Happy Friday! If you’re on the East Coast, I hope you’re not freaking out too much about Hurricane Irene. Seems like it’s been quite the week of natural disasters. We hope everyone stays safe!

To top off this week’s posts, here are five of my favorite from around the association blogosphere this week:

1. The Associations Live blog shares 10 learning shifts for conferences and events. These are great things to keep in mind, especially as events become more and more digital. One key non-digital learning? Talk to strangers! Conference facilitators should make an effort to group people up who may not know each other.

2. Jeff Hurt shares some great visual language all meeting planners should employ. Research has increasingly shown that most of us are visual learners and including interactive media and idea mapping at meetings is a step in the right direction.

3. Elizabeth Engel praises Joe Gerstandt’s session at ASAE’s Annual Meeting, and asks fellow association professionals if they are “ready to fly.” Other questions to ask: Who am I? why am I here?

4. David M. Patt reminds ASAE attendees that they should not necessarily try to replicate every element of this year’s excellent annual meeting. ASAE is a huge operation with a large budget – and small staffs especially should try to take inspiration from their events, but to attempt to copy them.

5. Wes Trochlil shares a frustrating story about a car salesmen and reminds association execs that truth is everything. Whether you’re working with your board, volunteers, members or staff, make sure they know they can trust you.

Whether you’re in Hurricane Irene’s path or not, we hope you have a wonderful, safe weekend!

I was perusing this week’s #assnchat transcript (available here) and it made me think about how associations can build buzz for an event. Normally, the topic, rather than the speaker, is the draw for events and meetings.

But what if associations made the speaker the main focus?

I agree that many speakers perhaps aren’t too well-known, but what if your association used its online community to create a buzz? Have the speaker write guest posts for your association’s blog. Ask them to record a podcast your members can listen to beforehand. Make the speaker a celebrity among your members, and they’ll be energized to come listen to him or her speak.

Of course, creating a buzz means you and your speaker are going to have to deliver. Lots of pre-meeting excitement followed by a sub-par speaker is, well, a let-down. And your members aren’t spending their valuable time and money to listen to a lame speaker. Booking a speaker is a whole other blog post, but talk to him or her about how they engage attendees — those there in real life and those attending virtually, if that’s a possibility. Get his or her handouts before the event and post them on your Web site. Is live-streaming the session a possibility? If so, consider it.

Most organizations likely collect comments and feedback from their members after an event and use them when planning your next meeting. But what about asking some of your members to blog about their reflections and key takeaways? Keep the conversation going — it shouldn’t end when your meeting does. Are any of your members avid photographers (amateur or expert!)? Ask them to post their pictures on a Web site easily accessible by all members.

Even if live-streaming the session isn’t an option, record the speaker and stream the video from your association’s Web site. Keep a running dialogue of comments from attendees and compile their comments in one place.

Create a buzz with online tools before the event, and foster a dialogue event after the meeting is over. The 90 minutes spent in a session shouldn’t be the only time your members learn and discuss.