The Zionsville IN Chamber of Commerce (just northwest of Indianapolis) recently announced a new marketing initiative using technology to promote their community.   However, several of the community's business owners are not exactly enamored with the plan.   Read the full article here.

The Chamber has purchased advertising on electronic billboards at the baggage claim area of Indianapolis International Airport.  While this is a technology used by many companies to reach their target audience, I wonder how effective it could be for a community such as Zionsville.   
If you have already landed at an airport, you probably already have an agenda or schedule of things you need/want to accomplish.  Would a billboard advertising a nearby community influence you to stop by?

To be fair, the Zionsville Chamber will also place ads in the Indianapolis Convention and Visitors Authority's promotional materials.  These may do a better job or reaching potential visitors before they are already in the area.

I don't mean to beat up on the Zionsville Chamber by any means.  I've worked for a chamber and know there can be many challenges, especially with chambers in small towns.  But, I do think there are several other ways to use technology to promote the community that could be even more effective.

Search-optimized website with great content
Chambers of commerce along with convention and visitors bureaus have a great resource of content sitting right in their membership management software.  By leveraging the business names, categories, contact information and business descriptions effectively, chambers can create huge numbers of content-rich pages to be indexed by search engines. 

Coming up high in Google, Yahoo and other search engines is more CRITICAL than ever if chambers of commerce want to attract more business to their community and drive referrals to fuel local members’ business success. The higher they come up on search engines, the more traffic their websites will receive and thus create more opportunities to attract more business to the community and their members. More website traffic also enables chambers to generate significant non-dues revenue via website advertising.

And, you can reach potential visitors before they arrive in your community.

Social media engagement plan
Social media is fast becoming the ultimate word of mouth tool.  It allows your members and their customers be more engaged and share information quickly with dozens (or hundreds) of their friends.  Chambers of commerce have the opportunity to use social media not only to promote their own benefits to members and prospects, but to promote their members as well.

Chambers such as Oceanside, CA, Clovis, CA,  and Nashville, TN do a great job of  communicating their chamber's agenda and mission, AND spotlighting their members, too.  Find and follow these chambers on Twitter.  Read their blogs.  Become fans of them on Facebook.  You'll see the many ways they use social media to gain exposure for their members and community.

Teach your members how to use social media
I see chambers of commerce across the country offering workshops and seminars for their small business members on how to use social media and improve their websites.  They bring in local or national experts to teach their members about the tools and strategies for effectively using social media.

This is a fantastic opportunity for the chamber and their members to all work together to promote the community and engage potential visitors.  Social media is SOCIAL, so use these communications to help each other, make referrals and share information.

See this post from Mashable on how the resort industry is using social media.  There are several ideas that chambers of commerce and their members can adapt and use to strengthen their community's marketing efforts.

Using social media in this way allows the groups to also reach a potentially under-accessed group of visitors - people who already live in the larger surrounding communities.  While they may know you're "nearby," they may not know about many of the great things to do, places to eat or shopping opportunities in your town.  Reaching out via social media can be the first step in getting them to visit.


All of these methods help you generate additional word of mouth for your organization and your community.   And generally, they can be accomplished with little additional expense - at least when compared to other advertising options.

What other ways have you seen chambers of commerce or convention and visitors bureaus use technology to promote their members and their community?

I read a story today about how the Mesquite NV Chamber of Commerce has worked through a rather tumultuous year.  

In addition to the economy forcing the Chamber’s members to rethink their investment of membership dues, the Chamber lost a grant of $25,000 from the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority (LVCVA) – money that had already been budgeted.  (Note: The Chamber did nothing wrong; the LVCVA stopped grant monies to all chambers of commerce.)  

Read the full article here. 

As with many chambers of commerce this past year, these events sparked some major changes.  The one word mentioned repeatedly in the article is accountability.   Accountability of the exec to the board, accountability of board members to each other and members and accountability of the chamber as a whole to its membership and the community.

There are many ways you could define accountability.

• Doing what you say you’ll do, when you say you’ll do it.
• Delivering on the value (and more) you promised the member
• Responsible use of membership, tax and/or grant dollars
• Accepting repercussions when promises are not kept or goals are not reached

How can you ensure you’re delivering on all your promises?   Certainly, a passion for your local community and a dedication to your members is paramount.  But, you simply can’t manage the relationships, expectations and benefits of all your members without a customer relationship management system.   Robust membership management software gives you operational, analytical and collaborative tools you need to deliver more value and be accountable to your members.

How does your chamber define accountability?  

And, how do you use technology to help you be accountable to your board, your members and your community?

Within the past two years, we’ve seen well-established newspapers fold as readership numbers plummet. The culprit? The internet, of course. As this CNN article points out, newspapers are “losing their relevance in the lives of a majority of Americans, particularly younger readers.”

And this trend isn’t isolated to just newspapers – it affects chambers of commerce and business associations. Today, the North Carolina Chamber of Commerce (a WebLink International client) announced they will cease publishing their magazine, NC Magazine. In this article Sherry Melton, vice president of communications for the Chamber, stated: “We’ve seen a 68 percent decrease [in advertising revenue] in 2009 from last year.”

Although there are many reasons for the declines in print advertising revenue, the impact from online advertising is undeniable. (See Mike’s post “Your website should make you money… not cost you money” for more.)

That’s why WebLink has created an exclusive website advertising program that helps associations and chambers create more opportunities for their members AND a sustainable source of non-dues revenue.

