Good Reads

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August 16, 2011

You’ve Got to Read This: August 16, 2011

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I’m back from the beach and plowing through emails, blog posts, conference tweets and more. Thanks to Andrew Hanelly at TMG Custom Media’s Engage blog, I found seven ways to tame the beast: 7 Steps to Dealing with Information Overload.

If you’re coming back from vacation to blog editor duties, you’ll appreciate the advice in this post from Sarah Arrow at For Bloggers by Bloggers, especially if your blog relies on several contributors: 7 Laws That Make Your Multi Author Blog a Success.

When I tweeted out the link to this post, I described it as my best read all day. Noah Brier says the number one question he gets from brand marketers is: “What should I tweet about?” He goes on to write in Want to Tweet? First, Teach Your Brand to Speak at AdAge Digital: “What eludes brands so persistently in new media comes to people naturally.…The content people are sharing, unsurprisingly, is the content they are consuming.”

Ian Greenleigh laments the state of company websites in Quit Blogging Like a Tech Company at Dare to Comment. After posting product release notes and press releases, he says, “They discover how easy it is to blog about themselves. But no one reads it, or cares. Sooner or later, when that ROI never appears from the ether, they give up. And then they’re really blogging like a tech company, because they’re actually blogging so infrequently, it’s a sad little ghost town of quarterly posts.”

Why are Restaurant Websites so Horrifically Bad? asks Farhad Manjoo at Slate. Using hideous examples from some top-notch restaurants, he shows how the design and content fails miserably. The topic was picked up by the readers of Andrew Sullivan’s The Dish who pointed out the weaknesses of artist and college websites as well as restaurant sites. Although the posts are good for a laugh, there is a lot to learn here. Take a hard look at your organization’s website when you’re done.

My last one is for office refrigerators and bulletin boards everywhere, by my online association pal Jeffrey Cufaude: Anyone Can: So Why Not You? I’ve always been fond of #5: “Say what everyone knows but is afraid to bring up.” Who wouldn’t love #12? “Bring in a healthy snack for what will be a very long meeting.”

 

August 4, 2011

Blogging Elsewhere: August 2011

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While the association community flies this weekend to St. Louis for the annual ASAE conference, I’ll be driving a few hours to spend a week with lots of family and friends at beautiful Ocean Isle Beach here in North Carolina. I’m sad about missing the opportunity to spend time with friends at ASAE, but I’m easily consoled by the thought of a coastal breeze, warm water and sand between my toes.

I’ll leave you with something to read while I’m gone.

Tasty Recipes

On my Grabbing the Gusto blog, there are three new chicken recipes to check out – blueberry chipotle, Milanese and rosemary walnut. I’m always on the hunt for good fish recipes. Recently I made sweet spicy glazed salmon, citrus coconut tilapia and Mediterranean braised cod.

If you’re looking for a potato salad recipe that doesn’t use mayonnaise, I have two options – southwestern and lemon spinach herb. In the veggie department, try haricot verts (green beans), broccoli rabe or summer vegetables with pesto. One of my favorite new recipes is Mexican shrimp cocktail. If you’re looking for other truly delicious appetizers, try eggplant caponata or white bean dip with homemade pita chips.

Meaty Blog Posts

Every week I write a blog post for my client Avectra, an association management software and online community platform vendor. I love how Avectra uses their blog to share association success stories, and I’m very happy to be a part of that.

Be the Host with the Most: Twitter Chats for Associations

Imagine a weekly conversation with newfound friends about topics that inform and inspire. That’s the power of a good Twitter chat. Read more at Avectra about how two associations host and participate in Twitter chats with their members.

I Gave at the Office: Community Service at the Association

Community service events provide a membership experience that’s more rewarding and memorable than the usual association networking, meetings and education. Here’s a closer look at an association (ACC) experimenting for the first time with community service at its conference and a communications firm (Capstrat) whose staff organizes and participates in an annual week of community service. Read more at Avectra about how ACC and Capstrat pulled off successful and fun community service events.

Associations: Follow the President and Librarians to the Virtual Town Hall

President Obama held a Twitter town hall that was broadcast via a live webcast. More than 70,000 tweets were sent to him. But he wasn’t the first one to do this. The librarians were way ahead of him. The American Library Association held their first Virtual Town Hall in June. Read at Avectra how virtual town halls give members the opportunity to feel and act like members.

Six Association Lessons from the Tour de France

For three weeks I was glued to my TV for the live morning broadcast of the Tour de France. In thinking about why I love (okay, obsess over) the Tour so much, I realized it illustrates principles that apply to the association industry. Read more at Avectra about what the Tour de France can teach us about management and leadership.

