Tag: Web and Social Media

What It Takes to Plan and Host a Conference in Only 46 Hours

In how many hours? Yes, 46 hours, according to my calculations. Sounds impossible? It can be done. As a matter of fact, it happened this week after the American Society of Association Executives (ASAE) had to cancel its annual Technology Conference.

The conference was to start on Wednesday with exhibitor move-in and pre-conference workshops, but DC was still under nearly two feet of snow from the weekend’s storm and was due to get one foot more in blizzard conditions on Wednesday. Airlines were already canceling flights. Some attendees and exhibitors got to town on Tuesday before everything shut down but many were still stuck at home. Even many of those based in DC were still snowbound due to impassable roads and no Metro or train service above ground.

On Tuesday morning ASAE announced via Twitter that it would make a decision by 3:00 p.m. as to whether the conference would be canceled. That’s when the member community started working on Plan B. Later ASAE announced their decision to cancel, the right thing to do considering the conditions. Immediately after, Maddie Grant and Lindy Dreyer of Socialfish blogged about UnTech10, Plan B, an unconference that a team of members had quickly started organizing.

On Thursday, 75 attended UnTech10 in person and 425 attended virtually via a live stream (live webcast) of the programming. I didn’t have the time or budget to go to ASAE’s Technology Conference, but now I was able to “attend” UnTech10 for several hours on Thursday. It was an intellectually stimulating afternoon, time well spent. On Friday, although there wasn’t an on-site component, a full day of webinars was scheduled for the virtual audience.

What do you need to pull off something like this? Here’s what I learned from Maddie and Lindy’s post about organizing it.

You need word of mouth (or mouse) marketing. Most of the marketing for UnTech10 was done via Twitter. A hashtag for the conference was created (#UnTech10) so members could follow that stream of tweets to keep updated. Keep your tweets short enough so that others can retweet them. Vendors also notified clients via email.

Create a Facebook fan page. Although UnTech10 didn’t do this, I saw several references to UnTech10 in my Facebook News Feed as friends shared the original Socialfish blog post.

Create a buzz-worthy email and ask your members to forward it to those they know in the industry or profession. Give clear instructions on how to register and compelling reasons on why they will want to participate. Don’t scare them off by using only technical lingo. This is user-friendly technology, like watching TV!

Contact affiliated or friendly organizations for help in spreading the word. Provide copy and links that they can use to share the news. If you create a sense of buzz and excitement about something, it will go viral if you make it easy for others to help you.

Create a central hub for handouts, schedule, instructions on how to participate and an archive of webcast segments. Content experts were asked to submit program ideas to a wiki. The organizers created a full day of on-site programming (that was live streamed) for Thursday and a full day of webinars for Friday.

Most importantly, you need a community – good relationships with vendors who can help you pull it all together – vendors that will contribute staff to work with you and free services and/or funding for other expenses. This organizing team will take charge and make it happen. According to Maddie, each company on the UnTech10 team had an area to oversee:

You can do this. You can do this if your event is threatened by weather or other unforeseen circumstances. You can certainly do this if you have more time than the UnTech10 team had. They were able to pull it off because they had relationships based on existing trust. Trust that everyone would work together and do their best for the right reasons. The team stepped up and made something excellent out of an unfortunate situation and provided a meaningful experience for our community — an experience that many of us would not have had otherwise.  Because of the generosity and hard work of my fellow members, now I had a chance to grab several hours of education and online networking with other members. This is what a real community does. Does your association have that kind of community?

I Wasn’t Expecting That Reaction

I had a moment of bliss watching The Who perform last night at the Super Bowl halftime. I have loved The Who since junior high and remained an obsessive fan through high school, college and some years beyond – the type that had all their albums plus bootlegs (yes, this dates me), camped out for tickets and knew all kinds of arcane facts about them.