There are many reasons why the WebLink Ad Program works, but what makes our program different is what counts. One of those differences is that this program is integrated with our membership management software (WebLink Connect), allowing you to easily show the VALUE of online advertisements to your members.

Still not convinced about the shift? Talk to the young professionals you know and ask them if they have ever heard of the area’s local tourism publication. Chances are they haven’t. And that’s because more and more people are disregarding the traditional, paper-based methods of research for the faster, more convenient internet.  (And no paper cuts is a bonus too!)

No matter, the push for online advertising is strong, so make sure you are keeping up by making such offerings available for your membership.

Today I came across this article that gives a glimpse into the spending habits of consumers. It’s obvious that discounts motivate buyers, but did you know it takes less to motivate young professionals?

YP’s said discounts as low as 10% would make them willing to spend. Comparatively, it would take a discount of nearly 30% to get the affluent to “open their wallets”.

So, why should you care? Members join associations and chambers of commerce primarily to grow their business. And allowing your members to display coupons on your website is another way your organization can help them convert your site visitors into consumers. With membership management software like WebLink Connect from WebLink International, you have the ability to track the number of times a coupon is viewed, which is a great way to show VALUE to your member.

You can even go a step further and use Twitter as another way to promote your member’s discounts. The best part, Twitter links can be tracked too. (Check out if your chamber or association is “Twitter-worthy").

Everyone’s budgets are shrinking; coupon clipping is no longer just for soccer moms. So be sure to help turn your audience into motivated consumers for your membership by promoting not only their business, but also their discounts. 

Retention. It's a key indicator for most chambers of commerce and business associations.  The factors that drive retention also drive just about everything else about the financial health and growth of your member-based organization.  Revenue. Sponsorships.  Event attendance. New member sales. 

Higher retention means more satisfied members, more connected members and more word of mouth advertising for your organization.  

And more fans.

Fans.  Not just Facebook fans, but someone who actually loves your organization and your staff and will tell other people about you.  In his book, Purple Cow, Seth Godin calls your biggest fans "sneezers" because they are so enamored with your company that  tell others about your products and services and help spread your ideas.

How do you get more fans faster?  Social media!

Think about how hard it would be to increase the number of true (raving) fans your chamber of commerce or business association has by hosting great events or sending out great newsletters.  Yes, you can use member segmentation and mass customization to deliver targeted, relevant information, but events and newsetters are relatively infrequent compared to how you can use social media. 

Blogs, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr and others all help you tell your story more frequently, more immediately and in more places.  And these social media allow your members to help you tell your story WAY more than your events or newsletters do.  (Word of mouth advertising).  Having more fans helps you build more momentum and improve retention even more since they can now all help you in your efforts.

Social media allows you to share more information than ever before without spamming your members.  They've voluntarily choosen to follow you, read your content or join your group.  They can reply, ask questions or share your content with others.   This blog and many others are full of great examples of non-profit organizations, chambers of commerce and business assocations using social media to actively engage their members and prospects and create an entirely new fan base.   I've seen great examples of members in a community reposting information about their chamber of commerce, writing blog posts about chamber events and even creating videos on YouTube about their chamber.

You can't do it with social media alone, though.  You must provide real benefits and demonstrate your value to your members using all of your communications tools.  You must ask for their input and respond.  Listening, learing, adapting and communicating helps you improve retention and all the other things listed above.  And, great membership management software can help you record and track information about your members to help you communicate your value more effectively.

But, social media lets you do this all faster and on a much larger scale.  So, go improve retention!  (And get more fans.)

WebLink is proud to announce the winners of our big contest conducted at the American Chamber of Commerce Executives (ACCE) Convention in Raleigh, NC.   Please read on to see if any of your peers were winners.

iPod touchGarmin Nuvi GPS system
Flip Digital Video CameraiPod Shuffle
$50 Amazon gift cardIt was great to meet so many of the chamber of commerce staff I've connected with on Twitter and other social media.  Thanks for stopping by the booth so we can now match a face with the avatar. :-)   That's one of the great things about social media - ultimately connecting face-to-face with someone you've been following for a while.  The online connection leads to an offline action.

WebLink received tremendous response and interest in our membership management software, website design and development, and non-dues revenue programs for chambers of commerce while at ACCE.  From all of the chambers we talked to it appears that now is the time most of you are seeking to make a change for the better.  Whether it's creating more functional websites, better utilizing your member database or jumping into using social media, chambers of commerce are eager to keep pushing forward.

Thanks again to those who stopped by the booth.  And congratulations to all of our winners!

Last week at the American Chamber of Commerce Executives (ACCE) Convention in Raleigh, I sat in on Rahaf Harfoush's presentation on how the Obama campaign used social media, websites and email to connect to and engage voters during the 2008 Presedential Election.

She explained several ways that the campaign created online connections to facilitate offline actions by voters.  These included extensive use of technology and social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, a dedicated social network, an iPhone app and many others. 

When she got to email, she stressed the key to their success: Hyper-Segmentation

The campaign delivered different messages to voters based on:

1. State
2. Interests on certain issues (indicated when opting in to emails)
3. Donation history

By carefully crafting messages for people and keying on their location, interests and history, they could make each email extremely relevant.  This helped make the recipient feel that the campaign truly knew who they were and that the issues discussed were happening right in their backyard.

Are you segmenting your email communications to your members?   Can you deliver relevant messages to your members so they feel like your chamber of commerce understands them and is working to serve their needs?  Can you make your messages personal?

I've mentioned segmentation on this blog before, but the concept bears repeating since many chambers of commerce are just now realizing the power of segmentating communications to help increase member satistaction and retention and generate new member sales.

