The Association Adviser Podcast Association Adviser

Elections require a delicate balance of transparency and privacy. You want your members to know and trust the process and the results. But sometimes you also want to protect the privacy of individual choices. There's also the chance of human error if making a group decision the old-fashioned way: by a show of hands, or by counting scraps of paper.

That's why Pete Westerhaus and Tony Hoff are with us today to talk about the benefits of using an electronic balloting system like the one Survey and Ballot Systems offers. Their DirectVoteLive platform is a cloud-based system of conducting elections or voting on initiatives.

Pete, an account manager for Survey and Ballot Systems, and Tony, their marketing director, explain how software like DirectVoteLive makes balloting in any size association easy, quick, and most importantly, secure.

This is a topic we've never broached before, but given the larger climate these days, we felt it was important to address, if only to get associations thinking about the integrity of their own elections and decision-making processes.



Interested in appearing on the podcast? Want to suggest an idea for an episode? Email Kelly Clark at kclark@naylor.com!



ASAE's Annual Meeting is Aug. 13-18! While we're disappointed we can't meet everyone in person this year, we hope the online format means many of you will be able to tune in again for a few days of education, networking, and fun. We'll have a team in attendance online and we hope to chat with you about our member engagement and non-dues revenue solutions.

Our Chief Revenue Officer Walt Phillips will lead what's sure to be an intriguing Q&A session with the dynamic Baratunde Thurston for the opening keynote. Join us for an Action Lab to talk about how your association will strategically plan in our next normal.

If you're going to be there for the education sessions, check out Digital Summit's Senior Sales Director Cedric Fellows's Express Talk on Monday, August 16 titled, "Will Your Sponsors Succeed at Your Next Virtual Event?" It's a 20-minute talk about ways you can improve your sponsorship offerings for virtual and hybrid conferences.

We'll see you online August 13-18!

Brian Hoffman, president at Illinois Bankers Business Services, loves banking. He loves what banks do for their customers and communities, and accurately predicted in his senior yearbook that he'd become a banker. Now all these years later, he's president of the Illinois Bankers Business Services, Inc. and Chief Evangelist, Co-Creator and Podcast Host for BankTalentHQ.com, a national network of job postings and resources for the banking industry.

Illinois Banking Business Services, Inc. is the for-profit arm of the Illinois Bankers Association. Its purpose is to create non-dues revenue for the association. IBBS started in the 1980s with a focus on selling insurance to members. Since then, the organization has grown to include a preferred vendor program and the online career center BankTalentHQ.com, a central hub for job listings and career resources for the banking industry.

Brian explains how BankTalentHQ grew out of members' stated need for more ways to get people interested in working for banks - and not just your stereotypical teller job, but everything that goes into running a successful bank - marketing, accounting, customer service, human resources, and more. This need for talent, and for people who would make a career out of banking, motivated the creation of BankTalentHQ. It started as a job board that catered to Illinois Bankers Association members, but has since expanded to a network of banking associations in 28 states, with more in the pipeline.

Brian tells us all about the amazing resources BankTalentHQ hosts and how he's built them. If you're thinking about adding or expanding your association's online career center, you'll definitely want to listen to hear how it can be done.



Thanks to our sponsor, Naylor Association Solutions, for supporting this episode. Learn more about our commitment to exceptional customer service and strategic growth for your membership at Naylor.com.

Want to appear on our podcast? Send Kelly an email at kclark@naylor.com. We'd love to talk with you about your association and the challenges and successes you're experiencing!

If you've worked in restaurants, factories, hotels, schools, or other places before attaining your dream job, you're going to relate well to this episode's guest. William Jones is the editor-in-chief for Independent Agent magazine, the flagship publication of the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America, Incorporated. But before he landed this position in October of 2020, he worked in all of those places. He's grateful for those experiences, however, because insurance is a part of every industry, and knowing first-hand the risks inherent in work in several industries has helped him better relate to members and what they want to know about through the magazine.

We talk with William about why it's hard for writers to build a career. When the Internet makes it easy for anyone to publish their words, the supply of writers increases. But so do the opportunities to practice your craft and set yourself apart from the pack. We cover how Will went from writing stories for free for a soccer fanzine to becoming editor in chief of a publication that serves 38,000 independent insurance agents.

We also cover how Will and his team heavily rely upon data to know how readers are responding to Independent Agent's content, and how essential it is to frequently survey readers to know what to talk about in future issues. IIABA is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year. And, the association has continuously published Independent Agent since 1903. There's a lot of tradition associated with a publication that established, but tradition will only get you so far. 

Will's routine for examining readership surveys, and studying click and impression numbers and visitor activity on IA's website is what keeps Independent Agent going strong in an era when many associations are decreasing the frequency of their print publications or ceasing them altogether.

Thanks to our podcast sponsor, Naylor Association Solutions.

Want to be a guest on The Association Adviser Podcast? Have an idea for an episode topic? Email Kelly Clark, kclark@naylor.com.

