By Pam Sefrino, National Sales Manager

Do you really know what’s happening in your membership? What are your members truly interested in? What events or workshops have the attended in the past year? How long have they been a member for that matter, and why do they stay?   And, how can you use this information to help improve retention and even generate new members sales?

Many business associations and chambers of commerce abandon what I like to call “member discovery” because it’s just too much work, it’s not automated and it requires a ton of data entry.  Some associations may have the capability of automatically tracking member participation, subscriptions or interest groups through their web site integrated with their membership management software, but many more do not.

Also, those that do have the ability may still not have a process in place for effective information collection and use because the staff has not been adequately trained.  More often than not, associations who are tracking this information actually have no idea how to get it out of their membership management system to help them achieve their goals. 

Missed opportunities abound for demonstrating membership value and increasing retention and sales.

Here are a few things you should consider tracking if you are not:

• Reason(s) for joining
• Their interests (business and personal)
• Committees, groups, communications they would be interested in or are participating on
• Business goals, what they are looking to achieve
• Date the business started
• What events they attend regularly
• What, if any, events or programs they have sponsored
• What other groups and organizations they are involved in outside of your association
• Their social media outlets

How do these things apply to membership value? With this type of information being collected regularly, your association is now able to:

• Show members what they’ve invested in the association in terms of dollars
• Share with members what they’ve received…what’s in it for them!
• Show their participation at events, on committees, at workshops etc.
• Identify trends with individual or groups of members
• Show referrals and connections made between people
• Connect people based on activity, interests and relationships

And so much more.

And if you can show this to your members through one simple report that you can send them periodically throughout the year, even better!

Associations today need to take a proactive, ongoing approach to demonstrating membership value for retention, and it all begins with effective tracking and then sharing of results. Knowledge is power!

Pam Sefrino is the National Sales Manager for software and technology sales at WebLink International. With more than 10 years of senior level association experience, Pam, with the rest of the WebLink team, is focused on helping membership organizations to remain relevant and easily gain and use valuable member and customer "intelligence" to help streamline operations and communications and create long-lasting member value, increased retention, new member sales and non-dues revenue.

By Pam Sefrino, National Sales Manager

Your members want more. That’s the bottom line. The biggest question they are asking themselves when they actually take a minute during the craziness of their day to consider your association is, “what’s in it for me?” or “how am I really benefitting from this?”

Every day, association professionals face the challenge of not only providing increased value to their members, but figuring out exactly what an individual member finds valuable, providing that value, and also demonstrating that value back for retention and additional non-dues revenue opportunities such as sponsorships or advertising.

Typically, what associations tell us is that they provide great value to their members and they share all of these great “benefits” with prospective members during the member sales process. And, associations share the value they provide with current members in their print and email newsletters, through event invitations, and on their Facebook page, Twitter feeds and other social media outlets.

Associations tell members all about the wonderful opportunities that the association provides, and how that member will benefit.  But often missing from a typical association sales process and ongoing membership communications is finding out what’s important to each individual prospective or current member, and reaffirming those priorities periodically.
 
I think that often, part of the problem is that associations don’t consider that they have to continually “sell” the benefits of membership, and that the most important thing in any sales process is actually listening, not talking or telling.

According to Sandler Sales Institute, which, for those of you who aren’t familiar, is a professional sales training program, too many sales people – and that includes association professionals, whether your title includes the word “sales” or not – “Spill their Candy in the Lobby”…which means, they give away too much information, too soon! They make the mistake of not listening more than they talk. They make the mistake of not finding out what’s important to that prospect or member, and they don’t take the time to fully understand that individual’s priorities, goals and challenges.

So, don’t make that mistake!

Put together a plan to find out what’s important to prospects and members. Formulate some questions to get at what their challenges, priorities and goals are. Once you’ve spent a lot of time listening, and identifying an individual businesses’ challenges and goals, only then share with them a solution ---

• how the association will help their individual business to achieve its goals
• what committees would be most beneficial
• what events would serve them best, based on what they told you
• what communications, newsletters, social networks, would be best – FOR THEM!