Ways you can segment your members include:

• Employee count
• Business category
• Interests (collected through your website or membership application)
• Dues amount
• Length of membership
• NAICS code
• Previous event attendance

So, when you send out emails to members about how certain issues affect their business, why not break that email into two or more versions?  Send one email to members with 1-50 employees, and include quotes from similarly-sized business stating how the issues affect them. Then rework the email for the members with 50+ employees with a different take on the issues.

You can do this for just about every email you send to members using any number of ways to segment.  Try to make your "blast" emails seem like you sat down and typed out a note to each of your members individually.  By carefully crafting your messages, you'll end up demonstrating more value to your members.

This issue was highlighted recently by Ben Wolf, IOM, vice president of member services at the Nashville Area (TN) Chamber of Commerce in his article in ACCE's Chamber Executive, "Are You Effectively Communicating Your Value? Make it Personal."   (Congratulations to the Nashville Chamber for being recognized by ACCE as the top Chamber in the country for their dues range.  The Nashville Chamber is a WebLink International client!) :-)

In the article, Wolf states, "Communicating value is not just about delivering a standard message. It’s about identifying what one perceives as valuable. It’s not just what is said, but how it is said that makes the difference. It is tailoring a specific, targeted message to a targeted audience member."  Excellent advice.

Know your members though data collection and management
Segment your members for greater member intelligence
Communicate your value by using segmentation and knowledge gained from your data

Obviously, the key here is membership management software or a customer relationship management system that allows you to collect your members' interests and other demographic information and easily export that for use with email and other communications.  Find ways to input AND extract this information in your database and use it to deliver targeted, relevant communications.

And...why stop at email?  You could create different versions of postcards, letters, mailings....even your printed newsletter, to deliver relevant messages to your members.

Happy segmenting!

WebLink will be exhibiting at the American Chamber of Commerce Executives (ACCE) Convention in Raleigh, NC July 30 and 31.  If you’re attending this conference, please stop by the booth (#224) to say hello.   We’ll have at least 8 staff members there:  me, Mike Bryan, DJ Muller, Misty Stennett, Pam Sefrino, Aaron Cox, Chris Painchaud and Nathan Marquardt.

We’d like to hear about the challenges your chamber of commerce is facing during these uncertain economic times and how you are working to strengthen your local business community. WebLink works with more than 400 chambers of commerce and business associations across the U.S. – a number of our clients are doing great work right now and even increasing membership.

While you’re at our booth, be sure to learn how WebLink can revolutionize the way your chamber operates and help you deliver powerful benefits to your members.  Our unique approach combines the industry’s leading membership managment software and award-winning website design and develoment with our proven marketing methodology to eliminate technology costs AND generate revenue for you year after year. 

If you're already a WebLink client, please stop by and let us know what we can do to help you continue to increase retention, gain new members, generate non-dues revenue and strengthen our partnership.  We value your business and want to grow with you.

I’ll be glad to discuss your social media ideas and goals, too, including blogging, Twitter, social networking sites, social bookmarking, and photo and video sharing.  There are a number of chambers of commerce doing great work with social media – I’d love to “talk shop" with you for awhile and learn from you, too.

And….(saved the best for last), we’ll be giving great prizes like Flip Video cameras and Amazon.com gift cards at the WebLink booth (#224).  It's easy to win....just stop by to enter!  We hope to see you in Raleigh!

Chambers of commerce have long held a physical presence in their communities.  Their offices have been a central meeting point for business leaders, small business owners and elected officials to network and discuss local business issues.  And, the chamber office is usually a resource to visitors in town looking for maps, guides or other local information.

But, does the chamber of commerce need a building or physical offices to provide benefits to their members and their community?

The Goleta Valley (CA) Chamber of Commerce will soon find out.  The chamber will be closing its doors - but not closing for business - and have the employees work from home through several web-based software solutions, allowing them to stay connected and share information without all being in the same location.  Note: One of these solutions is WebLink's web-based membership management software, WebLink Connect.  :-)   For more info about their descision to "go virtual," read "Goleta Valley Chamber of Commerce Relocates ... Online"

Yes, the chamber will continue to have events and and other meetings - they will just all be at member locations rather than the chamber's offices.  “Chambers are community-based organizations,” says Michael Kramer, a Goleta Valley Chamber member. “Going virtual forces chamber staff to meet in the community they serve."

Sure, there are some examples of virtual chambers of commerce already, but none that I know of that serve a local community.  These virtual chambers were designed to exist solely on the internet and serve a certain demographic. The Goleta Valley Chamber's move marks the first time I know of that a chamber with a brick and mortar presence has made the move to a virtual presence. 

The trend towards going mobile is increasing, for sure.  Last year, the International Data Corporation (IDC), predicted that by year-end 2011, nearly 75% of the U.S. workforce will be mobile.   And, Forrester's Consumer Techographics survey showed that telecommuting will rise to include 43% of the U.S. workforce by 2016.   A few years ago, Manpower released results of a study showing that 80% of U.S. workers would prefer telecommuting to a physical commute to work.   

What is your organization doing to be more mobile?  Does your staff use notebook computers that they can take with them?  Would your staff be more efficient if they could work from home?   Do you have web-based membership management software so your staff can utilize your database from anywhere?  What other technology would need to be removed or replaced for your staff to be mobile?

Perhaps the larger question is....is this even a good idea?  What are your thoughts? Do chambers of commerce and business association NEED a physical location to be successful and to provide benefits to their members?  Please let me know in the comments below.