Secrets to a Tightly Knit Association Community

Ravelry, an online community for knitters, crocheters and other lovers of the fiber arts, was launched in January 2007 by a husband-wife team, she’s the knitter and he’s the coder. It’s a gigantic community of 1.4 million registered members — 400,000 of whom visit monthly. Every day the founders invite 1,500 new users from a waiting list. What could an association possibly learn from such a behemoth? Read more at Avectra about lessons from Ravelry for your online community.

Virtual Work in the Association World

At a workplace flexibility forum President Obama said, “Work is what you do, not where you do it.” I live that principle as a freelancer, but, for most of you, ‘work’ is the association office. Maybe it doesn’t have to be that way. Read more at Avectra about how virtual work can benefit both an organization and its employees.

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While the household staff packs my trunks for the beach, I'll see what's happening on Twitter. Ta ta! (photo by Mike Licht)

 

August 2, 2011

You’ve Got to Read This: August 2, 2011

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It’s been a while since I’ve written a curated post. If you or your organization have trouble finding time to write a post or figuring out what to write about, consider publishing a weekly curated post. As a reader, I love them – my favorite bloggers filter their information stream and select some of their best reads of the week. It’s just like Twitter but instead it’s all in one place and delivered via my Google Reader.

So how do you find great content? Well, it’s funny you ask. Mike Stelzner wrote about eight ways to do just that on Social Media Examiner.

I’ll let you in on my little secret for having great content to share on Twitter. You can scoff if you want but it’s been working for me for years. I explain it all in my post about tweeting like a real tweep.

Bob Leonard shares good basic advice on how to repurpose content you already have – speeches, white papers and sales presentations. He also explains how to find and curate content.

Now you might be thinking, “Nice, but how do I find the time to do all this stuff?” The Nonprofit Blog Carnival, hosted this month by Britt Bravo at Have Fun Do Good, gathered several posts about time management. I haven’t yet dipped into it but wanted to share it with you. I’ll pick a few favorites for a future You’ve Got to Read This post.

Or, you might be thinking, “Ok, I get the need for fresh useful and interesting content. But I don’t have time to write.” No problem, you can tell your story through a ghostwriter. The Winn Group (more accurately, their ghostwriter) explains what to look for in a ghostwriter. But, psst, you don’t need to contact them to find a ghostwriter, give me a holler instead.

If you write about social media, you might wonder how to spell some of its newfangled lingo. ReTweet or retweet? Fear not, Kerry Jones of Bluegrass Media gives us The Grammar of Social Media. Turn it into a one-pager and tack it up on your bulletin board.

And now for something completely different, the most awkward 404 page on the Internet (love it!) by Steve Lambert. Save this one for when you have several minutes to watch, it’s worth it.

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Steve Lambert helping lost website visitors

 

April 26, 2011

Blogging Elsewhere: April 2011

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I’m spreading myself around, but not too thin, oh no, plenty of bandwidth here. My recent posts on other blogs — Avectra, Socialfish and SmartBlog Insights – include:

Member Communication: Have It Their Way

Member communication is getting crazy. Just when you thought email was the way to go, now we hear young people don’t use it. Do you give up on email? What about print? And must you add social media to the mix? Before you make decisions about what you’re not going to do, ask your members how they like to receive information.  Read the rest at Avectra…

Open Community Case Study – Empowering the Periphery

Like many large national associations, the American Library Association has struggled with a “digital image problem” in the last decade. With 1300 committees, 11 dues-paying divisions, 17 roundtables, 57 sections and a myriad of possible membership combinations, members had trouble figuring out how to get involved. Many thought ALA was too bureaucratic and not responsive enough.  Read the rest at Socialfish…

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Photo by Mike Licht

Content Alone Is Not Enough

Will you pay $195 a year to read the New York Times online? In a quest for revenue, the Times will erect a paywall on March 28. The folks at TMG’s Engage blog explain the Times’ new metered approach. Readers will still have access to articles through search engines and social media. Publisher and board chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. says, “We did not — any of us — feel that putting up an iron gate, if you will, that cut us out of the digital ecosystem, made any sense at all.”  Read the rest at Avectra…

How associations can engage a crowd of curators

How would you like to curate an upcoming art exhibit? You won’t even need a graduate degree in art history or museum studies to do it. In 10 minutes you can help curate an upcoming exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum, Split Second: Indian Paintings. Like many associations, art museums are experimenting with new ways to engage their audiences.  Read the rest at SmartBlog Insights…

