Scale: The Role of Content Curation in Membership Associations for the Indiana Society of Association Executives. As a component of that presentation, and with Jeff De Cagna 's advice and assistance, I wrote a white paper on the same topic. This week, I'm going to be blogging about what's in the white paper.
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Aaron Wolowiec
NOVEMBER 27, 2012
It’s the age-old dilemma: You’re looking for a quality speaker with a good message and a dynamic stage presence who will be well-received by your members. And, by the way, could this person present for free – or, at the very least, for a significantly reduced honorarium? In my experience, there are generally two types of speakers: Those who recycle the same three to five presentations from conference to conference with little (if any) customization; and.
Association Universe brings together the best content for association members and organizers from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
YourMembership
NOVEMBER 8, 2012
Categories: Membership Management Tags: engaging members , humanize , jamie notter , member community , webinar For organizations a fear of failure is one of the most common obstacles to innovation. Many organizations are so paralyzed by the fear of failure they have tied their future success to their past actions: “We’ve been successful thus far doing exactly what we’ve done, so why do anything differently?
Wild Apricot
NOVEMBER 26, 2012
Here's our round-up of free nonprofit webinars scheduled for December 2012. This month’s topics include: e-strategy; perfect phrases for fundraising; nonprofit sustainability; the mobile revolution; engaging supporters with video; and much more.
Association Leaders
NOVEMBER 26, 2012
If you are anything like me, you keep copies of way too many emails. You may have many folders and subfolders to organize them for easy access. You probably also rarely empty your deleted items and sent items folders. As a result, your email inbox is probably VERY LARGE. The bigger your email inbox, the more inefficient your computer (and especially your mail program) will run.
Thanks For Playing
NOVEMBER 12, 2012
Do you ever do conference calls? (duh - of course you do) Do you get tired of playing "who has the 800 number?" with the other participants? (don't we all?) Have you tried Speek yet? It's a FREE service that is web/VoIP based - but you can use a regular phone to participate - and allows you to create a personalized link you can share to conduct a conference call anywhere, any time.
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Ever wonder why brands like Apple, LEGO, and Sephora are going all-in on branded communities? It’s because online community building is the secret sauce to connecting with audiences in ways that ads and emails simply can’t. But here's the best part—it’s not just for big corporations. Associations can create thriving online communities too. GrowthZone’s eBook, "The Power of Community," breaks down exactly why a branded online community can be a game-changer for your association.
Aaron Wolowiec
NOVEMBER 8, 2012
The call comes in. A prospective client needs you – immediately! – to help with an urgent project. They’re unclear how to resolve the issue, but they believe you can help. Simply draft a proposal describing you’re recommended course of action and be sure to include your proposed fees. Days – sometimes weeks – later, they’ve curiously decided to complete the project themselves.
Reid All About it
NOVEMBER 16, 2012
In one corner, a company that made a mess of customer service and then made it worse with social media. A moving company threatened to sue my friend’s wife because she wrote a negative Yelp review about them. The company also purchased positive Yelp reviews, deleted negative Facebook updates, and doesn’t seem to know how to dig itself out except by digging deeper.
YourMembership
NOVEMBER 20, 2012
Categories: Member Engagement + Retention Tags: appreciation , member retention , volunteers Why do I call it an art? There’s no art behind being thankful. Anyone can do it, right? Anyone can be thankful but expressing the thanks in a meaningful way (to the recipient) is an art. In this case I’m not talking about the medium, I’m referring to the message.
Wild Apricot
NOVEMBER 9, 2012
Here are 5 fresh links we've bookmarked on Apricot Jam this week - from tips on fundraising after a disaster, to dressing up boring news to the fate of associations.
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Association Leaders
NOVEMBER 19, 2012
We often discuss in this blog that companies are like teams. Successful teams have strategic and inspiring coaching; efficient and hard-working playing and outrageous fans. I submit to you that companies have those same traits – strategic and inspiring CEOs; efficient and hard-working employees; and outrageous customers. (At least we hope our customers are outrageous about the products and services we deliver them).
Thanks For Playing
NOVEMBER 30, 2012
It's the final day of whitepaper release week, which means it's time to focus on what associations can do about the problem of information overload to better serve our members. From my new whitepaper, Attention Doesn't Scale: The Role of Content Curation in Membership Associations : Content curation provides a potential path to a new type of thought leadership, one that is more suited to a world where information is no longer the scarce resource.
Aaron Wolowiec
NOVEMBER 5, 2012
Jennifer Sweet, CMP. This post is authored by guest blogger Jennifer Sweet, CMP. Jennifer is owner and lead coordinator of JS Event Consulting. Email: jseventconsulting.com. Throughout my years of event coordinating, that is a question I have been asked time and time again: “What is the key to a successful event?” A successful event? How do you really know what ratio of components equals a success?