It will certainly be interesting to see how this move works out for the Goleta Valley Chamber.

WebLink International will host a webinar on July 22 titled "Top 5 Reasons to Use Member Segmentation to Drive Your Marketing Strategy."  Cathi Hight of Hight Performance Group and Mike Bryan, WebLink's vice president of marketing will demonstrate ways you can use technology to learn more about your members.

This webinar will show you ways to use your membership management software plus your website and survey data to analyze and define your ideal target market for members. You'll learn how segmentation strategies drive sales, increase retention, promote satisfaction, define program development, and deliver high lifetime value.  

Cathi and Mike teamed up last month to present a webinar on "Leveraging Technology to Measure Member Loyalty and Engagement." That session was very well received by chambers of commerce and business associations. 

Cathi has more than 18 years experience in sales & marketing and training & development. She has worked with organizations of all sizes and across industry sectors to plan for market changes and to develop customer loyalty strategies.   She is a national trainer for ACCE (American Chamber of Commerce Executives) for membership development and facilitates regional workshops on membership sales and retention. Cathi is also an instructor for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute for Organizational Management.


Mike Bryan has more than 14 years of experience in business strategy, marketing, and product development in the web-based software industry, including experience at First Advantage, TruStar Solutions, Major Video Concepts and consumer products at Walt Disney. TruStar Solutions was an Inc 500 Fast Growth Company in 2003 and 2004.  At WebLink he is responsible for client acquisition and retention, marketing strategy, advertising, and public relations initiatives, strategic business development and partner management.

Learn more about the webinar and register here.  Register on or before July 15 to receive the early bird rate of $49.  After that date, the registration will be $59.  We hope you can join us for this informative and inspiring webinar on using techonology to better understand and manage your membership.

I came across two posts yesterday that were very similar in nature and I wanted to share them here and get your input.

What Happened to the Original Social Network? by Joe Abraham

Is Your Local Chamber of Commerce Obsolete? by Jack Deal

Read these two posts, then continue below.

I've seen these posts mentioned on other sites and they bother me a little bit, too.  Maybe it's because I worked for a chamber for 8 years and know how hard the staff works to serve the members. I've seen the staff attend all the early morning breakfast meetings and the after 5:00 mixers and the weekly total resource development campaigns and I've seen their the genuine concern for local businesses.  Or maybe it's because I've seen so many chambers jump into using social media and reinevent the way they run their business by providing more and better benefit to their members. 

I do believe that chambers of commerce in general need to change in order to survive and thrive, but...BUT...why focus on pointing out these fairly obvioius facts (they are true for LOTS of businesses) and then wrap up the post with (essentially) "if they don't, they'll be gone." If you're going to point out a problem, why not offer a solution....or better yet, show examples of how some chambers of commerce ARE indeed changing as they suggest so that others can learn from them. Do the very thing you suggest that chambers should be doing and connect them with someone that can help them. I want others to see the success stories and know that chambers CAN evolve.  And I've tried to share information on chambers that are evolving here on this blog.

To be fair, Joe Abraham does have some decent suggestions near the end of his post. They mostly focus on delivering real value to your members by directly helping them increase profits and improving the lives of the individual members.  These demonstrate some of the opportunities and decisions I believe chambers have before them.

Be the great connector
Chambers have held mixers and networking events for a long time.  While these may still have some value, the two authors point out some deficiencies in these types of events.  (Those who understand the value of long-term networking will disagree, I'm sure).  However, chambers can go beyond these events and actively connect businesses who may need/want each other's services.  This may involve "business match making" services or using technology to match business together.  Listening to your members' concerns and needs though social media (and in-person visits) can be a great way to start connecting them to other businesses.  Certainly social media will be a major part of chambers' efforts to connect local businesses.  Those chambers already using social media will have a great head start.

Be THE business advocate
Dave Kilby (and others) at the Western Association of Chamber Executives have encouraged chambers to be active in business legislative issues for years.  Some chambers have long avoided jumping into the political arena.  If you're not there already, now is the time to be the advocate for business in your community and make their concerns heard.  Blogging, email and Twitter will take larger roles for those organizations who are politically active.  They'll be able to share information instantly and solicit feedback from members.

Provide personalized business services 
Many of the chambers of commerce I know are run by staff who have no or little experience running small business themselves. (Including me when I worked for one). Chambers could hire succesful small business owners and managers to provide one-to-one consulting services for other small businesses.  Things like creating business plans, developing marketing materials, even dealing with HR issues could be provided as paid services.  And because the small businesses would be getting help by someone who had "been in their shoes," they may feel like the chamber truly understands their needs.

Promote/develop a strong local economy
Despite Jack Deal's comments about how people can buy anything from anywhere in the world (which is true), the reality is that the vast majority of people in your community shop locally for most items. They drive to work each day past local gas stations and local grocery stores.  They drop off their cleaning at local dry cleaners and they buy lattes at the local coffee shops.  Chances are they have an account at the local bank and they bought or sold their house through a local realtor.   They live in neighborhoods full of other people that do the same types of things they do....they spend 75-90% of their time working in, playing and and shopping in their LOCAL area.  So, why wouldn't the chamber of commerce can work to create positive economic conditions in the area and promote their members?

