Webinar Archives - Personify https://personifycorp.com/blog/tag/webinar/ Mon, 03 Oct 2022 19:17:02 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.2 https://personifycorp.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/logo-color-150x150.png Webinar Archives - Personify https://personifycorp.com/blog/tag/webinar/ 32 32 Webinar Recap: Association Marketing 101: Online Communities https://personifycorp.com/blog/webinar-recap-association-marketing-101/ Mon, 03 Oct 2022 17:00:00 +0000 https://personifycorp.com/?p=43698 The top 4 takeaways from our webinar, Association Marketing 101: Online Communities. Why combining marketing with your online community is best practices.

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Here are the Top 4 Takeaways for Combining Marketing with your Online Community

When the question arises of how to improve association marketing and what should we be doing for our members, the solution is actually easier than you think. Going back to the basics of marketing, you consider the 6 P’s: product, price, place, promotion, people, and presentation. When considering your members, the people should be your first priority – this is where online communities thrive. 

During our webinar, we dove deep into everything marketing can do for your association through an online community — a digital place for your members to connect with one another and easily engage with your content. Personify’s own Benjamin Morton, Product Marketing Manager and master marketer: Ashly Stewart, Marketing Manager analyzed all the data and helped answer the big question: Why combine marketing and online communities?

4 Highlights from “Association Marketing 101: Online Communities” 

1. Membership Engagement in the Digital World – The Stats

The webinar started by looking at how our attendees utilize marketing tools to engage and retain their current members. The highest percentages were for email, social media, and content marketing with email marketing coming in at 90% of attendees – no surprises there.  

Ashly and Benjamin also looked at some statistics from the 2021 Membership Marketing Benchmark Report, which showed drastic increases in participation in webinars from the previous year – 83% from 53%.  They also noted the increases in member engagement in professional development meetings and visits to members-only sections of association’s websites. The takeaway from these numbers? People want to engage with members- only content and participate in some sort of online community. 

Some other numbers to note were that 76% of internet users participated in an online community in 2020 and 44% said it was more important to have an online community in 2020, from The Journey Ahead: The Future of Associations, Nonprofits and Events.  

2. Marketing + Online Community = Dream Team 

Marketing plus an online community really is the dream team for an association. It provides the benefits of a social media platform with the security you need for your members. This is a safe place for your members to engage with your content, whether it be blogs, newsletters, or webinars, and you have the control. You manage how, when, where, and why your members see your content, and ONLY your members see your content. There’s not nearly as much of a concern of hacking, like with a standard social media platform like Facebook.

Marketing plus an online community really is the dream team for an association. It provides the benefits of a social media platform with the security you need for your members.

This also allows for deeper insights and member feedback. With email marketing you can only see so much with open rates – an online community allows you to see WHY someone is engaging with you​ and your content. Online communities can be more measurable. Your members are in your online community with the intention to engage with your association and its content. This allows for an easy way to get direct feedback and further build that relationship with your members. Online community also allows you to test and communicate at a lower cost that some other methods. There’s no charges for posting in your community! 

3. Member Retention and Engagement in the Marketing Funnel 

Ashly and Benjamin then walked us through how associations can utilize an online community to bring members through a marketing funnel. Below are the ways that they have seen online communities help engage new members from the time they sign-up to join the community to the point that they’re contributing to the online community and telling other people about it.

Acquisition and Awareness: What avenues you can use to let people know your online community exists & all the member-exclusive benefits that come with it​. 

Consideration: What to do to inform members of how it works & highlight your top features. 

Conversion: How you can make sign-up easy and the onboarding process powerful​ for members. 

Loyalty: Creating superusers, content generators and advocates​. 

4. What Makes a Successful Online Community 

To wrap up the webinar there were some important things to make note of. Your online community shouldn’t be a “set it and forget it” effort. If you aren’t spending time in your community and with your members, you won’t see as much return. If your current online community is falling stagnant, you can absolutely relaunch it and see it thrive again – so don’t give up! 

Managing your online community is easier than you think, and you don’t have to have a dedicated community manager to see success. We have a series on this exact topic “No Community Manager? No Problem.” We’ve seen that a marketing or membership role you may already have in your association fits very well with management of the online community. But there are also options if you have a smaller staff, such as having a volunteer team to help run the community. 

A thriving online community will see engagement from your team as well as your members. Once your members start contributing their ideas and collaborating with other members, you’ll see a level of engagement you haven’t seen before. Members will even create their own content and start their own conversations! 

Looking for More from the Conversation?

To watch these highlights and to dive even deeper into how associations can utilize an online community for marketing efforts, watch the full webinar today.  

