Membership Knowledge Hub

Social Media was the hot topic at AssociationJam.org in July, in numbers of submissions, views and votes. Fundraising, Technology, and Membership management stories tied for second place.

Here’s a look at some of the most popular “AJam” links over the past month, in each of the subject categories:

Social Media

Nonprofit Blogging: Goals, Strategy and Tactics to Crush it
Frank Barry | Net Wit’s Think Tank

“A well implemented blog with a solid strategy behind it can be an incredible tool to help you connect with supporters on the web. Let’s look at some goals, questions, strategy and tactics to get you started.”

Social Media Strategy: ChildFund International
Frank Barry | Net Wit’s Think Tank

“ChildFund International recently went through a complete rebranding. As part of that rebranding effort they decided to be much more active in the social media world. Social media is now a key part of their online strategy. In the spirit of continuing to learn how nonprofits are using social media we spent some time with David Hylton from ChildFund.”

A ranking of the top English-language change and cause-related blogs in the world. The ranking provides a glimpse into the change and cause bloggers who are trying to positively affect our lives throughout the world.

Fundraising

I Gave Your Organization $500 & all I got was this…
Alia McKee | Sea Change Strategies

“The annual report acknowledgement is routine.
The pin is a nice thought.
The fancy paper and logo - ok.
But creating a deep and meaningful relationship with the supporters who make your work possible – that is something truly remarkable.”

Technology

Multi-feed RSS Consolidation
Dave Sabol | Associated Knowledge

RSS is one of the easiest and most flexible ways to get information “how you want it when you want it”: In this illustrated tutorial, Dave Sabol explains how to use Yahoo Pipes to merge multiple site feeds into a single source to make it easier to manage all that information.

Membership

How Do You Measure The ROI Of An Association’s Membership Dues?
Jeff Hurt | Midcourse Corrections

“People usually join associations for one of two primary reasons: because they believe in the mission of the organization or they receive benefits that are worth the member fee. So how do you measure the ROI of your membership dues? What benefits do you expect from your membership fees? Why do you join an association?”

Events

Survey on Social Technologies and Conferences
Chris Uschan | Omnipress Blog - The Conference Handouts

“As you know, the use of social media like Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and others is rapidly growing among members of many associations, but what are associations thinking about using social media for conferences? … We are gathering data about conference networking and social media uses and would love to hear your ideas.”

Board

Empowering Your Board to Fundraise: Part 1: Treating Our Board Members as Major Donors
Barbara Talisman | Talisman Thinking Out Loud

“Our Board members can be our biggest asset. Yet sometimes there exists a tension between staff and board. I think the key to making the relationship work is communication, cultivation and caring. The same efforts we apply to cultivating and soliciting a major donor, should be offered to our Board members.”

Empowering Your Board to Fundraise: Part 2: Five Easy Steps to Engaging the Board in Fund Development
Barbara Talisman | Talisman Thinking Out Loud

“To empower them to fundraise, we need to give them tools to make it easy. We need to work with our Board members to develop an individual fundraising plan for each of them.”

Volunteers

What Do We Really Know About Our Association Volunteers?
Peggy Hoffman : Mariner Management & Marketing LLC | SmartBlog Insights

“What do we really know about our association volunteers? Not much. That is the clearest finding of The Decision to Volunteer study (DTV) conducting by ASAE & The Center for Association Leadership… For starters, we don’t even know who is volunteering!”

Other

“The moment you designate an e-newsletter by the time when it’s to be sent out, you are off on the wrong foot. Instead, you should designate it by an event or action… [then] give your recipients a handful of actions related to the topic.”

Fun

Despair, Inc.

"I think the look on this guy’s face says it all..."

Get linked…

If you’ve got a stand-out blog post, article, presentation, video, or other online resource to help associations and non-profits be more effective, add your story links at AssociationJam.org. There’s even a badge you can copy-and-paste to your web page, if you want to make it even easier for your readers to “vote up” your AJam contribution!