Create/demonstrate value on an individual basis
Ah, the world of mass customization.  Each member has different needs and different reasons for joining the chamber.   Chambers will need to use customer relationship management software and other technology to create value for members as they need and want it.  And, you'll need to have customized ways of communicating that value to each member.  It won't be enough to say "you're on the chamber's health plan."  You'll need to tell them how much they spent, how much value they got and how much they saved over using other plans.   Where will you store this informaton? (Hint: Hopefully in your membership management sotfware) Can you provide this info for your Office Depot discount plans and other benefits? If not, you should probably start finding ways of getting this information and communicating it to your members. 

Explore different avenues for revenue generation
What if the chamber was an open organization that had benefits for all businesses, regardless of if they "joined."  Could you create a new set of services and charge for those services to all businesses?  Could you then offer a "premium" level of service that in essense replaced your membership dues structure?  What new product and services would you create? For more info on this concept, see an older post, Retain more members by competing with yourself.  Certainly, customer relationship management software and social media will have roles here as well.

What about exclusivity?  This has long been a selling point on being part of the chamber.  "If you're not a member, you won't get X, Y or Z."  Is it time to let go of this sacred cow or is it time to reinforce it and make it even stronger?  I can see both sides of this argument and I've love to get your input.

What are your opinions about the two posts above?  How is your chamber changing to provide more and better services to your members?  How will you use technology to help you evolve your chamber?

And most importantly, what do you think is the future for chambers of commerce?  Please leave a comment below or email me at curt.moss[AT]weblinkinternational.com.

There are certainly many examples of the economy affecting chamber membership numbers and sponsorship revenue. However, with each obstacle there are opportunities. :-)

I thought this was an interesting nugget from the blog post:

How are you implementing these and/or other strategies? How are you using technology to help you?    Are you creating segmented communications to deliver relevant information? Are you communicating value to every member using benefit tracking, referral reports or other tools? How are you attracting new members?  Are you showing your members that you "know" them?

I also found this line a bit contradictory: “Surprisingly, they identified online media (blogs, Facebook, twitter, etc.) as the least effective tool at their disposal.” The article goes on to say that most organizations will be increasing their spending on social media or keeping it the same. I suspect the response is due to the difficulty in determining direct ROI when using social media.  I know that plenty of chambers are having good success with social media and are doing the great job with it.

So, do you view social media as a valuable tool to help you survive and THRIVE in the recession? And if so, can you share your reasons why you think it's valuable in the comments below? I would love to know what you think about the article and report AND what you are doing to focus more on your members as mentioned above.

Edit:  I got a reply from one of our clients and it was so good, I just had to add it to this post.  Jessica Hibbard from the Frederick County MD Chamber had this to say.

I've been working with chambers of commerce and membership organizations for nearly 15 years. I've never seen anyone hug their computer, let alone hug their member database. Oh sure, there have been some who've said they LOVE their database (WebLink clients, of course!) ;-), but mostly it's viewed as a necessary evil.  Let's change that!

First, why do you have a database? Or member management software? Or a customer relationship management system?

What do you do with it?  Do you:

• Create mailing labels to send your members a newsletter?
• Look up members' phone numbers when you need to call them?
• Enter event dates and committee meeting minutes?
• Send invoices to your members?

If you're just doing basic things and not gaining valuable insight from your membership data, you're missing tremendous opportunities to truly connect with your members (and future members) and expand your organization's influence.

Sure, your chamber will be able to survive by tracking basic information, sending out email and newsletters and running monthly board reports. But do you want to survive or do you want to thrive and enrich your local business community?

Why not shoot for more?  Why not use your database to:

• Extract member intelligence to help you better KNOW your members?
• Use this member intelligence to make better decisions for managing and marketing your chamber?
• Directly integrate member information with your website for real-time updates?
• Learn which members are the most (at least) valuable?
• Segment your members for more personal communications to them?
• Predict how certain members may act based on past behavior?
• Build relationships with your members in such a way that they become raving fans?
• Communicate the value your members receive so well that your retention rate soars?

You may have heard something like, "you don't have a database to put information in to, you have a database to get information out of."  So, what kind of data, information and business intelligence are you extracting from your membership management software?  Are you using that info to do work or to grow and improve?

What would it take for you to do this?  Some features that help make this easier are:

• A web-based member management system.  This let lets you access the system from anywhere and allow for real-time integration with your website
• Seamless integration with your GL system. Integration saves you time and potential mistakes during duplicate entries.
• Robust reporting cababilities.  As you find ways to better use your data, you're going to want to see it in dfferent ways too. A reporting tool that give you maximum flexility will also give you maximum opporunities.
• Multi-user logins.  If each of your staff can log in as themselves, you can track their interactions with your data and the relationships they have with your members.
• Dashboards.  Quick-glance information centers that help you quickly understand your data and take action on it.
• Advanced member segmenation.  Slicing and dicing your membership data into chunks can help you see which type of members are most valuable.  And you can communicate with each segment to deliver more personal, relevant information.

What if you were able to do all these things and more?  You could change the culture of your organization to be data-centic and use your high-tech system to create a high-touch environment for your members.  Show them that you're listening. Provide them the information they want and need.  Communicate your value to them.   All of this requires good data, a good system and good people to manage it.  (Don't forget about the people aspect).

You can make your membership database SO valuable that you actually wanted to hug it!  And, in turn, probably make some members want to hug YOU!

I've found a bunch of good Twitter posts recently and wanted to tie them into one post. 

First, "How to Twitter like a Pro."   There are some great tips here on how to get your feet wet in Twitter.