Listen to prospects and members, identify what’s important to them, make sure you take note of it and then tailor Association benefits to their needs. Move away from One Size Fits All membership. That will bring you one step closer to creating loyal members.

And remember track the intelligence you gain on each member in your association management software and use it to create member loyalty! More on that in my next blog post…

Pam Sefrino is the National Sales Manager for software and technology sales at WebLink International. With more than 10 years of senior level association experience, Pam, with the rest of the WebLink team, is focused on helping membership organizations to remain relevant and easily gain and use valuable member and customer "intelligence" to help streamline operations and communications and create long-lasting member value, increased retention, new member sales and non-dues revenue.

by Aaron Cox, Membership Management Specialist

I have seen the puzzled look on the faces of board members, volunteers and sadly even staff at chambers of commerce and business associations when asked the question, “Do you know anyone else that would benefit from membership in your organization?”

While referrals are one of the best ways to generate new membership sales, existing members often understand the value they receive from the organization but can’t always readily see the same benefits for others. 

Further, with busy lives, packed schedules, and a thousand other thoughts how do you get current members to refer you? 



Here’s a thought — a quick survey of members that asks,  “Who Fixes Your Car,” “Who Cuts Your Hair,” “Who Does Your Taxes,”  or something similar that your members are likely to use in your community.   

Send the survey to members, ask them to complete it and end with 2 easy questions: “Are you happy with or feel you are receiving excellent value from our organization” and “If asked by any of the people/businesses above would you recommend membership in our organization.” 

Then take these business names you receive to develop a list of the common services, activities, and business categories that will be well served by your organization.

There you have it—several new referrals, potentially lots of new references, and at a bare minimum a nice new list of prospective members. 

It’s worth a shot.  Even if you get 50 people referring 3 people each and you can gain 1/3 of those referred as new members, at $200/member, you'd have $10,000 in new member revenue. 

What works for your organziation when asking for referrals from members?

Aaron Cox, a Membership Management Specialist at WebLink, brings a wealth of Chamber and not-for-profit leadership and management experience. Immediately prior to joining the WebLink team, Aaron served as the first executive director of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce Executives (KCCE). During his tenure with KCCE, the membership doubled, revenue increased dramatically, sponsorship of the organization was increased over 400% and three affinity programs designed to provide necessary services to KCCE chamber members and their members were developed and implemented.

Prior to KCCE, Aaron managed several not-for-profits in the areas of workforce and economic development. These organizations have ranged in size from a staff of one on a shoestring budget to staff of 60 and $6.5 million budget, hence his keen awareness on how to maximize staff, technological and other resources.  You can contact Aaron at aaron.cox@weblinkinternational.com.

Last week, I presented a session at the Florida Association of Chamber Professionals (FACP) 90th Annual Meeting called, "Social Media Strategy for Impacting Member Sales & Retention."   It was great to see how many chambers of commerce have implemented social media into their communications efforts!

I follow around 700-800 chambers of commerce and their staff on Twitter and Facebook and I see several chambers doing a great job of engaging their members and finding ways to demonstrate the value they bring to the business community.

In preparing for this presentation, I reviewed an older blog post of mine, Social Media Strategy for Chambers of Commerce, first.   That post talked about simply getting in the game and using social media as another tool in your chamber's communications plan.

But the FACP presentation had a specific topic:  using social media as a STRATEGY to improve member sales and retention. 

We know that word of mouth is a very powerful tool when a member of your chamber tells a non-member how great it is and that they should join.  You've probably had members refer other businesses to join your chamber of commerce in the past.  And we know that social media is perhaps the best word of mouth marketing tool around, so.....let's combine those concepts!