Change is hard, no matter how you look at it. Accepting change and working through it are essential to sustaining and growing your association, however. On this episode of The Association Adviser Podcast, we welcome Jennifer Spear, a facilitator, trainer, and un-consultant on this episode to talk about change. The past year has forced everyone to deal with some level of change, but the end of the pandemic won't signal the end of change forever. As associations like yours grow, adapt to new circumstances and refine their missions, change will always be a constant.

Jennifer works with organizations to help them think creatively, solve problems and plan strategically. Her consultancy, Unscripted, helps organizations accept the offer of change. We spoke with her about how to become more resilient and accepting of change, and how to work unscripted, especially during a time when we're all going through so many changes. She offers great advice about overcoming obstacles to changes as well as plowing through change fatigue in order to stay afloat and thrive. You're going to find this episode very useful no matter your association role or goals!



Before or after you listen to this episode, take the 2021 Association Communications Benchmarking Survey. This comprehensive study defines member communications best practices for associations of all sizes. It's possible because of professionals like you who give 30 minutes of your time to improve the practice of member communcations for all.

Give us your input to shape the report into an insightful and relevant resource for the entire association community. The survey is open through April 30, 2021. Participants who complete the survey will be entered for a chance to win one of 25 $100 Amazon gift cards when the survey closes. Access the survey today!



One more thing: The next Digital Summit at Home virtual conference is April 27-29, 2021. This is for all you association marketers—and for the association professionals who don't have "marketer" on your resume but wear that hat anyway. Hear keynote speeches from author Priya Parker, David Shing, and Robb Lee of ASAE. There will be more than 35 sessions across 3 days, and workshops about content marketing, member engagement, email marketing, lead generation, revenue strategies, diveristy and inclusion, and more. Snag your ticket at here! Groups of 3 or more get a $50 discount, even if that group isn't at the same organization! So tap your marketing friends to join you for 3 days of interactive learning. Go to digitalsummit.com and register for Digital Summit at Home for Associations, April 27-29, 2021.

Digital Summit, the leading education-based conference for the digital marketing community, got a crash course in holding virtual events after the world shut down last spring. Their team has learned tons about holding a interactive virtual events that speakers and attendees want to log on for—and Kip Edwardson and Jenn Sioteco from the Digital Summit team share what they've learned about holding a successful virtual event on this episode.
In person, Digital Summit typically holds conferences in more than 23 cities each year. Their events attract thousands of marketers at 1,200+ sessions, workshops, and seminars annually covering digital marketing best practices & tactics. Their speaker roster has included such luminaries as Seth Godin, Gary Vaynerchuk, Ann Handley, Mark Cuban and Randi Zuckerberg. When the pandemic happened and we all settled into our homes for the year, the staff at Digital Summit thought moving their eents online wouldn't be a problem. But they soon discovered—as your association has probably also figured out by now—that running an event online is just not the same as organizing it in person.
Now, Digital Summit is thriving with their Digital Summit at Home events. Kip and Jenn share how they refined their approach to online events, what they looked for in a virtual event platform, and how they modified internal operations to level up their virtual conference game and make logging on to another virtual meeting something you WANT to do.
Take the 2021 Association Communications Benchmarking Survey! This comprehensive study defines member communications best practices for associations of all sizes. The results have given association communicators a road map to more effective member communications for a decade! 
Snag your ticket to Digital Summit at Home:Associations here! Groups of 3 or more get a $50 discount, even if that group isn't at the same organization! So tap your marketing friends to join you for 3 days of interactive learning. Go to digitalsummit.com and register for Digital Summit at Home for Associations, April 27-29.

Association professionals are under constant pressure to get more done with fewer resources. They're being compared to leaner, more agile startups, and they're being told their foundations are outdated. What do you do when faced with the need to streamline operations?

To continue on a path of delivering outstanding membership experiences and making progress toward their mission, Emily Hendershot of Nova Strategies recommends following a 3-step process to optimize operations. She talks with us on The Association Adviser Podcast about what it means to optimize association operations. Optimization is not the same as improving productivity or efficiency, but a combination of both. She recommends slowing down with your staff and asking yourselves three key questions when faced with narring time and resources but a goal of providing the best member/stakeholder experience:


What's being done?
What should be done?
How can we make it better?

More than just increasing efficiency or productivity, optimizing your membership management means to make the best or most effective use of the time and resoruces you have. Optimized operations lead to happier staff and members. Focusing on the operations that really matter can also help your association fulfill your mission better. 

Emily loves building strong, collaborative relationships with organizations to strategize efforts and optimize operations. Her successful history in creating and executing strategic initiatives has driven growth for global associations with membership targets from 200 to more than 125K people.

She'll share a lot more during April's Digital Summit event, which you can sign up for online at digitalsummit.com. Digital Summit is 3 days of interactive, exciting sessions about everything marketing, including content, lead generation, branding, email, social, video, and and more. You can attend from the comfort of your home, office, favorite coffee shop, or anywhere you have an internet connection. Digital Summit's speakers are LIVE and excited about helping attendees like you learn. Reigster today!