• Use a Twitter client - This is a piece of software that you download and install on your computer.  When you set it up with your Twitter account, it will connect to Twitter's API, instead of you needing to go to Twitter's website to see/post tweets.  Some popular apps are Tweetdeck (allows you to set up groups of friends), Twhirl and DestroyTwitter.  These apps have a rich interface and make Twitter immensely more enjoyable and efficient.  If you have questions about using these apps, please let me know. I'll be glad to help.
• Complete your profile - Make sure you put your name (or your org's name), a link to your website or blog and include a brief bio of you or your org.  You may also want to create a custom Twitter background of your logo or a picture to help tell people more about you.  Your Twitter profile is what most people use when determining if they should follow you.  Give them some insight into you or your organization.
• Jump in and Tweet - Be sure you're adding to the conversation or starting new ones.  Retweet items that you find interested or useful and praise your followers for their business achievements, blog posts, successful events, etc. 

Two chamber of commerce staff who use Twitter very well are Beth Bridges of the Clovis CA Chamber and Brian Willms of the Loveland CO Chamber.  And the Maryland Chamber and Asheville NC Chamber have organization accounts. Follow them to see how they use Twitter to engage their members and promote their local communities.  

This brings up a good point.  You can (and probably should) have Twitter accounts for yourself and your chamber.  And, you should also have multiple staff using Twitter so you can connect to more/different businesses and have multiple conversations.  (Many of the apps mentioned above allow you to manage multiple accounts) 

The Loveland CO Chamber has a chamber account (in addition to Brian's above) and several of their staff use it, too.  What if your entire staff was using Twitter?  How many additional conversations could you have?  How many new relationships could you build?

Now, after you've been using Twitter for a while, you will naturally find other people who you'd like to follow and you'll be followed by Twitter users you've never met.  How do decide who to follow back?  Do you follow everyone just to "be nice."    Check out these post on creating following guidelines: The Twitter Followhollic: An Epidemic and If you were stuck on a desert island, and could only follow 150 people on Twitter, who would you follow and why?

Don't feel like you have to follow everyone that follows you.  Remember, though, that you are using Twitter to have converstations with your chamber of commerce members and to find potential new members as well.  Follow the people that you want to have active conversations with and stay focused on your Twitter goals.

Here are a few more Twitter resources:

• How to: Build a community on Twitter
• How to: Live inside Twitter and still stay productive
• Follow Fail: The top 10 reasons I will not follow you in return on Twitter
  
• Five ways your Chamber can use Twitter

At the W.A.C.E. Conference last week in Las Vegas, I sat in on a session titled, “Communicating Value…Messaging That Works.”   There were three speakers who each presented different ideas on how their chamber creates, measures or delivers value.  However, I felt that all of them missed the mark a bit on how to communicate that value.

I thought that Brad Hicks, President/CEO of the Medford/Jackson County OR Chamber, came the closest to explaining how to communicate the value.  (BTW, Congratulations to Brad on winning the W.A.C.E.’s Executive of the Year award.  Brad’s chamber is a WebLink client.)

Brad mentioned that value is about both the “macro” and the “micro.”   He also discussed that his chamber is promoting connection rather than participation and that his staff is working to develop stronger relationships with members.  I love this approach!   In the age of constant online connections and virtual everything, a phone call or face-to-face meeting with a chamber staff person is usually a welcome interaction for chamber members.   Many member don’t have time to participate on committees or attend events, so ask them if they are comfortable with their level of connection, instead of telling them to “get involved.”

These personal conversations are a great way to reach out to members, ask them about their business and LISTEN to their concerns and successes.  And you can use this opportunity to explain the macro reasons for being a member of your chamber such as how your chamber works to create a strong local economy and advocates for business in the halls of government.   These conversations can help explain the high-level benefits your chamber offers.

But, how are you handling the micro portion?  Can you use technology to track, monitor and communicate value that’s specific to each member?   For your members to make their own decisions about the value your chamber provides, you’ll need to provide them details on the referrals they’ve received, discounts used for office supplies or health insurance, events attended, sponsorships completed or any other benefit that can be tracked.   Can you demonstrate to each member what your chamber did specifically for their business?   Find a way to track this information in your member management software. Then, use this data to communicate the value to each member. Use email, letters, phone calls – anything – as long as you speak to specifics.  

You can speak to specifics somewhat in your newsletter and blog posts, as well.  Wherever possible, use real life examples of how a certain issue affects your members.  Rather than state that “the Chamber stopped a tax bill that would have cost area businesses $1.3 million,” find members to give you specific examples.  Something like “Joe Smith, owner of Speedy Dry Cleaning, has 6 full time employees.  He estimates the defeat of the tax bill will save his business $1,500/year” carries more weight than large, generic numbers.  Weave in examples from several different sizes and types of businesses so your members can find one they can identify with.

When it comes time to renew their membership, your members want a way to equate the dollars they spend to the value they’ve received.  And the decision about value is THEIRS.  Make sure you give them all the tools to make that decision in your favor.

Times are tough, money is tight, and No One is spending money right now.   Well the first two points are certainly true, but the latter is not.  The truth is; everyone is more selective in how and where they spend their money, but they ARE spending money.  Your members are looking to make the most of their dollars and get a clear Return on Investment (ROI) from your chamber.  You are in the right place at exactly the right time to make money with your website and provide tremendous value AND results to your members.

Why chambers exist
Now is an opportune time to revisit why you exist in the first place, or at least why members belong to your organization.  Chamber initiatives are diverse and you do so many important things for the local economy you serve, but members join to grow their business. 

