Happy Friday! One more weekend until (American) Thanksgiving … what are everyone’s plans besides being full of turkey and gratitude? Does your family have a special tradition?

Before you head out for the weekend, be sure to check out our favorite blog posts from the association community!

1. Jeff Hurt shares six important connections to be aware of when planning your association’s conference. The most important one (to me, at least)? Connecting participants to outcomes. Your conferences should always arm people to succeed once they get back to the office – and not every new idea has to be big and flashy.

2. Do your staff members sit on the association’s board? David M. Patt discusses why this isn’t a good idea. Staff members and board members have different goals and roles, and they could sometimes conflict.

3. Do you know what your strengths and weaknesses are? (I know my weakness – I tend to work too quickly and make little stupid mistakes.) Aaron Wolowiec shares why it’s important to know your personality, how you work and what you need to work on with regards to your style.

4. Tony Rossell shares five steps to creating a marketing recruitment program: the who, what, where, how and why. I think this is a great article for small staffers to read since duties can overlap and no matter what your title, there’s a chance you’ll be doing some marketing. There are some great comments on this post, so be sure to check it out!

5. Elizabeth Engel shared some great takeaways from a PRSA meeting, including info on Google+ (still made up mostly of early adopters) and LinkedIn (likely the future of business social networking).

Have a great weekend!

Good morning and happy Friday! I’m sure for most (if not all) of us in the U.S., it was a short workweek, which always means things are a bit crazy. But hopefully everything is winding down and you’ll be ready for the weekend soon. As usual, there were lots of great resources in the blogosphere for the association community, so here are five of my favorites:

1. Great advice from Keith Johnston: Create an editorial calendar for your conference or event blog. In addition to manning your conference or event blog 24/7, as Keith suggests, it’s crucial to map everything out so you don’t get stuck with a mean case of writer’s block (been there, had that it’s no fun). Keith even shares a great WordPress plugin (that I had no idea existed!) to help you plan your content.

2. Back this week with another great leadership limerick, Jeffrey Cufaude reminds us that traditions do matter in associations. We are constantly looking forward to the next big thing, but it’s important to remember where your association has been in the past and why its traditions are important.

3. We’re big fans of Seth Godin’s here at MemberClicks, and one of his posts this week really struck a chord with me: The overwhelming fear of being wrong. Often back in school, I wouldn’t raise my hand to answer a question because I was so afraid of being wrong. But, in both our work and personal lives, it’s important to not let the fear of failure from holding us back.

4. ASAE’s Acronym blog has started a series posing questions to Annual Meeting speakers, and this week, Michael Gardner, CAE and Lydia Middleton, CAE, weighed in on the building blocks of a small staff association’s staff. They have a great discussion about what’s more important: someone to handle financial services or someone to provide members with service.

5. Do you know what your staff members complain about? It’s important to know what your staffers, board members and members have gripes with. One thing to remember: you and your members are on the same team (although you may not always feel that way). Read more at the Hourglass Blog.

Happy Friday, everyone!

I’m more than ready for the weekend – somehow this was my first full five-day week in the office in about a month (thanks to a stint working from home and a quick trip out of town) and I’m definitely feeling it. Is anyone else ready for awesome, summery weekend?

As per usual, there were tons of great resources in the association management blogosphere this week. Which posts were your favorites? I want to hear about them – I love discovering new blogs!

For now, though, here’s my Friday Top Five:

1. Does your association benefit from strategic planning? Bunnie Riedel shares how to prevent your organization’s strategic plans from collecting dust: create actionable plans. As the old adage goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Bunnie shares that piece of advice and a few more in this great blog post.

2. In a nice link round-up, Maddie Grant shares some awesome social media resources for association professionals. In particular, I like the piece she shares about community managers. Are they really necessary for associations? Something to consider before hiring one!

3. At the Association Marketing Insights blog, Kevin Whorton shares a great example of how to learn how often is too often when it comes to communication. Although the study he shares wasn’t scientific, it gives great insight into how members want to be communicated with. Read on to find out more!

4. Joe Rominiecki at the Acronym blog, inspired by a post by Maggie McGary, asks, what good is governance without influencers? He gives three options for evolving the governance process, including the possibilities of bringing in new influencers, ditching the governance system or developing a hybrid.

5. Have you ever included certain things in your association’s events just because the audience preferred them? Have you ever not included things because you didn’t like them? David M. Patt encourages association professionals to “do it anyway” when it comes to certain aspects of your event.

From everyone at MemberClicks, have a great weekend!

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I think, in the fourth month of 2011, it’s safe to say social media isn’t going anywhere – in fact, it’s only getting more prevalent. Social media is great for small staff associations because it’s cost-effective and doesn’t have to take up too much time. So how can you use (cost-effective and/or free!) social media tools to drastically improve your conference?

1. Establish an event website (separate from your association’s website) and link to it from your association’s Twitter feed, Facebook and official website. Encourage attendees to use a specific Twitter hasthag and let the organization know if they’ll be blogging about it. Make it easy for people to share information about the event online.

2. Use location-based services (such as Foursquare, Facebook Places, Gowalla and Loopt) to offer rewards and bonuses to attendees. These tools easily integrate with the big two (that would be Facebook and Twitter) and little rewards (such as a gift card) can go a long way.

3. Twitter allows events to become bigger than they are by publicizing content online as it happens. (The real-time aspect is key, in my opinion). Encourage attendees and staff members to use the official event hashtag. If possible, set up a huge monitor and display tweets with the hashtag so everyone can follow along with the online conversation in real time.

4. Gauge interest in a livestream. Can you broadcast a few sessions on UStream for non-attendees? People watching a livecast can ask questions via Facebook and Twitter and truly be a part o the conversation.

5. Be sure to post handouts and key learnings on your official event website. Keep the event going even after it ends. Continue using the hashtag for a few weeks and promote attendees’ post-event blog posts.

Happy Friday! My favorite posts this week all had to do with technology in some way or another. It’s what we’re consumed by here at MemberClicks, and we love the idea of technology making someone’s life easier. So let’s get right to it!

1. I tweeted this post earlier this morning, but I want to draw everyone’s attention to Mobile Millennials Leading the Way. For many young people, their entire lives are on their cell phones. It’s a “24/7 lifestyle.” Regardless of your organization’s size, being cognizant of mobile is crucial — even if you don’t have a “mobile strategy.”

2. I’ve really been enjoying Joe Flowers’ series about his small staff association’s web redesign. Part 4 chronicles telling a vendor that their relationship is ending and the concerns of migrating their information. Any association can probably relate — we realize that dealing with vendors can be stressful! But hopefully your vendors are understanding and professional.

3. A recent post by Wes Trochlil got me thinking: people, process and technology. For any web project to be successful, you have to have a delicate balance of the three. But no matter how awesome your technology is, if your people (i.e. your staffers) aren’t on board, it won’t succeed.

4. OK, this one is technically neither a blog post nor about technology, but it is about small staffs, which automatically makes it awesome. In the latest issue of Associations Now, Teresa Evans-Hunter discusses how a small staff organization staffs its conference. It can be tricky to host hundreds (or even thousands!) of members with a limited staff, so this is a good read.

5. Last but not least, the crew at Association Tech shared a post about a website revamp. There are many challenges involved in such a huge undertaking, so it’s crucial to know your objective and work with the right people. What are some of the challenges your organization has faced during a website revamp?

From everyone at MemberClicks, have a great weekend!

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