These essential truths will keep your organization on target for fulfilling your mission and goals – while navigating trends, social media, economic changes and cultural shifts. Here are two bonus principles to prep you for the others to follow:

We should adapt our marketing plan based on past history, current needs and future goals.

We value impact and success over tradition. We will develop new means to work within industry trends and cultural shifts to remain relevant and vision-focused.

Trends come and go, cultural shifts occur, communication methods evolve and the economy is in a delicate place. With so much change happening in our day-to-day life, how can the same marketing plan from last year (or five years ago!) be relevant and effective?

Yet, we know many associations that execute marketing plans that were developed in previous years. Some try to “keep up with the times” by slapping on a Facebook page or  a text messaging campaign to the plan.

That strategy will guarantee the only thing in the world that won’t change is the continual decline in conference attendance.

So, what do you do?

Will you expand beyond your current membership base by purchasing an email list, sending out an email and hoping for a 2% open rate? Or, launching a Facebook page that is updated once or twice a week?

No, that’s not going to cut it. You’re wrong to think that you are the only, or the first association to think of that. You have competition. You are challenged with wooing potential attendees, and that is only going to happen if you learn to adapt your marketing plan each year.

Tips:

• Talk to potential attendees as people first (professionals/members second). People who change from year to year and have different needs over time.
• Listen to your target audience before acting.

We will have a vision of growth for conference attendance and commit the energy to implement necessary changes.

We will not accept excuses or utter the word “can’t” when faced with a challenge. Instead we will be flexible towards change and open to learning for the sake of growth and success of every single conference.

Keep up motivation and energy throughout the entire marketing campaign. As soon as you get in a rut, the look and feel of your marketing pieces change and the members can sense that vibe.

So, what do you do?

Be positive about your event. It is the largest, in-person gathering of your members. It has the potential to be the living representation of your mission. You should express that at every chance you get.

Tips:

• Review our previous newsletter about positioning your conference for greater attendance.

We’d liken white space to the gaps a composer uses to build suspense. When a musician follows the composer’s direction and observes the rests, those silences enrich the other notes to dramatic effect. Ever sat in a concert hall when the entire orchestra pauses in unison before the final chord? The audience holds its breath in anticipation, then explodes into applause after that last crucial note.

White space serves a similar purpose. Some clients want to cram as much information on a single webpage or a brochure as possible, but the result can be overwhelming to the audience. Look at the margins on this blog. If the text blended right into the images, then neither text nor images would be very effective (or visually pleasing). Similarly, if a logo doesn’t have a little breathing space, then it’s harder to process. Give it a little more space and suddenly it appears to jump right off the page (or screen).

But we’re not about to just insert white space for the sake of having white space. These voids should be used purposefully. They need to be part of the overall design concept and strategy. And since we’re all about helping associations and nonprofits improve their communication strategy, it’s only fitting that our WhiteSpace newsletter reflects this approach.

Think your job is done? Think again!
In a recent newsletter, we mentioned the need for brands to change and evolve as the marketplace changes.

The ultimate example of brand evolution is Madonna, whether or not your a fan. Over the last twenty-five years, she’s gone from “Material Girl” to Marilyn Monroe lookalike to children’s book author to pop icon. While many eighties rockers are relegated to the bottom of people’s CD collections, Madonna remains relevant and in the public eye decades later.

But you don’t need such an extreme makeover to keep your brand current.
Just look at Apple. Their logo is iconic, and it’s undergone several redesigns since the mid-seventies. Remember that rainbow-striped apple they used between 1976 and 1998? It made sense because its color graphics were one of Apple’s main selling points. Now the company is known for the slick, streamlined appeal of the MacBook and iPhone, so their new logo reflects this new identity.

Brand enhancements like tweaking or simplifying your logo can improve your brand, but they’re not a cure-all. Your association itself needs to evolve as well: for instance, getting involved in social media and facilitating two-way communication with members. With strategic changes over time, you ensure that your association continues to grow alongside its members and maintain relevancy.

PURL’s
Personal URLs are perfect for potential attendees to interact with the marketing materials. For example, as you send out your save the date postcard, you can send along with it a PURL for the recipient to log on to. On their personal page, you can have them register early, fill out a questionnaire, or have them choose or suggest topics that they would like to have covered during the conference. By allowing the attendee to participate during the pre-conference stage, the conference value and attendance will increase.

Twitter
During the pre-conference stage, you can begin to setup #hashtags for your conference on Twitter. Invite possible attendees to follow your conference twitter account to receive instant updates about the conference and to begin conversations about what they would like to see at the conference and to start networking with other attendees.