It bears repeating.  Members join primarily to grow their business.  If you are helping them grow their business, you are VERY valuable to them. Most especially in tough economic times. 
                                                                                              
The chamber brand = Credibility
Chambers of commerce have a “brand name” advantage over other local directory sites as most consumers know each community has a chamber and they will seek out a chamber’s website to search before the site of a local newspaper, TV station or radio station.   And chambers have a physical presence to support their efforts – something most directory websites do not.  Local means physically local and that still matters to buyers.

In the 2007 Schapiro Study, a key takeaway is that when consumers know that a small business is a member of the chamber of commerce, they are 44% more likely to think favorably of them and 63% more likely to purchase goods or services from that company in the future.  This translates directly into credibility.  Why does that matter?  People do business with businesses they trust.  They can’t afford to take risks with their money and a chamber membership is an implied seal of approval by the local business community when people search for local businesses online.

So what is the potential?  Let’s look at some important trends.

Internet advertising trends
In 2008, $100 Billion was projected to be spent on local advertising across all mediums (Insiders Report – Universal McCann Dec. 07).  Local online advertising was expected to reach $13.1 Billion in 2008 according to Borrell and Associates.   What was your share of the $13.1 Billion spent in 2008 and are you positioned to take advantage of the $100 Billion already spent locally that is migrating online?

Online usage trends and directories
According to a recent Pew Internet and American Life Study – 49% of people use online search at least once a day.  More importantly to you, a study conducted by Piper Jaffrey & Co. in 2007 determined that 58% of online activities are searches for local information!  People are already searching online for local businesses in your community EVERY DAY.

New sites with interactive directories are popping up continually and other sites are adding them to compete for advertising dollars.  Traditional local media websites such as TV, radio, newspaper and yellow page sites are moving to designs and features that blur the lines regarding their media type.  In essence, everyone is going online and you have a fantastic resource in your online business directory that is under-promoted and under-monetized as a profit center. 

Results matter and conversion is king
A client of WebLink is generating a 2.9% click through rate on ads on their website. As a point of reference, industry-wide average click through rates for web advertising (impressions delivered / clicks) are typically 0.1% to 0.2%.  This means that ads on chamber sites can 14x to 28x more productive than other websites.  Conversion rates are high on chamber sites because you are trusted by visitors.   Greater credibility AND greater results.  Now that will get members’ attention.  And their dollars.
  
History shows that the greatest opportunities often come during the times of greatest adversity.  Your chamber IS the most valuable cost effective advertising medium there is.   Your chamber website provides targeted, immediate, affordable, and measurable results.  Remember that members join primarily to grow their business and you can help them do exactly that with your website. 

To summarize: people are searching for local business information, your website has high credibility, and businesses are already purchasing local online advertising.    

NOW is the time to take action and make money from your website. 

If your chamber is like most, you go through a certain process to sell memberships to local businesses.  At some point in this process, the business will decide to join or not to join.   If the business joins, you can be well on your way towards gaining member intelligence for your chamber.     But what if they don’t join?  What can you learn from these businesses?  Plenty!

Let’s start with this, “Why not?”  Ask them why they didn’t join.  AND, record that information in your database!  You’ll soon be able to determine the top 5-10 reasons why businesses don’t join your chamber.  You probably hear things like:

• I don’t have time
• The corporate office says we don’t join chambers
• Dues cost too much
• You don’t have “X” benefit
• I’d like to, but the boss says no
• I was a member once and didn’t get any new business from it
• We’re already a member of an industry trade group

Create a way to track these objections in your member management software and assign them to these prospects that don’t join.   (If you can, be sure to record their type of business, how many employees they have and how long they’ve been in business, too…more on using that information later.)

Over time, you’ll notice trends for why businesses don’t join. Then you can adjust your messaging going forward.  For example, if you continue to hear “I don’t have time,” you may want to alter your advertising, website text and selling process to focus on how businesses get benefits from your chamber even when they don’t participate. 

You can also revisit some of these businesses in 6 months to a year and demonstrate to them the ways you chamber has benefited businesses just like theirs in the past year, using their own objections “against them.”   First, find businesses that are similar in industry and/or size, by mining data from your membership database.  Then check the objections from this business when you first tried to sell them a membership.   Run referral and benefit reports from your member management software and get testimonials from these similar businesses to use in your conversation.  You can create mini “objection kits” for most objections to help you go back to those businesses that told you “no,” and demonstrate why they now should say “yes.”

For example, you might say “When we talked last time, you said that you didn’t have time.  I want to show you how some other businesses like yours are seeing value from our chamber even though they don’t attend events or participate on committees.”    

The effects of such a conversation can be very powerful.  Foremost, it shows that you listened.  And, it shows that your chamber cares about the businesses in your community and you are interested in forming relationships with your members, not just collecting dues.  And listening and strengthening relationships go a long way toward improving member retention and generating additional new member sales.

See part one of this post here.

Why would you pay another company for email services? 

One of the biggest reasons I already mentioned above – relationships with the ISPs.   It would be very difficult for most chambers to dedicate a staff person to constantly monitor their outgoing email to see if it looks like spam and build relationships with the various ISPs to make sure their email is getting delivered.  In fact, many of the ISPs don’t have the staff to work with every small and mid-sized business - they would rather work with email service providers that represent multiple companies. 

Another reason is the reporting.  Email service providers all offer various levels of reports for you to understand which members are reading your emails and plan your future communications.   See who opened emails, who clicked on which links, which emails bounced back, etc.  And some services allow you to view each profile’s past history, knowing how many/which of your previous emails they’ve viewed as well.

How effective is the tracking?  