Think about this:  How often does an email you send to a member get forwarded to their entire contact list?  How often does a member share your printed newsletter with all of their friends and colleagues?   Not very often, right?  

Well, what if there was a tool that did that for you?  There is.  The Facebook Like Button. (and more.)
When a fan/follower of your chamber of commerce clicks on the Like Button on your website, they automatically share that content with all their followers.  It's like a mini-endorsement of your chamber, your events, your program or whatever the content was about.  (Feel free to click on the Like Button below to test it out.) :-)




I'd recommend adding the Facebook Like Button, Twitter tweet buttons and other similar services to all your website pages.  Add This and Share This make it easy for website visitor to share your content, too.  There are also toolbars like Meebo and Wibiya that "wrap" the bottom of your web pages with sharing tools.

Adding these features to your website will make it easier for your site visitors, fans and follower to share your content.  Now, you've got to give them something that they want to share! 

I'll share some ideas on how you can do this in an upcoming blog post.  How are you getting your followers to share your content online?

In the past year, I've seen dozens of chambers of commerce dramatically increase their use of social media, especially Twitter and Facebook.   I've noticed a few chambers of commerce that have truly created their own community of followers on Twitter, too. 

These chambers not only promote their own events and news, but they highlight their members (using their Twitter IDs) and they engage them with conversations.   And, their members even end up promoting each other in addition to recommending their chamber to others.

How cool is that?  An online community of chamber members using Twitter to promote their business, their friends' businesses, their chamber and their physical community!

I think this is fantastic, but it can be hard to keep your followers up to date on which of your members are on Twitter.

Today, I saw one way the Mountain Brook AL Chamber of Commerce makes it EASY for members to follow other members on Twitter - all at once.   On the lower right portion of their website (and probably in other communications), they link to a list of their members on Twitter.


The page you land on is created on TweepML, which lets you create lists for any group of Twitter users you want.   What's neat about this service (and makes it a bit different from the lists that Twitter lets you create) is that you can choose to follow one, multiple or ALL of the members on the list at once. 

You simply select the people you want to follow (or Select All) and scroll down the page to enter your Twitter name and password or connect using Twitter's Oath service.   Then you'll be following everyone you selected.  Quick and easy!

I know that some applications like Tweetdeck and Seesmic let you see Twitter lists that you follow, too. But most small business owners probably don't use those applications or fully understand how Twitter lists work.  By using a tool like TweepML, you can help them directly follow other chamber members.

I did a quick test of TweepML and it was very easy to set up my list.   Try it out for your chamber of commerce or business association.  And let me know other ways you connect your members on Twitter to each other, too.  Happy connecting!

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. 

A few months ago, I wrote about the Pitfalls of Social Media for chambers of commerce and associations. Since then I've had some great conversations with staff from chambers and association about how to avoid these pitfalls and use social media to strengthen their brands and engage their members.

Recently, I found this post by B.L. Ochman about Three Top Ways to Damage Your Brand With Social Media.   She makes some good points about ways you could negatively impact your organization with the MIS-USE of social media.


Start a Twitter account, then don't use it - Fortunately, I haven't see very many chambers of commerce with Twitter accounts such as the @TimeWarnerCares example in the post. 

However, I have seen plenty of chamber Twitter accounts with hundreds of followers, yet they are only following a handful of people.  A big part of using Twitter is listening and engaging in conversation with your followers.  What does it say about your organization if you're not following your members or other businesses in your community?  It seems like you're not interested in listening to them!  That doesn't do much for your brand, does it?

No, you don't have to follow everyone that follows you, but you should probably follow anyone who is located in your community or has an obvious link to your organization.  When someone follows you, look at their profile location, URL and bio to see to determine if you should follow them back. (In most cases, you should). 