Uh Oh, I Just Did Something Really Stupid

You hear the words from outside your door and freeze. It’s the voice of your social media specialist. Now there’s only silence. You’re thinking, stupid how? Stupid for the association, stupid? You stare at her gray cubicle wall, willing her to speak again. Maybe it was nothing, something personal.  Or maybe she dropped a bomb, like the person tweeting for Chrysler, and soon your world will explode.  Read the rest at Avectra…

 

March 31, 2011

Blogging Elsewhere: March 2011

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I’ve been cheating on my blog again. Here are some of my posts on other blogs — Avectra and Socialfish.

Yes, You Can Be Private in Public

Do you have a hard time convincing your members to get active online? Even the lure of curated resources, scintillating conversations and new friendships might not be enough to get them over a huge mental barrier – loss of privacy and, in their minds, loss of control.  Read the rest at Avectra…

Gratitude is the Best Attitude

Gary Vaynerchuk’s new book, The Thank You Economy, hit bookstore shelves, iPads and Kindles yesterday. Vaynerchuk believes companies are “going to have to relearn and employ the ethics and skills our great-grandparents’ generation took for granted” when building their own businesses. By using social media platforms, organizations can give “personal, one-on-one attention to their entire customer base, no matter how large.”  Read the rest at Avectra…

Open Community Case Study – GoPlow

The first goal in SIMA’s vision statement is: “be the ‘go-to’ resource in their industry.” Brian believed they couldn’t do that until they had a open community website generating solid content.  Read the rest at Socialfish…

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Photo by Mike Licht (Flickr: notionscapital)

Making Your Community a Good Habit

Any community manager can tell you: “If you build it, they will come” only works in the Field of Dreams, not with online communities. What if you did your research, filled your community with valuable content, marketed it in all the right places and your members are still MIA?  Read the rest at Avectra…

Open Community Case Study – Food Bank

I first met Jen Newmeyer, who is the Food Bank’s social media person, at a Raleigh tweet-up last year. She’s done a great job using social media to create a very supportive community of donors and fans, so I immediately thought of them when planning the first case study for Open Community. And do you see what I’m doing here? I’m fulfilling my role as an accidental spokesperson by giving them the spotlight and spreading their message. See, it works!  Read the rest at Socialfish…

Lessons from Weekend Camp: EventCamp

I went to camp on Saturday: the EventCamp National Conference in Chicago. But, I didn’t fly to Chicago; I enjoyed the hybrid conference from the comfort of my home office.  Read the rest at Avectra…

 

February 10, 2011

You’ve Got to Read This: February 10, 2011

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Innovation starts with self-critique (which is why it’s so rare), says Peter Linett. Go against your type, don’t put on “an exhibition that feels like an art museum designed it” or “a concert format that feels like a symphony orchestra designed it.” His litmus test for innovation: “I ask myself whether it feels like it was designed by that kind of institution, within its traditions, values, and personality — its comfort zone.” What does a conference or work meeting look like that doesn’t feel like an association designed it?

Kivi Leroux Miller reminds us that we are not our target audience. Before communicating with that audience, do all you can to put yourself in their shoes – research, listen and seek advice of those who are like that audience. Just because you’re in charge, doesn’t mean you get it.

It kills me when an organization doesn’t get the fact that helping their staff connect to their members, prospects or customers is the smart thing to do. Janet McNichol writes about making association business cards social media-friendly but her advice works for any organization.

Lindsey A. Zahn has a very informative post on the Palate Press site about website scraping, copyright, fair use and wine bloggers. I’m seeing more and more sites that scrape content without permission and then get higher page ranking and increased advertising revenue. Bottom-feeders! As one commenter puts it, “it just pisses me off that our hard work and content is contributing to someone else’s bottom line.”

“Please, don’t hire a social media director,” says Dion Algeri. He’s right. Too often organizations start their journey into social media by hiring someone to do social media. Instead hire someone to collect, curate, repurpose and create content. Hire a chief content officer. Ok, you don’t have to call it that, but focus on content as a tool to create conversation and connections.

In December I wrote about the Smithsonian’s censorship of a video in a National Portrait Gallery exhibition. In case you were wondering if anything was done about that ignorant decision, ArtInfo tells us, well, yes and no.

If your appetite for resources on nonprofits and social media is not sated, Beth Kanter shares a bunch from the Zoetica Salon, including posts on editorial calendars, strategy tune-ups, benchmarking and more.