Last night I was just a normal fan grinning ear to ear (and got a bit misty-eyed, I admit) as they played. I didn’t expect a dynamo performance, after all Roger and Pete are well into their 60s, the only survivors of the original four, and can’t quite sing and move like they used to. But, in my opinion, they can still rock — Pete doing his windmill chords and Roger singing with passion. After the bliss and a bit of friendly sparring on Twitter about old rockers, I saw a retweet of this tweet from the National Association of the Deaf:

The phrase in question is from Pinball Wizard, a song from The Who’s 1969 rock opera Tommy. Tommy became blind, deaf and mute shortly after World War 2 and most of the opera took place in the twenty or so years that followed. We will all have different opinions on whether the phrase is offensive or not, whether the context matters or not and, based on that, whether the NAD overreacted or not. I want to concentrate on how the association reacted and what we can learn from that.

Their tweet got a response – about 37 people so far have retweeted or responded to it, most of them with disparaging remarks. NAD is not a complete social media rookie. They created their Twitter account last June and have 1064 followers. They also have an active Facebook page and a blog (no recent updates). Their web site has recent updates about their work with the NFL and CBS “to make advertisers who purchase Super Bowl commercials aware of the importance of captioning their content.” They do important work and are good at it.

This morning I found myself thinking again about their Twitter reaction and some issues it brings up. First, unfortunately, there’s the dreaded control issue. Did the staffer who tweeted have to seek approval before saying “the NAD will take action?” Were they authorized to say that? And if so, how did they manage to get approval so quickly? Or were they just reacting? Does NAD have guidelines for social media use? Do NAD members agree with this reaction? Only three tweets out of the 36 appear to support the NAD position. The members were not there defending them. Could this happen to your association?

And what’s the best response now? They could ignore the whole situation. 36 tweets is by no means a public outcry, although there is the possibility that someone with a much larger following than me could be writing about it right now and bring more attention to it. But more likely it’s only the prickly Who fans who care.

NAD could reply by explaining their reaction and giving us context as to why that reaction makes sense for their community. Perhaps discussing the history of their advocacy, the struggles and victories, and the need to pay attention to how we describe others. Turn it into a lesson for us. That’s hard to do in 140 characters but they could link their replies to a blog post. But 20 hours later, that hasn’t happened.

Let’s assume for a moment and for argument’s sake that this tweet was a mistake. What can we learn from this? We all make mistakes. Twitter is a fairly new evolving communication platform often blending our personal and professional lives – things can get sticky. I reacted as a Who fan, not as an association professional. Perhaps I should have ignored the RT and given them a pass, considering they’re an association and have enough battles to fight. But I couldn’t help but react – it seemed so ridiculous and wasteful to pick a battle with a 41 year old lyric. I can’t stand how litigious our society has become. I understand that sometimes legal action is appropriate, but this seemed over the top to me.

Mistakes will happen. What’s critical is how we follow up and whether we learn from our mistakes. Twitter is a public platform that’s indexed by Google, so there are more eyeballs than you might imagine who can see how you handle a situation. A mistake is an opportunity to do many different things, depending on the situation — make apologies and amends, explain a complicated or controversial issue, make friends or not. How we handle public mistakes will influence the perception that our members and the public have of us. Mistakes also help us learn how to improve our social media practices so we don’t make the same ones again.

Part of what draws us to social networking is the opportunity to learn from each other. Here’s an opportunity to imagine what you would do in their place – what if the tweet got more publicity, how you would handle the situation? How would you have prevented it? Has your association ever made what others thought was a public gaffe, and if so, how did you handle it? What did you learn?

UPDATE February 26, 2009: Thanks to Jessica Sidman at Association & Non-Profit Bisnow newsletter for doing some follow-up reporting for me. She told me about a February 25 blog post (and forthcoming video response) by NAD’s president where she explains their reasons for the Twitter reaction. They definitely did their research on the lyrics and Tommy story. The post is a good explanation with a call to action for their members to remain vigilant and educate others about how the appropriate use of the word “deaf.”