And if you have any questions about online communities or how to get your members to engage with you and your content. We’d be happy to chat with you.   

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Webinar Recap: How to Grow an Online Community in the First 90 Days After Launch https://personifycorp.com/blog/webinar-recap-community/ Wed, 08 Sep 2021 13:56:04 +0000 https://personifycorp.com/?p=38636 Deliver a seamless experience to your members whether they access your online community on their tablets, mobile devices, or desktops.

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Get the highlights from our recent webinar to learn about making the most of your new community launch

By: Ashly Stewart, Content Marketing Manager

Last week, Benjamin Morton, Senior Product Consultant for CommUnity at Personify, joined me as we talked about setting the right expectations for the first 90 days after launching your brand new or revived online community.  

We talked about everything from our first online community experiences (AOL chat rooms and forums were mentioned a lot) to reaching that delicate and important balance of staff-generated content and member-generated content.   

Here are the top moments and insights we’re still talking about when it comes to the triumphs and challenges many association and nonprofit professionals face when launching a new online community. 

Now is the perfect time to start or refresh an online community  

76% of internet users participated in an online community in 2020. That’s a huge number! And a recent Personify research report revealed that 44 percent of member respondents told us that it became more important to have an online member community in 2020 than in previous years.  

Why the move to online communities in the past year? We know that COVID-19 played a huge role in people turning to communities to make long-distance connections. But beyond the pandemic, research and the webinar attendees listed these as some of the reasons why online communities first started and why they continue to grow:  

  • You get the most up-to-date information 
  • You get the most reliable information 
  • You can get early access to discounts and new offerings 
  • You can connect with like-minded people from anywhere 
  • You feel like it’s a safe, more private place 

Build your online community strategy BEFORE launch date 

Long before you press that “publish” button on your online community page, planning and promotion are key. At least a month before your launch date, you should be promoting the community to your members through regular emails, social media, and at any events where you’ll have a large audience. 

And to build hype, you may want to consider offering fun prizes like “the first person to post wins a Starbucks gift card” or “the first person to complete their profile gets a free ticket to the annual event.” Of course, this type of promotion means that you and your team will need to collaborate and plan even earlier. As they say, the early bird gets the worm, or in this case, more engaged members.  

30-day community goals: Delight & deliver

The first month of your new online community is about attracting your members and meeting or exceeding expectations.  

It’s important to identify the “first impression” areas of your community. What will your members first see when they land on the community page? Many times, the first thing your members will see will be a newsfeed. On social media, the newsfeed is the area where users see all the posts from their friends and connections. For an online community, it’s the same concept. Some associations choose to feature the most popular discussion forums, rather than individual posts, but each community is unique. Your community page should be determined by what your members say they like, your team’s resources, and your tech solution.  

Beyond the newsfeed, here are a few other strong first impression ideas you could include on your main page:  

  • Member spotlight where you share a quick interview with a featured member 
  • Trending discussion topics 
  • A welcome video 
  • Event calendar 

And don’t forget to ensure that your members can access the community easily whether they’re on their mobile device, their laptop, or tablet.  

BIG TAKEAWAY: Benjamin reminded us all that leaving a good first impression and building a thriving community isn’t rocket science. He encouraged us to think about a time we felt especially welcomed to an in-person community and to try and recreate that feeling.  

GET A 30-DAY CHECKLIST BY DOWNLOADING THE EBOOK 

60-day community goals: Recruit & Reward

After your first month, you should be getting a feel for how your members like to engage with the community and what they find valuable. You should also start seeing your community super users emerge.  

You may see the most active super users express excitement for the community during the pre-launch promotions. Maybe they “like” and comment on social posts or they respond to a call for community volunteers who help post to the community and welcome new members. You may see the same members starting new discussion forums or respond frequently to discussion threads.  

After you have identified your member super users, make sure you reward them! You can’t go wrong with swag items like t-shirts, sunglasses, or mugs with your organization’s logo on them. You could offer a Starbucks or Amazon gift card for member participation, or you can offer discounts on event tickets. 

BIG TAKEAWAY: Another pearl of wisdom from Benjamin: “Tech doesn’t make people talk. People make people talk.” The first few months of your online community are a lot of work, but it’s also a time of great reward if we can remember that your team can now listen and respond to your members in real-time.  

90-day community goals: Reflect & plan

At 90 days, you’re a seasoned community pro — or you’re well on your way to becoming one. After three months, you won’t have reliable data, but you should be able to start deciding what metrics you want to start tracking.  

