YGM Total Resource Campaigns

Is it 2021 yet? Tips for getting the next year in order

October 26 2020 admin Uncategorized 0 comments

This year has brought uncertainty and discomfort to communities and individuals on a mass scale, to which few of us have seen firsthand in our lifetimes. It left everyone scrambling to determine how to continue onward in different ways, to find ways to make 2020 productive, bearable.

And now, we are all looking to 2021 to decide how to grasp hold of its potential now. We know there are lots of things we just can’t plan yet because there are still lots of things we just don’t know now.

But instead of approaching the new year either with a sense of unease and trepidation or with the same plan as usual, we encourage you to approach 2021 with a different model.

Covid-19, for all of its devastation, has allowed us the opportunity to get out of the everyday rut we’ve been in and shown us possibilities to change in places where we thought change wasn’t possible. Our programming and initiatives may not be as inflexible as we had previously thought. We now have, to some degree, a blank slate in terms of our 2021 calendars.

We are suggesting to clients – and to you – to print out two blank calendars for 2021 with just the months. BLANK calendars.

On the first one, write in all of the events and initiatives you usually schedule in each month. Take a good look at each of the items you wrote down. You’re going to do some critical evaluations of your calendar in light of the unsettled nature of 2021.

Those items scheduled for the first quarter may not be able to be held in person. We are all hopeful things will settle into a new normal by mid-year, but we know the first few months may still include restricted movement for some.

Even though your by-laws require you to have an annual meeting, they do not require the dinner that accompanies it. Can your meeting portion be done via Zoom or another platform? Can you handle the required portion at the usual time while postponing the dinner and fun portions until later in the year when you can gather together?

Or could you do the entire thing virtually but from a new perspective? Have the meeting and some fun networking things as well. Depending on how you market the event, you can still sell tickets and sponsorships.

You can offer 30 minute networking opportunities with a speaker or select member prior to the event.
You can hand deliver event boxes to ticket holders prior to the event with small bottles of wine or champagne, gift cards to a local restaurant to cover the meal that normally would have been served, along with give aways from sponsors.
You can have a webpage set up for your live auction and allow online bidding until a certain time and announce the winners during the event.

The possibilities are endless. It’s up to you to determine how you want to approach the options. We encourage you, however, to refrain from calling an event held online a ‘virtual’ event. For instance, don’t call it your ‘virtual annual meeting.’ You would never have called it the ‘hotel annual meeting.’ The hotel was merely the location of the event. The same is true if you have the meeting virtually. We would suggest you merely call it your 2021 Annual Meeting. Location: Virtual.

You should not be charging people to attend an event because of the location or the meal. You should be charging based upon the content, for the access to the people in the room, even if that room looks a lot like a Zoom gallery.

Before you move an event, we urge you to take some time to look at each item under the following four lenses.

Income Gain/Loss – Is it financially profitable to move?
Participation – Is your target market going to attend?
Staff Time – How focused can staff be?
Value to Members – Should you be more focused on more important initiatives?

Consider especially whether it would be better to move to virtual or to move to later in the year. In looking at this option, consider especially staff time. You don’t want to expend staff time early in the year to only have to postpone and then have staff have to do that work again later in the year.

After reviewing these questions for your events and initiatives, you should be able to take that second blank calendar and build your 2021 calendar with a more accurate reflection of what a productive 2021 might look like for your chamber, both in terms of being a strong supporter of your members and in terms of building your own internal foundation.

While the word for 2020 was surely ‘unexpected,’ here at YGM we are claiming the word ‘wiggle’ for 2021. We’re aware that there will need to be some flexibility in order to greet the year with hope and in order to continue through the year with promise. Join us as we plan to wiggle through 2021.

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60 Sponsorship Ideas in 60 Minutes

August 06 2020 admin Uncategorized 0 comments

YGM recently sponsored one of our favorite workshops – ACCE’s 60 Sponsorship Ideas in 60 Minutes. This is our fourth year to sponsor this workshop, though this was the first time the workshop was conducted entirely online. We were delighted with how well the workshop went and with the interaction with the participants.

If you missed the workshop, here are some of the ideas suggested.