Kudos to them for the well reasoned and written response. How could they have done better? If they had posted their response earlier, it might have captured some Super Bowl momentum, and perhaps some press too. But associations are creaky institutions. We have procedures to follow, reviews and approvals, and maybe even a vote before we can take action. Our governance and departmental processes often prevent us from moving nimbly enough for the social media space.

Twitter – My Moving Experience

When I hear people disparage and dismiss Twitter, I’m compelled to tell them about my experience with Twitter, particularly how it made my move to Raleigh an entirely different (and better) experience compared to my move to Sacramento several years ago.

When I arrived in Sacramento in October 2004 to accept a job at the California Building Industry Association, I didn’t know a soul except for those who interviewed me. Slowly I widened my social circle, but for a long time it primarily consisted of those whose paths I crossed  — work friends and neighbors.

My move to Raleigh had been in the works for a while because my boyfriend is here. To prepare for my move, I started following and chatting with locals on Twitter. By the time I moved here I had dozens of people my Raleigh Twitter network. When I got here, one of them organized a lunch so I could meet him and four other Twitter acquaintances. I had beer and coffee dates with many others. I found my apartment through a Twitter friend, and learned about my hair stylist, shops and social events via Twitter.

Today, just six months later, I find myself with many friends and acquaintances, most of whom are entrepreneurs I first met on Twitter – a stimulating bunch of “grab the gusto” type people. My social calendar is now always full. When I look back and compare this to my Sacramento move, the difference is astonishing. It feels like I’ve lived here longer than six months because of my new network.

Twitter has also given me a circle of professional peers across the U.S. We chat on Twitter, read and comment on each others’ blogs and participate in weekly Twitter chats. Some of us are Facebook friends now too. When I met several of them in real life this past summer at Buzz 2009 and the ASAE Annual Meeting, it was like reuniting with long-lost friends. When you meet someone first on Twitter, you have time to get to know each other, both personally and professionally. By the time you meet, you’re not meeting as strangers but as friends who just haven’t met in real life yet. If this has happened to you, you’ll know what I mean by a Twitter hug — it happens all the time.

The tweets of those I follow have led me to blog posts and other resources I wouldn’t have known otherwise. Our twitter chats allow us to discuss successful practices and cutting-edge ideas. Twitter is now the best professional (and personal) development source in my life.

Contrary to what some say, Twitter isn’t about what you’re having for dinner. However, I have received good dinner ideas and recipes courtesy of Twitter. I’ve gained so much from Twitter that I try to help others get the most out of it too. It takes a bit of time to find the right folks to follow and to figure out how to use it in a way that works best for you and those who follow you, but it’s definitely time worth investing.

Sometimes You Know More Than You Think You Do

A few months ago Scott Oser asked me if I’d like to be a presenter for a webinar series for association staff who want to learn how to implement social media tools at their organization. I don’t consider myself a social media “expert” but I do know that since immersing myself in social media over the last year and a half, I do have a lot to share with others in my profession. Since I have never presented via a webinar before, and never even presented on social media in any format, I was tempted (for just a second) to pass, but I wanted to stretch myself, so I accepted.

I’m sharing the presentation duties with my new friend Ted LaBarbera. Ted’s the web editor at the American Association of Advertising Agencies in New York. Typical of social media relationships, Ted and I have never met in real life, but I’m sure we’ll enjoy sharing a beer together one day. We’re taking turns on presenting — I’m the lead for two of the webinars (the intro and LinkedIn) and Ted is for the other two (Facebook and Twitter). When we’re not leading, we act as color commentator for each other.

Last week I took the lead on our first webinar — Social Media 101 for Associations. It took a while for me to get the content nailed down. I wanted to focus on the big picture — how social media efforts must align with an association’s strategic plan, the mindset (or culture) required to be successful and the first steps to take. It was way too much content for 50 minutes but we managed to fit it all in, barely.

I posted my PowerPoint presentation and a PDF with session notes on Slideshare in the hopes that my approach will help somebody’s organization or business.