One of the biggest expectations to set with your team and your members when it comes to your online community is that it’s not a “set it and forget it effort.” And it’s important to communicate to members that you have built your community to be agile and responsive. Ultimately, the message to all your constituents should be that your community can and should change based on consistent member feedback.  

In your first 90 days, you should have regular meetings scheduled with your internal advocates — peers that help you manage the community and/or leaders who can champion the community strategy — to review member feedback, develop reporting, and brainstorm new ideas.  

BIG TAKEAWAY: One of the biggest marks of a thriving community is a good ratio of member-generated content (posts, announcements, threads, etc.) and staff-generated content. In other words, you want to see your members starting new topics and promoting threads alongside your staff.  

Get the 90-day community roadmap to growing an online community 

Starting an online community is a big effort that takes strategic planning, but we hope that giving you a 90-day roadmap takes the mystery out of growing a thriving community.  
 
For a deeper dive into some of these highlights and checklists for your first 30, 60, and 90 days, download the eBook and watch the webinar!  

And let us know if we can help you engage your members through your online community.  

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De-Code Your Association Management System Purchase: Understand Your Needs and Requirements https://personifycorp.com/blog/de-code-your-association-management-system-purchase-understand-your-needs-and-requirements/ Thu, 30 May 2019 23:15:40 +0000 http://personifycorp.com/?p=35861 “Truth is the ultimate power. When the truth comes around, all the lies have to run and hide.” -Ice Cube  Whether you’re a fan of Ice Cube’s work as a solo artist, his contributions to N.W.A or are just here to learn about making technology purchases for your association, you know the importance of gaining a single source of […]

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“Truth is the ultimate power. When the truth comes around, all the lies have to run and hide.” -Ice Cube 

Whether you’re a fan of Ice Cube’s work as a solo artist, his contributions to N.W.A or are just here to learn about making technology purchases for your association, you know the importance of gaining a single source of truth…for your memberstheir interactions and your organization.

As a member-focused organization, your association management technology is the heart of your business. A good association management system (AMS) allows you to manage your organization’s data within a single platform, empowering your organization with the insights and tools to work smarter and focus resources on your mission, not your technology.  

With that being said, the process for evaluating and selecting the right technology can be daunting. Whether you’re replacing a homegrown legacy system or starting from scratchbuilding a list of requirements will be the most challenging and the most critical step of the process.

Each step in the evaluation process is important, but the step that is often rushed is the process of understanding your needs and identifying requirements.  

Understand Your Needs 

  • Enlist the help of various departmental stakeholders beyond just the buying committee. Outlines the teams and departments that will be using the technology. This can and should include member services staff that are creating new member profiles and signing up people for programs, executive members who are leveraging the data to develop insights and drive forward the organization and events staff who are planning your annual conference Are all of these individuals represented in the committee that is compiling your needs and goals for an AMS? 
  • Ensure that you have a comprehensive, thorough list of requirements before you ever begin your search. This will improve your odds of ending up with a solution that can meet the needs of your entire organization 
  • When gathering this informationevaluate the business processes that are needed as part of your association management system. This exercise creates an opportunity to reevaluate legacy business processes and areas of inefficiency 
  • Keep an open-mind and remind staff why you’re having these conversations- to acquire the right tools to save time, streamline operations and free up resources to work towards your mission. If the tools are not achieving these objectives, why are you expending your efforts to acquire them? 

Build Your Wish List of Requirements 

To get started building a list of requirements, outline the goals and objectives of each area of the business, including a wish list of what each program hopes to achieve with the new system. Examples may include:  

Membership 
  • Support complex membership and event types  
  • Streamline new member acquisition  
  • Provide greater visibility into member needs and trends  
Technology  
  • Deliver efficiencies to maximize staff time  
  • Stand up reliable, secure systems that will withstand changing technologies  
  • Protect member data  
Marketing 
  • Integrate with best-in-class marketing tools
  •  Ability to access reporting and analytics to understand what’s working and what’s not 
  • Manage personalized communications across various channels  
Operations 
  • Provide ROI and data to support the organization’s initiatives  
  • Accommodate data intelligence, create workflows and clear audit trails to manage the organization’s finances  
Events
  • Drive participation in annual events and meetings, whether it be as an attendee, sponsor or exhibitor  
  • Evaluate the operational and financial status of meetings and events throughout the event lifecycle 
  • Streamline key operational processes to deliver a smooth experience for event organizers, attendees, sponsors and vendors   

Once you have a clear understanding of your organization’s needs and specific criteria, you’ll be ready to take the next step of drafting a request for proposals!  

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