Not tracking your brand using monitoring tools  -  With all the free tools available, there is really no excuse for not doing at least some monitoring.   See "Is your chamber 'listening' to the internet" for more info.  Set up searches for your organization's name, your city name or other terms specific to your organization so you can know when people are talking about you. (And decide if/when to respond).  Some tools to try include:

• Twitter Search - View results in your browser or set up an RSS feed of your search
• Google Alerts - View results, set up email alerts or get an RSS feed
• Google Blogsearch - View results, set up email alerts or get an RSS feed
• Twilert - does a Twitter search, but sends you email
• Monitter - a browser based Twitter search tool that lets you search by keyword and geographic location.

If you don't monitor the web for your brand mentions, you will probably be left out of the conversations taking place in your community.  You can't do much for your reputation and brand if you don't know about these discussions.
 
Start using social media, but don't tell the rest of the organization - Good news, here.  I don't know any chambers of commerce or business associations who have done this.  Occasionally, individuals will start using social media and because they work for a chamber of commerce or assocation, the followers will assume they are speaking on behalf of the organization.  It's probably worthwhile to have a conversation with all staff about the appropriate use of social media and refinforce that (whether they like it or not) they are respresenting your organization.  Remember, too, to keep your board (and members) advised of what you're doing with social media.  We've all had those phone calls from board members who are upset because they had to find out about something from someone else.


I have a couple of addtional ways beyond those listed in the post:

One way communications on Twitter - I've seen a few chambers of commerce that only post updates on Twitter with links to their own events, blog posts or website.  There are no replies to others, no retweets and no sharing of links or resources on other sites.   This practice is similar to not listening.   Even when someone replies to the organization, there are no subsequent replies. 

If someone answers your question or retweets your info, reply to them, thank them and engage them!   Some replies are certainly better sent as direct messages (and not viewable on your stream), but having some RTs and @replies in your Twitter stream shows you're engaging your audience, not just pushing out info. 

Repetitive Tweeting - Some organizations seem to post the same 5-10 things every day on Twitter. "Check out our website" or "Did you know XYZ" are great every once in a while, but when done systematically, day after day, with exactly the same text, they become the equivilent of spam.

Sure, you could argue that not all followers will see the message each time and you want to make sure you get the word out. I certainly understand that. But, you can vary your text and messaging so that you're not monotonous.  Your followers will quickly tire of seeing the same message over and over again and may choose to stop following you.


What do you think?  Are there other ways you could damage your organization by using (or mis-using) social media?

Many young professionals give back to their communities by mentoring area children and students, but rarely are they are on the receiving end such a relationship – until recently!

In an effort to get more young professionals involved in their young professionals groups, chambers of commerce are beginning to offer mentoring programs.

The types of programming for such mentoring programs vary, but two of the most popular I’ve come across include:

• One-on-one programs that pair young professionals with older, more experienced professionals for a minimum of sixth-months
• Group mentoring in which members meet in groups with a mix of older and younger professionals

As a young professional, it is exciting to hear that chambers are creating such innovative programming to help better connect the business community and to help develop future business leaders. I would be eager to join a group that offers the chance to “pick the brains” of seasoned business professionals.

Has your chamber or association already started a mentoring program within your young professionals group? If so, how is it working for you – have you seen an increase in participation, what is the feedback like? If not, is this something your young professionals group might start considering?

Consider this: For the chamber of commerce, this is not only a great way to get young professionals involved with your chamber and more informed about your organization, but it also offers your members a way to volunteer while getting more involved in the chamber. Plus, who else is better equipped in your community to do this than your chamber? No one -- because no one has the kind of connections to the local business community like you!

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.)

While perusing the U.S. News and World Report’s website today I came across a few lists of “Bests” -- America’s Best Places to Find a Job, 10 Best Places to Grow Up, etc. And yet, when I went to some of those city’s websites, there was no mention of these honors -- a missed opportunity for the chambers of commerce, the visitor’s convention bureaus and any other city website really.