Twitter can be used during the conference as well to let attendees provide their own personal views on subjects and to strike up hot topics throughout the conference. Have the speakers setup their own accounts so they can get involved with conversations through twitter.

For more information, check out our newsletter on Twittering your Annual Conference.

Facebook
Setting up a group on Facebook for your conference is a great tool. As you add friends to the group, you can gauge the potential for attendees at your conference. Utilizing the upcoming events tool, the group will be notified about key dates for the conference.

Check out this blog post about using Facebook for your organization.

Registration Offers
Who does not like a discount or special offer? Why not offer a discount for early registration using PURL’s? Provide special offers to your Facebook Fans who participate in discussions. Conduct contests through Twitter during the conference where you provide information or clues only seen through your Twitter updates.  Providing more options for early registration and participation in pre and post conference sessions will encourage members to take advantage of the situation and in turn it will help with conference attendance and late registration because we know “it’s not just a trend, it’s a fact.”

By incorporating these personalization tools, you will help with the overall value of the conference, but more importantly it will help increase your attendance.

Facebook’s popularity is still growing at exponential rate. Is your nonprofit taking advantage of this gold mine?

Here are three key features that can help your organization get the most out of Facebook:

Key Feature #1: Pages

Facebook has introduced Fan Pages for businesses and organizations, whereas, profiles are meant for individuals. From your Facebook Fan Page you can build community and increase communication with your members by posting updates, sharing pictures, blogging and interacting with your fans. It can also be helpful in recruiting volunteers, raising money and essential networking. It is free to set up a Facebook Fan Page. The only commitment your organization will have to make is one of committing time to create the page and keep it active.

Key Feature #2: Causes

Facebook has a diverse group of users who want to use their Facebook for various reasons. To help users get just what they want out of the social networking site, Facebook has allowed other companies (or web geeks) to create Applications which users can download to their profile. These thousands of applications include games, ways to share music or pictures, quizzes, polls, and lots more. The one that nonprofits need to be aware of is Causes. Instead of us telling you what they do, here’s a snippet from their website:

“Causes offers nonprofit organizations of every budget size, staff capacity, and issue area access to Facebook and MySpace, which between them have over 400 million monthly unique visitors. Facebook, the world’s “stickiest” site, sees over 100 million people log in on a daily basis. Beyond the sheer reach of these social networks, Causes provides nonprofits with specialized tools for spreading awareness, building community, fundraising, circulating petitions, and promoting other actions. Whether you want to reach out to a new supporter demographic, expand your donor base, engage and mobilize existing supporters, or spread the word about your incredible work, Causes is a platform for efficiently and effectively achieving those goals.”

The Causes website has a wealth of information for nonprofits interested in using their platform, including everything you need to know to get started, success stories from other nonprofits, and information on corporate and foundation matching grants.

Key Feature #3: Events

Besides allowing users to manage their contacts and multimedia, Facebook has a feature which allows users to create events and invite guests. You can customize the event, edit its privacy settings, invite members (you can also invite members not on Facebook through email) and add pictures or video. After creating the event, you can send reminder messages to your guests, monitor RSVPs, and interact with guests via a comment section.

But, did you know that those are not your only options for creating social networks? Using commercial social networks is becoming more and more popular for nonprofits and associations. But, they may not always be the best fit. This is especially true if your members are really active within your social network.

The next step up for organizations is to create a house social network, which is not as difficult and technical as you might think thanks to the help of Ning.

What is Ning?

Ning is an online platform for people to create their own social networks. With little time investment organizations can set up their own house social network that can add an alternative way to engage with their members and fulfill their goals or mission.

In a recent survey, nonprofits answered questions about social networking, over three-quarters of the survey respondents indicated that the network is valuable asset to their communication efforts.

Popular Features of Ning

Ning has several features that allow members to easily share information with each other.

• Communicate with members through blogs, forums and videos.
• Members can also interact with each other through chat and sharing pictures.
• Communication is encouraged through the ability to form groups based on interests or geography.
• Nonprofits can increase fundraising efforts by installing widgets to collect donations.
• Increase event participation by posting information to your members.
• Export your social network member data to increase your list of contacts.

Enough Talk

We’ve done some research and found some quality house social networks from organizations to help give you a picture of how this tool can increase communication and engagement in your members. Check them out, then come back and leave us a comment on what you think.

ASPCA
American Library Association
Geographical Association Network (A network for geography teachers)
Bridge Builders

This week we are introducing The Best of White Space. This print version captures the highlights of our monthly e-newsletters over the past few months. Conference marketing, Twittering your annual conference and improving membership retention are just a few of the topics included in this premiere edition of The Best of White Space.

Keep an eye out for your copy to arrive on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week.

If you would like to receive a copy, simply email us at rcg@rottmancreative.com.