I’m riveted to the news from Egypt. We (they, it’s all the same now, isn’t it?) are either on the cusp of something amazingly positive for that country, although the obstacles are formidable, or we are in for a huge disappointment if the military regime holds onto power. They are so intertwined into the political and economic infrastructure, it’s hard to imagine them ceding power at all. I created a Twitter list of  29, at last count, Egyptian activists and journalists worth following. Respect.

egyptian twitter list

Image by Nick Bygon

 

February 8, 2011

Blogging Elsewhere: Winter 2011

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I’ve been a busy blogging bee lately. Here are a few of my posts on other blogs.

Give New Life to Your Press Release

With the rise of social media, some pundits have declared the press release dead. Others say that’s an extreme view; a good release still plays an important role. However, too many releases deserve the dustbin — poorly crafted, irrelevant and self-serving announcements disguised as press releases.

Read more…

The Power of Personal Learning Networks

It’s an exciting time for lifelong learners. Sources for news, information and knowledge were limited when I first entered the association management industry, but now, thanks to social media, options for learning are unlimited. As a result, we’re bombarded with words and ideas.

Read more…

Is Boomer Leadership Failing Millennials?

Millennials have been pushing my buttons lately, but in a good way. In my last post I looked at the online discussion about the value of association membership that Joe Flowers’ post provoked. This week I read a post by another Millennial blogger, Josip Petrusa – Attracting Millennials to Your Event and Why You’re Failing at It. He wrote of a recent PCMA conference. “It’s as if no one had a true grasp on who and what the Millennials are all about.”

Read more…

To Be or Not to Be, a Member

Last week Joe Flowers tweeted, “After a lot of thought, I decided to not renew my (ASAE Young Association Professional) membership.” I suggested he blog about his decision. His reasoning is probably shared by many association members so his peers would benefit from hearing his views. His post spurred a passionate conversation about associations and membership.

Read more…

Social Media and Political Action Lessons from Egypt

“Every Egyptian I talked to on ground this week laughed when I told them some think tech was not a vital tool for organizing.” Jared Cohen, Director of Google Ideas and an Adjunct Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, sent that tweet last week.

Read more when it’s published on Wednesday, February 9, 2011

associations social media press releases grassroots membership

Graphic by Mike Licht

 

February 3, 2011

You’ve Got to Read This: February 3, 2011

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Joe Pulizzi at Junta42 shares a great idea for many organizations that’s also a natural fit for associations, and more imperative than ever since many have been losing traction in this area — Starting a News Service for Your Industry. Chief Content Officer? What a cool job that would be!

Social media can be a catalyst for positive organizational change. In this fascinating interview with Arthur L. Hue, author of Social Media at Work: How Networking Tools Propel Organizational Performance, at Thomas Clifford’s blog, we learn how using social media can foster staff engagement and motivation. Hue also believes it will be the key to recruiting and retaining Millennials.

Maggie McGary at Mizz Information is one of my favorite bloggers because she cuts through the bull, asks tough questions and gives solid advice. Her recent guest post on Socialfish is an example of what I mean – Five Reasons Why Facebook Will Never Replace Your Website.

An interesting article by Neal Gabler, Everyone’s a Critic Now, is another in a recent flurry of writing about the state of criticism, including a blog post from me. Gabler writes about the strange critical consensus on 2010’s Top Ten lists and the battles between high and popular culture. Be sure to spend some time reading the responses from critics. The whole argument about cultural elitism has really struck a nerve with me lately. I love being part of the “age of cultural populism” that Gabler describes, but I really detest the way some populists disdain the tastes of others, and vice versa.

Thanks to Adam Haslett’s recent article, The Art of Good Writing, I’ve added yet another book to my wish list — How to Write a Sentence: And How to Read One. Haslett’s article itself is a treat for literature and word lovers.

My Greensboro pal, Danielle Hatfield at Experience Farm, shared a good post with her Twitter friends by Kathryn Williams, Working from Home: A Survivor’s Guide. Kathryn obviously knows the benefits and downfalls of a home office. Yes, I’m in yoga clothes right now but that’s because I plan to roll out the mat soon. Really.

If you’re an art lover who doesn’t have a big travel budget, you’ll love the Google Art Project. You can browse through 17 major art museums, including the Met, Frick, MoMA, Tate Britain, Rijksmuseum, Uffizi, Hermitage, Reina Sofia and Alte Nationalgalerie. Wow, studying art history is nothing like it used to be!

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Glad she's safe! ~ flickr photo by Paul Mannix

 

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