Maybe my college liked to brag too much, but whenever something like this was announced and we were on the list, it became a top story on the homepage. Does your chamber of commerce or business association ever put links to third party reports on your website, or does your news section only contain content written by chamber/association staff? If it’s the latter, there are still ways for you to promote the great news from other sources yourself – by writing a press release, writing a response to the report, etc. Finding ways to boast about your organization on your website is a great way to capture potential new residents and potential new chamber members or association members.

You might be wondering what I mean by potential residents. Well, when I was looking for a job right out of college, my biggest concern was location. I figured that after I found a city I wanted to be in, the job search would follow suit.  (A sort of ‘If you build it, he will come’ mentality :) ) And I’m not alone. My experience with a lot of my friends has been that young professionals want to live in certain cities -- not we want to move to a place because of a job (although sometimes that is what ends up happening).

Picture this. A college student/recent graduate has found your website thanks to your high SEO when he or she types your area into an internet search. This person sees the pictures of your area on your homepage and likes it so far. Then, on the homepage there is a blurb that says “One of America’s Best Places to Find a Job!” You better believe that young professional is more likely to consider relocating to your city with that kind of news! (BTW - Is Your Website Attracting Young Professionals?) 

But, even if that person ends up somewhere else, they become a prospect for local tourism. Sometimes things don’t work in our favor to allow us to live in the cities we want, but that’s what vacations are for, right?

So don’t hold back. Make sure visitors to your website know not only the value of your chamber of commerce or business association, but also the value of your community!

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!

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.

Today on Twitter, my co-worker Benji Craig (@benjicraig) posted this tweet: 

1. What is the role of of chamber of commerce
2. What is the purpose of a chamber of commerce

There are probably plenty of businesses in your community (and even some members) that have the same questions.

Right now, go create a blog post and/or newsletter article that explains not only the role of a chamber of commerce, but specifically how YOUR chamber serves your business community.  Include specific benefit programs, recent government affairs efforts and more to demonstrate how your ogranization works for your members. 

And, use this as an opporunity to ask your members how THEY see the role of your chamber.  You may find that some of them have much different ideas about what activities your chamber should be doing.  Cross promote your new post on Twitter and/or your LinkedIn group and engage your members in a conversation.  Ask them for their opions and ideas.  Educate them about services they may not know about.  Share the information you learn.

And, if you need ideas for more blog posts, see 25 Things Your Chamber Can Blog About.

If you can use only 4 social media tools, use these:  Twitter, Blogs, LinkedIn & Facebook.   These are by far the social media tools that marketers most frequently use, according to the Social Media Marketing Industry Report. (page 19)

Each one of these - Twitter, Blogs, LinkedIn & Facebook - can be used in concert (see what I did there) with each other AND with what you’re already doing in your organization’s communications efforts.  But how can your chamber create a communications symphony with all these different media?  Read on...

Twitter
Use Twitter to cross-promote your chamber's blog posts, events and members.  There are a number of chambers using Twitter in other ways, too. However, don't forget to follow businesses in your area and have conversations with them, too.

And, of course, you can cross-promote your LinkedIn group, Facebook page and any other social media you use.  I will stress again, though....don't just push information.  Mix up your tweets with questions and replies to your followers.

Blogs
We know that blogs are great ways to position your chamber as an expert and create communications that engages your members.  If you've been blogging for a while and think you've run out of topics, check out
25 Things Your Chamber Can Blog About.  

See some good Chamber blogs below.  These Chambers do a nice job of creating communications that are relevant for their members. Yes, you can mix in posts about events and members with legislative and business issues as you'll see in some of these blogs.

LinkedIn
If you're not on LinkedIn yet, go there now and set up your profile and have your coworkers do the same.  Using the tools that LinkedIn provides, you'll be amazed out how quickly you can build a network.  You can (and should) create a profile for your chamber, too.  Connect with your members and other businesses in your community.  Keep you and your chamber in the middle of your area's local and online networking.  If you don't, someone else will take that role.