There were countless great discoveries and advancements in 2008, but one that peaks our interest is about changes seen in usage of social media. Social media sites experienced exponential growth in 2008. In addition to seeing a continual growth in usage, many social media sites are also having a shift in their user demographics.

Let’s take a quick look at some stats from 2008 for the increasingly-popular Facebook. We’re choosing to examine Facebook because it is one of the largest social networking sites with over 200 million users around the world; therefore, we feel confident that whatever assumptions we make from Facebook’s stats, will be true other social media sites.

• By mid-2008 the fastest growing age demographic was 35-54 year olds
• The 24-35 age population doubles every 6 months
• Over 66% of all Facebook users are over the age of 21

What can we take away from these numbers?

First, social media is obviously not just something for teenagers. Second, more young professionals and Gen-Xers found their way in the jungle of social media. They figured out the tools, downloaded apps, learned new lingo and joined the online conversation…or in many cases, started new conversations online. These are people who are full of energy and want to get involved in worthy organizations, say, like your association or nonprofit!

Identify networks of users and online conversations that make sense for your organization. Ask yourself what is it about these social media/networking sites that are attracting millions and millions of people? Take it a step further and brainstorm how you can join the party in effective and strategic ways to help engage younger members.

We’ve come up with a few tips to help you engage younger members of your association through the wonderful world of social media.

Social Networking

If you hang out with a group of young adults between the ages of 21- 34, you’ll notice an interesting trend. They are more likely to say, “I’ll Facebook you”, instead of asking for a phone number or email address. Social networking sites, like Facebook, give users the ability to communicate with others, share pictures, videos, blog posts, articles of interest and more. Users can also create events and invite others. A major benefit is that it allows users to keep lots of information in one place, combined with a simple way to communicate with others. Create a Facebook page for your association, and use it to inform younger members about upcoming events, share your newsletters and any other organization news, add videos and pictures and show a little bit of personality and passion – two of the most attractive qualities young professionals enjoy in any group they associate with.

Through trial and error, young professionals are setting the etiquette for balancing their personal life and professional life using social media tools. LinkedIn is considered the professional version of Facebook. It allows users to interact with each other and share information, but it has the reputation of being more serious about networking and being a place for people to build community around their career.

Multimedia

There are several sites that allow you to share multimedia with others. Nearly everyone has at least heard of YouTube and Flickr, which allow you to post and share videos and pictures. Creating an account for your organization with each of these sites is free, and allows you the opportunity to allow younger members to watch videos from previous events – which may help them RSVP to your annual conference; or, allow them to see all the great photos from the last event they attended.

Blog

Whether it is a new product, a restaurant, an event or your organization – young professionals are going to Google it before giving it a try. In addition to wanting more facts about their new item of interest they also what to get a “feel” for it before they make a decision. We recently read a statistic that said nearly 40% of consumers place more trust, and have a more positive view of brands that have a blog. There are several guides with tips on how to start a blog, if you don’t already have one. Besides posting news information about your organization, make it social as well by sharing pictures, videos and information your younger members may find interesting. Not all blog posts have to be serious and directly related to your organization’s mission – they can be fun, with the sole purpose of trying to engage readers.

At first glance it might seem like some of these suggestions don’t directly relate to your organization’s mission, and might even seem like a waste of time. But, this is how your younger members are using social media to interact with everyone (and every organization/business) that is important to them. Understanding how your younger members consume, manipulate, produce and communicate information through social media will bring you much closer to understanding them, and how to get them more involved in your organization.

For more tips on using social media, check out these blog posts:
Social Media Goes Corporate
Fitting Social Media into Your Schedule
Managing Your Professional Relationships
Using Twitter at Your Annual Conference
Twitter to the Rescue

One of the most sophisticated, safe, and user-friendly web analytics programs just happens to also be free for anyone to use, regardless of site size or amount of traffic. For many web developers, marketers and site owners, Google Analytics seems like a gift too good to be true. It performs just as well (if not better) than costly, high-end web analytics programs.

Google Analytics is enabled by including a tracking code in the template of your website. This code allows Google to see every page of your site and then give you information about the traffic you’re receiving.

We use Google Analytics to track the performance of our website by observing how visitors interact with our online content. On a regular basis we review our Google Analytics stats to evaluate which pages of our site are getting the most traffic, where those visitors are coming from, and how they are interacting with our site once they arrive.

This is invaluable information for any site owner who desires to make their website a powerful means of communication. The data provided to use from Google Analytics allows us to transform our website from being a one-way piece of communication, into a conversation with our visitors. Without this data, we would just be spewing information onto the web then sitting back hoping that the right people would find us, and that hopefully we’ve lived up to their expectations. But, through the magic of Google Analytics we discover how and why visitors come to our site, if they found what they were looking for, and how often they return. Then we respond in the conversation, by taking this information and tailoring our online content to better meet the needs of our visitors.

