Social Media Training for Your Members

Do you know how many of your small business members are experts in social media or know nothing about social media?

There have been many articles on delivering value to our chamber members.

Delivering value is about solving problems!

Why not start a monthly training session on social media that addresses:

• The pro's and con's of the different platforms chambers are using today (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, Google+, Blog, YouTube, etc.);
• How to get online and create a content calendar (a previous blog post on Content Rules and be found HERE;
• Measuring outcomes with the likes of Google Analytics, etc.; and
• Share successes and failures of other businesses who have played in the social media sandbox.

These monthly sessions should be great to not only get those members online that are not currently online, but improve the techniques of those already on the Internet to help them grow their businesses.

Find a college student who you can hire once a month (first Friday of the month) to conduct a one hour session over coffee.  Be consistent with the same time and venue each month.  Whether 10 or 1 show up, you're providing value.

For a great resource on content marketing go HERE and visit HERE for social media tips or visit my blogroll on the right navigation bar for other resources.

In addition, here's three websites I visit on a regular basis Copy Blogger, Jeff Bullas and Content Marketing Institute.

Solve your member's social media problems by creating a monthly training session on how to use the latest tools on the market (free or fee based tools).  Click HERE for 14 Social Media Marketing Tools Recommended by the Pros.

That's a great way to engage your members on a regular basis and solve their social media challenges!

Chamber Mergers: Lessons Learned

At a recent best practices session with a dozen of seasoned chamber CEO's the topic of mergers was addressed.

With a sluggish economy it was suggested that there will probably be more mergers or outright closings of chambers in the future, not less.

Let's start with a couple of facts:

• There are over 7,000 chambers of commerce in this country
•  Local chambers are in competition with each other

Now that we can agree that mergers are inevitable in our business, as discussed in this session, I thought I'd share a few comments from the panel.

The following statements we're made:

• Most difficult thing I've ever done!
• Put people on your board who can be change agents
• You may not have a job at the end of it
• It's emotional
• In today's global economy there will be more mergers in the future
• Address all the issues
• You must believe in the merger
• Potential companies don't look at community lines, it's bigger than that

But at the end of they day, you need to do what’s best for the organization and the surrounding community.

Can you come up with any partnerships with surrounding chambers of commerce?

For some research on the subject of nonprofit mergers by the Stanford Social Innovation Review go HERE.

Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch

Chambers have been talking about strategy and strategic planning for years.

Yes, it’s important but I buy into the title of this blog.

You can have all the ideas in the world, but if you don’t have a culture to implement those ideas, you’ll end up spinning your wheels.

What do I mean by culture?  Staff and volunteers have to trust each other. My take:

• Staff and volunteers working together
• Staying true to your mission
• Transparency
• The ability to try new things
• Trust

I talked about failing forward in a previous post HERE and it’s important to support the concept (the CEO and Board).

My final comment on this is the last bullet above.  If you don’t have trust you have nothing.

For an interesting blog on culture in the workplace go HERE or follow them on Twitter @WorkXO.

Chamber Loyalty: Do You Have It With Your Members?

There has been a lot written about this concept over the years.

Loyalty programs are programs that keep your members coming back.

Sounds like a golden handcuff to me!

For a previous blog post on golden handcuffs go HERE.

Think of the following loyalty programs:

• Costco
• Airline Programs
• Credit card rebates
• Dunkin Donuts

To build loyalty you need to have something your members can’t do without.  Have you identified what that is for our chamber?  Is it:

• A directory
• An advocacy program
• Access to government officials
• An affinity program (insurance, etc.)
• Other

I like to call it a core good that your members can’t do without.  What is your core good?  It is critical that you can answer that question.

If you can’t answer that question you’ll continue to struggle with who you are, who you want to serve, and I bet you’re struggling with growing membership.

People will continue to be loyal as long as you’re delivery value.

As a side bar, I’ve been a Canon camera guy for over 35 years now and I’ll never change as long as they continue to deliver the goods.

Don’t you want to be like Canon or Nikon?  These two companies have the loyalty equation down pat.

Just a thought!

Are You Solving Problems For Your Members?

If not, you should be.

There has been a lot of talk recently about delivery value to your members.

And by the way, a networking event is not solving a problem.

Solving a problem is helping with a regulation, complying with a new law or getting information so your business member can grow their business.

Do you have toolkits on how your small business members can:

• Write a business plan;
• Gain access to capital; or
• Learn effective marketing techniques.

Especially now with the Internet and social media as a free resource, it's time to step up and solve some problems!

For some of your members, you might want to teach them how to use social media to help them get their message out and grow their business.

If your members think of you as a problem solver, I'm suggesting that will be a happy and retained member.

Solving problems will grow your membership and your community will benefit from that growth.

I like that combination!

Membership Marketing Plan Toolkit

Do you have a membership marketing plan that sets your strategy for your upcoming year?

Don’t run a membership campaign without a plan and make sure you’re measuring your results.

All plans can be tweaked but they shouldn’t be thrown out.

If you’re thinking about throwing out your plan, you didn’t do your homework to start.

Here’s a few things to think about as you set a plan in motion:

• Who’s are target
• What’s the frequency for communicating
• What’s the offer
• What’s the timetable for this campaign
• How are we going to measure success

You will need to decide what constitutes success for your chamber, but a few things that would be on my lists:

• Revenue vs. costs
• Number of members recruited
• Time it took to run the campaign
• Diversity of members

It’s time to start your plan today!

A great resource on the subject is Marketing General Inc.'s annual survey.

Click HERE for a copy.

Mobile: What’s Your Plan?

Are you in the mobile space?

Are you thinking about the mobile space for your chamber?

Let’s start with a couple of statistics (provided by ComServe and SoMobile 2013):

• 42% of phones in the U.S. are smartphones
• More than 110 million smartphone users in the U.S. and Europe access social networks and blogs on their phones

Now let’s add your website to the mix.  Now it’s important to note that you can’t just put your website on a mobile device.

Many chambers are using mobile apps through third party companies or their CMS (content management system).

All the research I’ve read makes the same statement.  Your mobile application must be user friendly.  Chris Brogan recently said "if there’s more than two items on the smartphone screen it’s too many."

I’m not sure I buy into that theory, but you need to really think about what your mobile presence looks like.

One thing is for sure.  Your mobile look cannot be your website on a smaller screen.

In the old days we talked about how your website cannot be your brochure.  I remember those days.  Do you?

We’re transitioning to mobile like we transitioned to websites 10 years ago. Something to think about!

For a list of resources on the mobile web click HERE and for a list of FAQ's click HERE.