There are plenty of chambers of commerce who have LinkedIn groups, too.
I've been researching chamber LinkedIn groups and will post soon about using these groups effectively.  In the meantime, here are some quick tips:

• It may seem obvioius, but ask questions. Push content and concepts to your LinkedIn group members and get their input.  
• Answer questions asked by others, or at least refer them to another resource in your area.  Be the great connector in the online world just as you are in the offline world.
• Post national and local business news, make it relevant to your community and see how your group members respond.  Again, ask for their input, see how it is affecting them or show them what they can learn from it.

Facebook
There are two things (among many) that you can do on Facebook for your chamber:  Create a group and create a page for your chamber.   The biggest difference is that people can "join" your group, but they can become a "fan" of your page/chamber.

There are subtle differences in how you would manage a group versus a page. (Why not have both?  The two can live in harmony, after all.)  For example, through Facebook's interface you can invite anyone to join your group (either your Facebook friends or send email to anyone else).  Once they are a member of your group, you can send messages to them about new items in your group, invite them to events, etc.   

On your Facebook page, you can send an update to your fans (through Facebook's tools) and let them know when you've added new videos, events or other content. 

See a list of chambers with Facebook pages and chambers with Facebook groups.   Similar to LinkedIn groups, be sure to engage your Facebook fans or members by giving them frequent updates and new content.

The big finish
Use this quartet of social media tools to cross-promote each other.  Use Twitter to announce a new blog post or ask for replies to a question in your LinkedIn group.  Connect your blog's RSS feed to your Facebook page and your LinkedIn profile.   Create blog posts about successful connections between members in your LinkedIn group.  Share information about your chamber and about your members.

However, please don't simply repost everything you do to every other medium.  Occassionally that's OK, but if you do it all the time, it will seem like spamming to your biggest fans (the ones who connect with you on all networks) and you certainly don't want to alienate them. In fact, you want to reward them!  Why not create some social media exclusive items like contests on Twitter or Facebook trivia questions that you don't promote in other areas?   Your followers and fans on each network will appreciate your efforts to create unique content. 

And....have some fun!  Let your enthusiasm for your chamber, your members and your community come through in yours posts.

By using these tools, you and your chamber can be make sweet music using social media - no chamber orchestras required. (OK, enough with the music puns!) ;-)

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.

Last week, I posted about how chambers can use Twitter to welcome and promote members.  Since then, I've seen lots of chambers using these concepts to talk about their members on Twitter.  I've also seen some great examples of chambers of commerce using Twitter in other ways and wanted to share them with you here.

Ask your followers what they'd like to see posted from you.  The Boise Metro Chamber asked their followers this exact question. What a fanstastic way to engage your followers to learn how to provide information that they want.

Share business information about your community.   The Indianapolis Chamber shared information from another organization reporting on local job creation.  Even though the chamber didn't create the report, the news is relevant for those following the Indy Chamber. 


Reach out to people talking about your community.  If you're not using tools like Twitter Search or Twilert, start right now!   Set up searches for your chamber's name, your city's name and other community-specific terms you'd like to monitor.  The Wausau WI Chamber likely used one of these services to find the tweet below:

and responded with:

This is a great way to introduce someone to your community AND connect them with businesses in your area (YOUR MEMBERS) that can provide the products or services they are looking for.  You can even go further and create links that take them directly to your employment, visitor or relocation information pages as needed.

In the next example, a board member for the Tualatin OR Chamber saw this tweet from someone obviously visiting their community.  (And maybe not sure why they were there?)
and responded with:
Wow! If I had posted that original tweet, I would be very impressed that a local business person found it and thanked me for visiting the community. How cool is that?