Most recently we identified a page on our site that was receiving a high amount of traffic compared to other pages on our site. Assisting associations with conference marketing is a popular service we offer our clients, but it was still pleasantly surprising to see the amount of traffic generated by a recent White Space (our monthly newsletter) edition on the topic. This simple page was where we dumped the newsletter after sending it out to our subscribers.

Our Google Analytics told us that visitors were coming to this page when searching for:

• Conference Marketing Plan
• Increase Conference Attendance
• Marketing A Conference Steps Deciding On The Content
• Conference Attendance Down
• Marketing Plan + Annual Conference

This clued us in on what our visitors are expecting when coming to this page: they want to see tips, information and resources about annual conference marketing. As you can tell, this is not rocket science.

With this information in mind we decided to improve this page of our site in hopes of better meeting our visitors’ expectations.

• First, we added a link to our blog – a place that we update regularly with tips and resources that can be useful to associations planning a conference.
• Second, we added a blurb about who we are and what we do to give the user an idea of who they are taking advice from.
• And lastly, we added a link to our digital portfolio, which is a great opportunity for visitors to get an idea of how our ideas translate to strategy and practical pieces of visual communication.

Now when visitors come to this page, they have easy access to more information on the topic of their interest, they get a better idea of who we are and our capabilities, and they generally have a more enjoyable user experience.

With the help of our Google Analytics data we have quickly and easily transformed a high-trafficked page of our site into a stronger means of communicating with prospects. Associations and nonprofits have very different goals for their websites than we have for ours, but this lesson in optimizing web performance can easily translate to your site.  The data provided to you through Google Analytics can boost your website’s ability to capture the interest of potential members or sponsors and inspire current members for specific actions such as renewal or purchasing a product.

Many associations and nonprofits have service areas that stretch far beyond their “hometown”, but that doesn’t excuse them from striving to build a vibrant, healthy reputation among the local population. Regularly communicating who you are, what you do, why you do it, and how your association makes a difference, can make a strong impression on the local community – which is comprised of potential sponsors, partners, volunteers, members and other valuable connections.

Many organizations are familiar with traditional means of PR, but are still a little uncertain how to take advantage of social media. Reaching out to your community through local websites and blogs is an easy, powerful, and often free way to increase visibility. Here is a simple three step process to help your organization seize rich, local PR opportunities.

Step 1: Scope out local blogs and websites.

You’re probably already familiar with the local newspaper and other print publications, therefore step it up a notch and search for online news sources. The first step to starting a local PR campaign is to identify where your audience is already having online conversations and where they are going to get information.

Spend an hour or two browsing the websites of your local newspaper and TV stations. You may be lucky enough to find a guide to your area’s best blogs. If not, specifically look for news that is being pulled into their website from local blogs. It is becoming very common for traditional media companies to aggregate information from smaller, topical, local blogs that are run by citizen journalists.

The first place you should start is with local business-focused websites. Regardless of your organization’s mission and reach, the common factor between you and the community is that you employ members of the community and conduct business with other local businesses. Secondly, start looking at topical blogs and websites.

Make a list of the blogs and websites that you feel have the best chance for promoting your organization’s news. Be sure to single out the contact person for each website you identify as having potential for your organization’s message.

Step 2: Send 1-2 press releases a month to local news sites.

All the local news and information sites you’ve identified need new, regular content since they likely update daily, and they will gladly welcome any news-worthy information or story you pass along to them. Also, one of the great benefits of a press release is that you have control over what information is shared. You will find that some websites may simply post your information (or a shortened version of it), which is typical for many print publications as well. But many blogs prefer to make their posts more personal, and may offer the opportunity to have a key staff or board member be a guest blogger.

It’s imperative that you follow basic guidelines of telling a compelling story with a strong news angle in each of your press releases. To increase the chances of your information being published on the websites you contact, make sure it is relevant to your audience and answers the 5 Ws: who, what, where, when, and why. Remember to include plenty of contact information.

Step 3: Add a news section to your website.

News pages are a great way to manage content about events, sponsorships, and all forms of company news. It can become a place where local media outlets can depend on getting the latest information about your organization. In addition to being an invaluable communication tool, it is a great opportunity to boost credibility and return the favor of linking to the websites that post your information.

A sound local PR strategy can go a long way in boosting local recognition and enhancing credibility for any association or nonprofit, especially if you are intentional in seeking out online hotspots for your community. While it’s fresh on your mind, jot down a couple of topics for upcoming press releases and start your search for relevant websites.