It’s a strange feeling to talk into a phone to an audience that you can’t see and that can’t talk back. But I did enjoy the experience, not as much as speaking to real people in front of you, but hopefully what I had to say made a difference to them. And like speaking in real life, I was wired for about three hours after!

If you are ever offered the chance to do something out of your supposed comfort zone and you know that deep inside you have what it takes, or, with a little work, could have what it takes to do the job, than do it. That’s my advice for the day!

Be a Renegade – Bringing Social Media to Your Association

I know that there are many association mid-level staffers (managers, directors, etc.) who are personally engaged in social media and believe that their association could benefit from it. However they are not in a position to lead their association there. What do they do? How can they somehow work the system and get their leadership to see that social media can help their association achieve its goals and so much more?

First, they need to look over their association’s strategic plan (or mission, goals, etc.) and see where social media can fit in as another tool or strategy to achieve those goals. Pay particular attention to these areas as they can all be enhanced by social media: advocacy, public relations, member recruitment, member engagement/retention, member communication, education and events.

Set up some Google Alerts on your association’s name, acronym, and variation of name, publications, conference/trade show, chapter acronyms, competitor name/acronym, and any other keywords that will help you to listen in on what people are saying out there. Set up a Twitter Search on the same terms. You can set up RSS feeds for all of these so that you can receive the alerts and search results automatically. I use Google Reader to get my RSS feeds.

Export your member and staff list, or if that is too cumbersome, export a list of your leadership, committee members, and show/meeting attendees. Be mindful that this will exclude those whom you probably would most like to know better – your “mailbox” members (that old term should be replaced!). Upload your list to Facebook and LinkedIn, and then to a Gmail account and have Twitter search that network for you. Find out who is active and what’s on their mind. Do a lot of listening.

Also do a search for some of your leadership’s peers (both staff and members), your association’s competitors and other associations that are similar in member type to yours. Are they involved in social media? These examples can be helpful later when trying to sell your leadership on social media.

Then make a plan. Review your organization’s goals or strategic plan and note how social media tools (starting with Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter) might help your association achieve those goals. Only plan to take on one of these tools at a time – baby steps. Remember, you can’t just create a presence and walk away, you need to stay engaged, and that takes time and effort. Break your plan down into immediate, short-term and long-term ideas, keeping in mind that your plan will change as your association learns.

Try not to go it alone. Talk to some of the staff whom you discovered are involved in social networking. Bear in mind that many will not want their personal social media life to be known at work but they can be allies and advisors to you. Contact some of the members and ask them for advice. Tell them that you are “going renegade” and investigating options to further your association’s goals through social media – you’re just in the research phase. Ask their advice and if they would like to help. Take advantage of this intelligence-gathering opportunity – you can find out a lot about their real perception of the association, what they want/need, how they envision their association.

This is a lot of work but you will learn much from it. A huge concern to any CEO about social media is the amount of time it requires. This is a valid concern and one that you should be ready to address. It’s why I haven’t mentioned blogging as part of this plan, although it may be something to consider depending on your association’s resources. Another reason to have allies amongst staff is that you may already have in place others who can assist with this effort. Social media can not belong to one department alone. It must be integrated across many departments and can be an aid in breaking down departmental silos since it will require collaboration.

Here are some recent posts that will help you prepare for this task and for the nay-sayers.

What else does someone need to do before they bring their ideas (and a plan) to the big guns? Some of you have gone through this at your association. What advice do you have?

Twitter’s First Association Chat

The first association Twitter chat (#assnchat) was held on Tuesday, May 12. Jeff De Cagna (@pinnovation) came up with the idea, spread the word and moderated the chat. I volunteered to go through the tweet twanscript (oh, sorry, couldn’t resist!) and post a synopsis. Although we did not solve all of today’s association problems, we did have a good conversation about some of the issues our industry is facing and how we can begin to tackle them. Here is an outline of the topics discussed — it’s a bit rough but will give you a sense of the conversation.

