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. 

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!

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!

I keep hearing that when individuals search for businesses within a community, the first place they go is to the chamber of commerce website. But what if that individual doesn’t know what a chamber of commerce is?  While this may seem absurd to some, I’ll admit my ignorance – before working for WebLink, I did not know much about chambers of commerce, let alone that chambers are a trusted business search engine. And the sad reality is that most of my generation is missing out on the valuable resources of chambers simply because we don’t know about them.

A perfect example. I recently moved to Indianapolis from Dayton, Ohio. After settling in my new apartment, I decided I seriously needed a hair cut before starting my new job. So I turned to the internet. My search (hair salons near 46268) had over 300,000 results, all of which were individual websites requiring me to sift through more results than I cared to. Had I known that chambers of commerce are the ‘Google of their community’, I would have saved a lot of wasted time going through various websites – some that did not even relate to my search.

Chambers are not only valuable to their members, but also to people like me who just want to easily find relevant information on the internet in ONE PLACE. Membership directories are like a one-stop shop for people looking for local businesses. Chambers of commerce easily connect searchers with their member businesses – saving the searcher time, and giving the business a potential new customer.

How is your chamber making sure you reach consumers who might not know what a chamber is? There are probably residents in your community who don’t realize the tremendous resources and services your chamber of commerce offers.   Sure, you might say that “residents aren’t our target for membership.”  But, consider that all those residents have to work somewhere, right?  Are their businesses members of your chamber?  And, what happens when all the young professionals start their own businesses or move up the corporate ladder.  It would be beneficial to your organization if they already knew what the chamber was.  It would be even better if they already had a relationship with your organization.

How are you getting the attention of young professionals in your community?  I know many chambers of commerce have started separate young professionals groups.  How is that working? Are they eventually transitioning over to your chamber or are they losing interest?

Recently I sat in a conference call with the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce. As WebLink’s Benji Craig was explaining the importance of SEO to their chamber, it hit me – this really is important.

Before I joined the WebLink team, I knew nothing about chambers of commerce, convention and visitors bureaus or business associations. It was almost embarrassing learning about these organizations and realizing what a great resource I had been missing out on. Whenever my friends or I would plan a trip outside of our community we – like most – started on the internet. Searching for generic terms such as “hotels” or “attractions” often lead us to multiple pages that gave us headaches on our quest to find what we wanted. If only we had known about chamber of commerce websites!

If someone does a generic search such as hotels and attractions in your area, would your chamber’s website come up?

But it’s about more than just SEO – your website needs to not only be appearing high on the results page, but needs to be easy to navigate, esthetically pleasing and informative.

My generation is your chamber’s next major audience to reach, and our reputation of having short attention spans needs to be accepted! Within the first couple of seconds on your website a tone will be set about the professionalism of your organization. In addition, if we cannot find what we want within those same seconds, we’ll turn somewhere else.  If possible, reach out to the younger professionals of your organization and have them or their friends audit the accessibility and overall appeal of your website.

If a person wanted to find a hotel or a local business in your area, would they be able to from the homepage – without clicking through many navigation tools? Do you have a search box on your home page?  What does your home page say about your organization?  Although we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover – we do, so make sure your homepage gives visitors the impression you want it to convey.

And, it’s not just about site visitors either. Your community is full of young professionals that may have pre-conceived notions of what a chamber of commerce is.  You can show young professionals that your organization is “up with the times” by creating a modern, easy to use website that contains updated and useful information for local businesses and visitors alike.

By Pam Sefrino, WebLink Director of Sales, Northeast Region (formerly with Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce)

 

In this tough economic climate, member retention rates are falling and even long-time chamber members are scrutinizing every dollar they spend and looking at the return on their annual membership investment. What are you doing to ensure that renewing membership in your chamber is an easy decision, even when belts are being tightened?

No longer are chamber professionals able to get away with talking about the “benefits” of Chamber membership in intangibles. Saying that you host 50 networking events per year or that your Chamber played a role in defeating important anti-business legislation at the State House just isn’t going to cut it anymore. Chamber members want hard evidence as to how they are benefitting by being a member of your chamber - and that evidence needs to be easily accessible, both to them and to you, well before the renewal notice is received.

Using strong technology for your membership management system is truly the only surefire way to gain the member intelligence necessary to demonstrate real value. Show AND tell them how they are benefiting, don’t just tell them and hope that they’ll renew.

Show your members exactly how many times their business listing or banner advertisement was displayed on the chamber’s website with instant referral reports for their company. Demonstrate how many times they were referred on the phone to those who called your chamber looking for a business or services in their industry, by using an automatic “front desk” phone referral system built into your database.  Provide members in the top categories searched on your website with real evidence of their return on their membership investment by sharing those reports regularly. Give non-members in top categories searched a “trial” membership for one month. Then run the referral report, share the top categories searched report and sign them up for membership!

Purposefully using technology to address the question “what’s in it for me?” before it’s ever even asked, goes a long way in increasing member retention and even selling new memberships.