The Blogoclump

Anyone else into old-skool deep house? My husband Andy Grant spins a mean groove. Ah, the nostalgia of youth…

Read & discuss at Maddie Grant's blog.

I don’t mean you, of course! I mean your association!

A bunch of us bloggers are all passing around Rohit Bhargava’s book *Personality Not Included - Why Companies Lose Their Authenticity - And How Great Brands Get It Back. It’s practical guide about how to build a brand with personality in a more open, transparent and engaged world full of “accidental spokespeople”.

The book is chock full of good stuff about what it means to have personality, how a company can distill their personality into a communications strategy, how to create a marketing backstory. In Lindy Dreyer’s review she highlights Chapter 6, which describes “personality moments”. For me, the killer chapter is Chapter 5 (Conquering the Fear Factor), where Bhargava discusses common roadblocks to creating personality.

This is a situation we are very familiar with. Here are his “Four Great Barriers to Personality“:

1. Success - What we are doing is already working.
2. Uncertainty - We don’t know what will happen.
3. Tradition - We have always done it this way.
4. Precedent - No-one else is doing it that way.

Sound familiar? Yeah. I hear ya. Bhargava goes on in the rest of the chapter to explain ways you can overcome these roadblocks, ways we can all find of good practical use.

In the second half of the book, he gives us real practical techniques, guides and tools we can take away and use today to start building our organization’s personality.

Here’s an example. He describes ten new styles of marketing, gives examples of companies using each, when it works and when it doesn’t, and a step-by-step guide to how to undertake that particular type of marketing effort. Here are a few that I think are really relevant to associations and non-profits:

Curiosity Marketing - Engaging customers by inspiring their curiosity
Karmic Marketing - Doing something good without any expectation of reward
Participation Marketing - participating in a dialogue without needing to lead it
Insider Marketing - Giving consumers special access to inside information or experiences
Useful Marketing - Creating content that has value and using it for marketing

I’ve been reading a lot of theory, sociology, analysis around the Web 2.0 world lately, which is interesting, for sure, but I thought this book was a refreshing contrast, with lots of good, simple yet effective ideas and takeaways. ‘Cause you know I like to just get crackin’. : )

Read & discuss at Maddie Grant's blog.

What if you had a whole segment of membership who used Facebook like you use Microsoft Outlook (guess what, you do!)? How would you communicate with them? Given the statistics above, these are very relevant questions for association marketers today. Fortunately, Sarah Perez at ReadWriteWeb.com shares insights about how, for those who have recently entered the workforce, Facebook has replaced conventional calendaring and other stuff that we consider the domain of Microsoft Outlook. And of course, you already knew that e-mail is for old people.

If you’ve decided to take your association into the Facebook world, your first inclination might be to start a Facebook Group for your association. Hold it right there! Don’t do it. Opt for Facebook Pages, a richer option for business users with features like statistics, embeddable flash or video, and more. Check out these two posts from FacebookAdvice.com for a primer on how to set up your association’s profile in Facebook Pages.

So you’ve got an association blog, and you’re active in Facebook. Maybe you’ve even begun streaming your blog content into Facebook using their Notes feature. Great! Read through Mari Smith’s 10 tips for leveraging your blog in Facebook. My favorite piece of advice? “After a certain period, use the Share feature on your Note (imported blog post) to post out the Note on your profile. e.g. say 3-5 days goes by and your Note has many comments - you could post to your profile (use the Share button) and include a comment to the effect there’s a great discussion going on and you’d welcome more input.”

As always, if you have feedback or a tip, e-mail me at bkmcae at gmail.

Read & discuss at Ben Martin's blog.

I saw this posted on the MeCo listserv this morning and well, my stomach still hurts from laughing. Joe Cocker’s performance at Woodstock, translated:

I’m going to see him, along with Steve Miller, in concert later this month, and I just know this is going to be running through my mind…

Read & discuss at Sue Pelletier's blog.

On occasion I like to brag about the little town of Carrboro where I live. Residents fondly refer to it as the Paris of the Piedmont, and c’est vrai – it is a great little place to live. One amenity I particularly enjoy is being able to grab breakfast or lunch at Weaver Street Market […]

Read & discuss at jtcobb's blog.

Read & discuss at Matt Baehr's blog.

Last night I remembered I needed to call a French Consulate, but it was already 7PM so I figured too late for Boston. So I called the consulate in San Francisco as still business hours there. And got what I needed.

When it’s after business hours on the East Coast, you can still find people in their offices in other parts of the country (such as, Federal agencies, department stores, real airport ticket offices, etc.) Even called Hawaii once because too late for California office hours.

Feel really smart when I think to do that. Maybe everyone on the East Coast does?

Read & discuss at CindyAE's blog.

Read & discuss at Hilary's blog.

Thanks to Kevin Holland for letting us know about this vibrant, and unusually frank, debate.

Read & discuss at AEM's blog.

I’m trying to finish up my promised prediction, but in the process of so doing, I’ve been marinating a deep thought or two and felt it necessary to make this statement: There is no such thing as a self-forming group.

Self-forming groups get talked about quite a lot in association circles, but the fact of the matter is that all groups are subject to the law of entropy. Without someone or something to hold them together, groups disintegrate. When it comes to so-called self-forming groups, there is always someone (or many people) who devote time and attention to creating and sustaining them. It sure is convenient to refer to online communities or herds of like minded people who network through the web as self-forming groups, but it isn’t accurate.

When confronted with a so-called self-forming group, don’t just assume all of the participants just spontaneously banded together. It’s more likely that there are a few ringleaders who have quite a bit of sweat equity invested in it. Keeping this in mind could help you craft your engagement strategy.

It may reek of circular logic, but this assertion isn’t incompatible with an earlier statement made here: All associations are self-forming groups.

Tagged: Association Management; Associations; CAE; Certified Association Executive

Read & discuss at Ben Martin's blog.