Online communities as a threat to associations

  • Information – members get news and information more quickly from online peers and sources and have access to experts online.
  • Networking – associations are not usually the conduit for members’ networking online.
  • Online as alternative to the status quo of associations
  • Some associations don’t think their members are using social media, but you need to survey members to determine if that perception is in fact true, you may be surprised at what you learn.
  • Even some participants are questioning their future membership in industry associations because of the benefits (professional development, networking, information, news) received freely online.

Solutions to the online threat

  • Do associations really know what members want? Or do we and/or our boards assume we do? Ask your members, “what could we do that would make you a member for life?”
  • Demonstrate value above and beyond what people can get elsewhere. What’s indispensable?
  • How does the association enhance/augment a member’s social networking activities with other value? Association as a starting place to meet peers or the glue that holds folks together — online or face-to-face can enhance those relationships, should have both channels, members can participate in ways that work for them.
  • Be in the social networking outposts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn) while linking to a home base for members on your web site – one supports the other. Enable associations to become the conduit for people to find each other. But why should members pay for this when they can do it themselves online? Because associations are better at organizing face-to-face meetings and events?
  • Successful associations will focus on building community, being relationship brokers and serving as a conduit.

Content as a membership value

  • Associations as holders of content (experts), “legitimizers” of content (still true?), conduit/forum for members to deliver their own content/expertise
  • Who creates content?
    • Members as knowledge/content creators – associations must encourage and facilitate that; enable members to become creators, but allow others to comment, etc. Association as curators.
    • Some associations do not have the staff resources to create content, must rely on members/others.
    • Social media can be used to co-create with contributors (not necessarily members) to build trusted markets of exchange.

Members-only content

  • Still viable? Some say no, not a useful construct.
  • How to determine what lives behind the member wall? Associations first need a social media strategy to determine that.
  • Don’t build a wall, create a fishtank – provides transparency with the membership and the profession, shows how members engage with association. Create a filter to “clean” the process as you go — new blood in staff and leadership, new initiatives, trying to break new ground. Pressure to make changes is greater outside the fishtank than inside.

Why aren’t associations changing?

  • Fear of change and the unknown, risk-averse, bureaucratic nature, slow moving, slow to critique or envision alternate futures
  • Lack of understanding drives decision makers to want more assurances, research and risk management
  • Members want safe networking with peers and safe experimentation with leading edge tools — safety as a form of deep support (AAA and AARP – their value propositions are built on safety)
  • Need to create a safe, trusted environment in which people can make sense of things, access advice and experiment
  • Education is necessary during periods of change

Membership dues revenue model – viable in future?

  • Are associations in danger of following in the footsteps of the newspaper industry? Yes, because we won’t give up what holds us back – closed membership.
  • Where then does revenue come from to support advocacy, operations and other member services?
  • If content is open to all, what are members paying dues for?
  • Social media as possible revenue source — advertisements, sponsored webinars/podcasts/videos, tie-in with events, user-generated content
  • Or, more likely, social media won’t be arevenue source but a way to build new capabilities that create revenue. Associations as a unique, personalized experience, as deep support for member.
  • Extract the value of the interaction between activated network and content.
  • Possible revenue source – product/content development
  • Perhaps a membership model that grants access to info/events based on participation level, those who give more, get more.

Tools for communication

  • Yammer for internal communications – have to have an email address from the same domain to use Yammer, otherwise you can’t login; great for cutting across departmental silos.
  • Cubetree
  • Tweetgroup – groups and attachments, wonderful application with desktop client
  • iPhone apps – American Bar Association has one for its magazine, American Booksellers Association

Questions for future chats

  • Does anyone see associations struggling to deal with the way different generations want to interact? Face to face vs online?
  • With high demand on staff in small associations, how do we get our members to support and feed content creation?