Reid All About it
NOVEMBER 2, 2012
The morning after Sandy hit I read a post by John Herrman about how we use Twitter during disasters. “Twitter’s capacity to spread false information is more than canceled out by its savage self-correction. In response to thousands of retweets of erroneous Weather Channel and CNN reports that the New York Stock Exchange had been flooded with “three feet” of water, Twitter users, some reporters and many not, were relentless: photos of the outside of the building, flood-free, were posted.
Speaker: Radhika Samant and Todd Wuestenberg
Employee recognition has often been deemed a "feel-good" initiative, tied closely to rewards. While we understand its importance, we tend to associate recognition with intangible outcomes like engagement and sentiment, rather than direct impacts on retention and high performance. In today’s workplace, the true ROI of recognition lies in its ability to regenerate tangible, business-driven results.
YourMembership
NOVEMBER 16, 2012
Categories: Membership Management , Social Media and Business Trends Tags: Friday Fix , innovation , member organizations Proceed until apprehended — one of my favorite lines from our recent webinar with Jamie Notter. (If you missed it, you can must view it.) As Jamie explained, this phrase is a little softer version of “Act now, apologize later.” Many member organizations are structured with appropriate sign-offs and an adherence to protocol.
Wild Apricot
NOVEMBER 21, 2012
Volunteers are essential to helping organizations meet their mission. But did you know that volunteers, especially skilled volunteers, are twice as likely to give as well?
Association Leaders
NOVEMBER 14, 2012
“Thank you” are two of the most powerful words in any language. Saying ‘thank you’ shows respect to a person and acknowledges them for a job well done. To great leaders, saying ‘thank you’ is natural – especially in their personal lives. They thank people for holding doors, for delivering packages, for providing a lending hand – even for saying ‘thank you’ Great business leaders also frequently say ‘thank you’ in their busi
Thanks For Playing
NOVEMBER 15, 2012
Back in June, Leslie White ( Croydon Consulting ) and I presented a session for ASAE's Finance and Business Operations Conference (FHRBOC). It was a simulation on risk management. We had assumed, given that it was a room full of accountants, that everyone would a common understanding of, and language around, risk. Boy, were we wrong. And it got us thinking: when senior teams are trying to make decisions together, do they suffer from the same problem?
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Association Subculture
NOVEMBER 15, 2012
I ran across the latest mini-film by Tiffany Shlain and am (once again) blown away by her. Here is the video link for those who can't see the embed - BRAIN Power: From Neurons to Networks. Here is a link to the post she wrote on HBR - How the Internet is Shaping our "Global Brain.". I think it's valuable for us to take a step back every once in a while and look at the wider picture.
KiKi L'Italien's Acronym Soup
NOVEMBER 21, 2012
We had a fabulous discussion about gratitude yesterday on Association Chat and if you missed it, you are probably kicking yourself. But never fear! The whole convo was captured using Storify and you can feel like you were actually there by visiting the post on "Saying Thanks to Members" -- I promise you, you'll get at least one good idea on showing your members gratitude if you take the time to look through the commentary.
YourMembership
NOVEMBER 13, 2012
Categories: Social Media and Business Trends Tags: innovation , jamie notter , open , transparency Silos (in organizations, not on farms) allow for departmental knowledge and expertise. They create a go-to mentality within organizations; if you need X – you know where to go. There is a certain sense of pride that emanates from creating a knowledge silo and if you believe knowledge is power, your department gains a strangle hold [.] ( Read more. ) The post Killing The Silo System appeared f
Wild Apricot
NOVEMBER 19, 2012
Social networks are popular with marketers but often don't lead to tangible results. Here's an example of how LinkedIn recommendations drive real business for Wild Apricot.
Speaker: Joe Sharpe and James Carlson
Payroll optimization can be one of the most time-consuming and complex factors of small business management. Yet, organizations that crack the code on streamlining employee compensation often discover innovative avenues for growth. With the right strategies in place, outsourcing and streamlining payroll processes can result in substantial time and resource savings.
Eric Lanke
NOVEMBER 19, 2012
image source This is a true story. My association Board chair and I were chatting not long ago, talking about the mission and big-picture objectives of our association, and I mentioned, literally without giving it a second thought, that we were incapable of measuring progress on some of the things we had set for ourselves. It was only the look of shock that passed over his face that made me step back and think about what I had just said.
Thanks For Playing
NOVEMBER 1, 2012
Public service post today. A friend of mine is a paid blogger for Razoo , and she is looking for stories to tell. Her beat is organizations that are doing social good around the following issues: food insecurity homelessness, especially homeless veterans the coming higher education loan default bubble arts education human trafficking the immigrant experience in the United States millennials engaging in philanthropy She also has a personal interest in anything with a foreign policy or internation
Association Subculture
NOVEMBER 5, 2012
I often refer to Dilbert cartoons (a creation of Scott Adams) as a way to explain not only the inner workings of office environments but also how they apply to associations and nonprofits. (In fact, I consider " Way of the Weasel " required reading for staff.). Does this cartoon look familiar to anyone? It does to me. I am often amazed at how much time we spend in associations and nonprofits developing "metrics" that in many cases reward the wrong behavior.
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