This varies by provider and also depends on a number of other factors.  Even some of the best permission-based email marketing packages can only track email to a +/- 10% accuracy rate. Reading email offline, Blackberries, firewalls and SPAM filters can all cause inaccuracies both positive and negative. As firewalls, anti-virus and anti-spam software continue to get better, getting your message through will become even more difficult. 

Using an email service provider whose sole business is to deliver email may become a necessary business expense for your chamber as you become more reliant on email.  These companies must stay current on technology and spam filtering trends to ensure the greatest percentage of your emails gets through – that’s what you pay them to do.  Email is becoming a necessary tool for you to do business and something that you may want or need to pay for to receive better delivery rates.

You’ve heard the expression, “You are what you communicate.”  This certainly holds true for email – you still need to consider the content of your message.  But you must also consider what you are if what you communicate is never seen.

Note: this is part one of a two- part post.

Why track email?  You’ve already got enough to do running your chamber.  Why would you want to spend additional time and resources worrying about who’s reading your email? 

Let’s first consider some other methods of one-way communication.  When using direct mail, print advertising, television or radio to promote your programs and events, you have no real way of knowing how many of your target audience actually received the message.  You may get a general feel for how many people potentially saw or heard your message, but you can’t really use that information to do more targeted communications in the future.

Email, though, can offer fast, flexible communications that can be relatively easily customized for each recipient.  And email can also usually be tracked (more on that later) and used to refine your marketing efforts.   Email, when read, can even increase traffic on your website as members follow links back to articles, event details, etc.  And increased traffic can help your chamber through increased event revenues, additional member referrals and site advertising.

 Tracking when emails are opened, links are clicked and when someone forwards an email is a good way to measure a member’s involvement or “engagement” with your Chamber.   Since many of them may never come to events, serve on a committee, etc., it may be the only tool you have to measure that member’s activity.

 As you continue to face more competition for your members’ time and money, your ability to deliver relevant communications becomes increasingly important.  Your members are becoming more tech and data-savvy and they expect you to do so also.   For example, have you ever wondered why you get solicitations to subscribe to a magazine when you’ve already been a subscriber for years?  You probably feel like the company doesn’t care enough to be careful or that they don’t “know you.”  Your members will feel the same way when you send them email about registering for an event that they signed up for three weeks ago. Tracking your email and using the data acquired can help you avoid such situations. 

To help your emails get through, the software and/or the company providing it must ensure that the emails are being sent to people who want to receive such communication – this is frequently called permission-based marketing.  Many times, when using a bulk email service, you must agree that you are using it to email only to those people who have granted you permission to do so.  This helps the email service provider show the various internet service providers (ISPs, such as AOL, Yahoo, cable companies, etc) that the email they are sending isn’t SPAM. 

Your email software must have easy-to-use tools for recipients to unsubscribe and for you to manage the “unsubscribes” and flag or delete bounce-back addresses. In addition, it should also track/log the times the email was opened, any links in the email that were clicked and if/to whom the email was forwarded. 

You should also be able to assign groups of recipients who performed certain tasks (like click a link) to a new group so you can include or exclude them in a new/different communication. 

For example, in one email you may send a link to your sponsorship document.  Next time, you could then send a follow up email to only those who clicked on the link.  Or send another email to those who didn’t click on the link.  Being able to group recipients by their past activity allows you to be more segmented in other communications.

The software company needs to have very close relationships with the ISPs to constantly stay on top of the latest spamming trends.  This way they can help clients avoid looking like spam and can check with the ISPs to make sure email coming off their servers isn’t being globally caught. 

There are a number of email service providers that can provide many of these functions and more, such as Constant Contact, eNewsBuilder, ExactTarget, Campaigner, iContact, Bronto, Emma, Vertical Response and many others.  (Full disclosure:  WebLink is an authorized reseller for ExactTarget)

What service does your organization use? What do you like or dislike about them?  How are you using these email services to manage the relationships with your audience to improve member retention and generate new member sales?

 Part 2 of this post will cover why you should pay for email services and how effective the tracking it.

A few days ago, I posted about sending your members out-of-the-blue communications.

Today, Chris Brogan posted “Why Jason Falls Rules” about something that happened after he mentioned to another friend that he hadn’t heard from his friend Jason Falls in a while.  (If you haven’t heard of these two and you are at all interested in social media, follow them on Twitter and read their blogs!)

Turns out that word got back to Jason and within two hours, flowers showed up at Chris’ office - something completely unexpected and yet sincerely appreciated.  (Read the post, watch the video) This demonstrates the power of social media and the relationships it can produce.  And since your organization is already social, you already have relationships with your members, so you have even more ways to surprise them.

What if your staff was “tuned in” to your members at your events and listened to what was important to them and then acted on what they heard?  For example, a member mentions to another member that they are going on vacation to celebrate their 30^th anniversary.  How cool would it be for your chamber of commerce or business association to send them an anniversary card?    Or, what if a member mentioned to you that they were having trouble finding a reliable mechanic to work on their car?  You could call them the next day with a recommendation.  Show them you were listening.   (Are their ways for you to log and track this information in your membership management software?)

You could also monitor Twitter feeds or blogs posts and reach out to members with complaints or just thank them for their support of your organization.  You’ll demonstrate that you are paying attention in social media and that you value your relationship with them.  With rare exceptions such as Apple and Starbucks, people don’t fall in love with brands – they fall in love with people.  And, as business becomes more virtual, I believe the “human touch” will become even more important to helping your organization build long-lasting relationships, demonstrate value and improve member satisfaction.