Cross-promote your blog.  The tweet below is a great "double play" post from the Asheville NC Chamber.  First, they are cross-promoting their blog and including a link to the post.  But at the same time, they are sharing great information about the local business community with their followers.
And, here's another example of connecting your followers and chamber members with each other on Twitter.  The Rogers-Lowell AR Chamber shared several of their members who are on Twitter with this post:
And, if you're not following what the Loveland CO Chamber and their President/CEO Brian Willms are doing on Twitter, you should be.  There are many great examples of them sharing local information, relevant business and marketing information for their members, retweeting others, promoting members and events and connecting busineses in their area.  Bravo!

I'm very excited (yes, I'm a geek) that so many chambers are using Twitter and other social media to have conversations with their members and share information.   Do you have other examples of how your chamber is using Twitter?  Please share them in the comments below or email me at curt.moss[at]weblinkinternational.com.

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!

On this blog I've mentioned several chambers who are using social media well.  They include the Maryland State Chamber, Clovis California Chamber, Frederick County Maryland Chamber, Salem Oregon Chamber and North Mason Washington Chamber.   I know there are others, too....tell me your stories!  (Please.)  :-)

How is your chamber and your staff using social media?  And what successes are you enjoying?

I'm doing more research looking for upcoming whitepapers, webinars and technology presentations and I'd like to include your success stories. 

• Are you using your blog to position your chamber as an expert and engage your business community in discussions of the issues?
• Have you used Twitter to reach out to prospects and convert them to members?  Or have you connected existing members to each other to foster a business relationship?
• Do you have a Facebook or LinkedIn page/group that is active with member participation? Are your members asking/answering questions and having conversations on these sites?
• Have you used YouTube or other video site to promote your members or your community?
• Does your chamber or community manage a Wiki where community members can collaborate on business topics?
• Do you have your own social network where members are connecting and building relationships?
• How else are you using social media?

As you may know, I worked for the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce for eight years...chamber is in my blood and I truly enjoy working with so many chambers around the country.  I love hearing how you're using social media and I also love sharing your successes with other chambers.

Please send me an email at curt.moss@weblinkinternational.com to let me know how you are using social media (or if you have questons about how your chamber could use social media). 

There are so many chambers of commerce doing great work and evolving their organizations.   Let's show everyone that chambers are progressive and using new media to engage their members and their community!

I really do want to hear your stories!  Thank you. 

On Monday, the Wall Street Journal published a story about how chambers of commerce are helping small businesses stay abreast of the latest technologies.  The article demonstrates how some chambers of commerce are using technology to engage their members and strengthen their business community.

We're very pleased that two of our clients, the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce and the Salem (OR) Chamber of Commerce were highlighted in the article.   A few months ago, we had our PR firm contact the Wall Street Journal in an effort to help our clients get media coverage demonstrating how they are benefiting their communities.  A few of our clients' stories - and even a mention of WebLink - failed to make the final edits, however.  (Darn editors!) ;)

Now consider this blog post by Tony Rossell - Associations Get Mixed Grades for Helping Members in a Recession    (I know that chambers of commerce are sometimes different from associations, but I think there are some common themes here.)  Tony mentions a report, "Beliefs, Behaviors and Attitudes in Response to the Economy," that shows how members feel about their organization's efforts to help them during these economic times.   

In his post, Tony highlights several key points from the survey.  How do you feel about the survey? Are the results similar to what you're seeing with your members?

Tony also says in his post:


I touched on some ways chambers can do that in this recent post.   Many of our clients use referral reports and custom fields to track and report on all the ways their chamber provides benefits to their members - on an individual basis.  They then use this information in communications (phone calls, emails, mail) throughout the year to help communicate value.
The Wall Street Journal article shows some clear cases of chambers of commerce are evolving and using technology to create and communicate value for their members.   Back in December, I wrote this post about creating value with technology and have since heard from several of our clients.  We've heard that some of them are indeed able to increase member retention and generate new member sales (even during a recession) by using technology.

Grafton deButts of the Loudon County Chamber of Commerce, had this to say:

How is your chamber of commerce or business association using technology to create and communicate value? Let me know in the comments below.   I'd love to hear your success stories!