Participants

AddyKujawa, alisonharle, BeccaFlach, CharmsS, DeirdreReid, desabol, eventpublisher, j8nd, jcrosby4, Jeffhurt, jeremygriffin, jmoonah, joerominiecki, JoeStella, karenaltes, kevinpatrick, kristildonovan, maggielmcg, MissLynn13, pinnovation, rharris, rjohnston, sgiarde, unklbuck

The next #assnchat will be Tuesday, May 19 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern (11:00 a.m. Pacific). You can follow by going to Tweetchat or Tweetgrid and following #assnchat, or in Tweetdeck you can create a search column for #assnchat.

Everything I Know About Social Media, I Learned As A Restaurant Manager

Ok, not entirely true. I’ve learned a lot from books, blogs, Twitter, webinars and practice. But once during an Awareness Inc. webinar David Carter said, “Everything I learned about social media, I learned as a waiter.” I don’t think he expected anyone to put as much weight into that sentence as I did. It dawned on me that part of the reason I took so wholeheartedly to social media is that I’ve been operating with its principles for years. I’m going to examine some of these principles in restaurant terms, but they apply to any organization.

Word-of-mouth marketing

It’s the most effective (or potentially destructive) marketing tool for restaurants, as it is for all companies and organizations. Being the hot new place is great, but the buzz will fade unless we back it up with food and service that’s worth talking about, for years. We want to be the place that tourists mention to others traveling to our city, that friends talk about at parties, and that colleagues discuss at work. We are also aware of the lasting power of negative word-of-mouth.

Integrity at all costs

Never ever lie or mislead your staff or guests. Be honest and trustworthy. If your salmon is farmed, admit it, don’t pretend it’s wild. If you anticipate an hour wait for a table, disclose it, don’t fool them into thinking it will only be 30 minutes. Don’t date your cocktail waitresses. Have high standards. Do what’s right, always.

The customer is right, even when they’re not

We cringe at that old phrase, but the customer’s perception is their reality. You have to start from there. If someone has a bad experience and isn’t satisfied with our response, we have just created a walking nightmare. However, we can turn them into a raving evangelist if we figure out the right thing to do for them, and then do a little more. This is no time for egos. It’s about them, not us. How do we fix it?

It’s all about relationships

What does every restaurant want? Repeat guests. One visit is appreciated, but we can’t succeed for long if they only come once. We can make that easier if we create relationships. Be a personality not a brand.

  • Welcome your new guests. They’re taking a chance on you — make them feel appreciated and comfortable.
  • Nurture your regulars — your evangelists. They will do your marketing for you –- reward them for that. Stroke their egos in front of their friends. Give them special treatment.
  • Treat everyone the way you would like to be treated. Even better, the way you would like your grandmother to be treated – the golden rule.

Look and listen

  • Scan the room. Are your guests happy to be here? Look at their faces, their body language, their interactions, and their tables. Anticipate their needs –- that’s the key.
  • Listen to what people are saying about you and respond to it, the good and the bad. Accept criticism and learn from it. Put your pride and ego aside and make things right.

Your staff determines your success

  • Trust your gut when you hire staff. Do they want to learn? Do they really like people? Are they positive personalities? Do they care?
  • Educate your staff. Create a culture of knowledge that they will share with guests. Encourage and recognize those who demonstrate that knowledge. We had oyster-tasting contests, wine and beer seminars, and fish school. We made it fun and ended up with the smartest and most loyal wait staff in town.
  • Trust and empower your staff. Give them guidelines to follow so they can make customer service decisions on the spot. If you’ve done right by them up to now, they’ll do the right thing.

Pay it forward

Be a good citizen. Give back to the community that supports your business. Join your local chamber or business group. Find a cause that you and your staff feel passionate about and partner with that organization to raise funds and awareness. Show the world that you are more than just a brand or a storefront; you have a personality and a heart.

Were you thinking about your customers or members when you read this? If not, go back and translate these restaurant scenarios into your organization’s perspective. Before incorporating social media into your culture, make sure you are comfortable with these principles. They’ve been around forever, but in the new Web 2.0 world, you can’t succeed without them.