Institute a webinar series. Sell sponsorships of the series.
Move your networking events from in-person to virtual via Remo.
Send an email per day with chamber and local news. Sell a sponsorship for that email.
Sell sponsorships of Zoom backgrounds with sponsor’s logo on the background.
Maker’s Mark Spirit Sponsorship – Attendees paid $35 for a signature cocktail with a specially dipped bottle
Boxed lunch sponsorship – For the Military Appreciation Luncheon, the event was pushed to a virtual platform for the awards portion, and a sponsor was found to provide a boxed lunch, which were delivered to soldiers on a local Army base.
Chamber Trivia – host virtual trivia nights and get sponsorships
When you transfer meetings and such to a virtual format, consider having a virtual swag bag. Instead of pens, give tips. Create a virtual, secret website on which you give warm leads.
Sell series sponsorships
Life Fair (job fair) which is a talent portal and allows sponsors to spotlight jobs within their businesses.
Online trivia nights can feature sponsors throughout – blur sponsor logos or remove portions of the logo… whichever participant guesses the logo receives a prize from the sponsor business
Podcasts are excellent sponsorship opportunities and provides sponsor recognition through deep-dive conversations.
Annual meetings – Everyone has to have one. This chamber’s was themed each year. The chamber planned a theme and delivered theme boxes, including the kind of swag that would normally be on the tables, along with a bottle of wine and a gift card for dinner. It made it so that while people watched the awards portion online, they were also able to simulate the experience of the dinner portion at home.
Question of the Day – On social media, allow each sponsor to answer a question regarding their business and how it is involved in the community or how they impact the community.
Blog posts – There is a need for current information right now. Get sponsors for blog posts such as what businesses should do if they have an employee test positive for Covid-19.
Do you have a Community Improvement Awards Luncheon? This chamber is doing them as a publication this year.
Support local employees who might be out of work. Sponsors pay to be in a video, holding one word of a supporting message.
Pay it forward. Establish a program in which your larger, more established businesses can “sponsor” your smaller businesses’ membership dues.
Recovery kits – This chamber had posters with helpful information printed. The kits included the posters, sanitizers and other useful information. Sponsorships made it possible to distribute to both members and non-members alike. The chamber gained new memberships as a result.
Seniors on the Silos – This chamber has multiple silos in town. To honor the high school seniors, the chamber got sponsors and projected the photos of the seniors onto the silos each evening for a certain number of days.
So many chambers have a Taste Of. This chamber continued on with their’s despite the issues Covid presented. They changed it to a drive-thru event, giving the samples in take away packaging.
Chamber Night Out at the Movies – Sponsors have video promo spots prior to the movie.
Race Bridge – This chamber’s YP group hosted conversations focusing on race relations via zoom.
Trade Show – Rather than moving their trade show to a virtual platform, this chamber created a publication similar to a “Who’s Who” and included a check-in challenge encouraging people to visit each business in person.
Book Club – This chamber started a book club focusing on diversity, inclusion, and equity. Businesses can showcase what they are doing toward these things. A branded swag bag was created to go with the book giveaway.
Game Changers – The chamber President interviewed local leaders who have innovative ideas. The sponsor was able to present the opening remarks.
Coffee and Connections – Hosted on a virtual platform that allowed participants to move to different rooms. Each room had a sponsor who was a coffee shop and the sponsors were able to chat with participants directly.
Keep it Local Directory – Magazine which featured a multi-cultural section that was sponsored.
Member Minutes on Facebook – Sponsors were able to be visible and linked on Facebook
VIP Meet & Greet for webinars – Sponsor the 15 or 30 minutes prior to a webinar and allow the sponsors to host the networking time prior to a webinar. Sell the breakout rooms
Virtual Chamber Auction – Members provide donations for the Chamber to auction.
Steam-a-thon – In a telethon format, Chamber and COVID information shared throughout the day with sponsors having promo spots.

Our congratulations to the winners of the best ideas:
* Honorable Mention: Nate Phillips at Grand Rapids Chamber
* Third Place: Colleen Schipsi of the Michigan West Coast Chamber of Commerce
* Second Place: Randall Chase, IOM, of the Cedar Hill Chamber of Commerce
* First Place: Andrea Cole of the Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce

If you would like to watch the video of the workshop, you may find it here – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7J7_3ZM5TY&feature=youtu.be

We encourage you to take these ideas and take them for yourself. Modify the ones you like to fit your chamber and your community.

And make notes of what you think are your chamber’s best sponsorship ideas. Make plans to present those at next year’s workshop at the annual ACCE conference – hopefully in person!

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Improve Your TRC Communications

July 01 2020 admin Blog, Chambers, TRC, YGM 0 comments Tags: communications, sponsorships, total resource campaign, TRC

Are you planning your fall Total Resource Campaign (TRC) now? One of the first things on your timeline is most assuredly to promote it to your members and community.

In the YGM TRC world, you know that all communications and promotions should be centered around your members. If the focus is put on how involvement in the TRC through sponsorships benefits the members and their businesses, that communication will be more successful than if it is focused on how the TRC helps the chamber.

Now, we know TRCs help chambers. They give you a deep dive into strategic planning. They give you funds for your budget for an entire year. They bring in new volunteers and new members.

But Total Resource Campaigns – if done well – are also really beneficial to your members because they allow them avenues of contact with their target audiences that they might not have otherwise had. Let your pre-TRC marketing reflect that.

How do you do that?

Don’t simply announce in your newsletter/e-news that your TRC starts on whatever date. That’s boring and not informative.
Tell the story of your TRC by telling the story of your members. And let them tell their own stories, either in print or video.
Ask successful volunteers for the names of businesses they worked with that saw significant growth as a result of their sponsorships. Ask that volunteer to do a 60 second video interview with the business owner about how the sponsorship helped them reach their target market.
Include information in your communications pieces regarding the different sectors that were reached in your last TRC and how your sponsorships helped your member businesses reach those sectors.

Above all, you cannot overemphasize in your communications leading up to the campaign that the TRC is about finding ways to best assist member businesses in furthering their unique missions. Find new and different ways to say that. Even if you grow tired of saying it, your members won’t grow tired of hearing it. Because for them, the chamber should always be about how you can be of service to them.

Do your communications pieces communicate the right messages? If not, now is the right time to discover that and make any changes necessary.

If you need any help with a communications review, let us know. We are here to help you.

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Tend to your sponsorship garden

May 15 2020 admin Blog, Sponsor development, TRC, YGM 0 comments

Spring is beginning, and I love to see the flowers beginning to bloom. This spring has been anything but usual, but we have seen people out tending to their gardens. In fact, we have seen a few more flowers and gardens popping up around the neighborhood. I think people are finding the calming effect of being in nature.

When you look around your neighborhood, is there one house with a perfect lawn or beautiful stoop? If that beautiful display is at your home, then you know it doesn’t happen by accident. The true beauty of a garden happens thanks to the dedicated hand of a gifted gardener.

In many ways, maintaining your Chamber’s sponsorship list is like maintaining a garden.

Those gardeners who enjoy their beautiful garden in the spring and summer and then leave it dormant through the fall and winter have a very difficult time preparing the garden again the next spring. It is extra work, and through the years, the garden may not continue to rebound with the same beauty as the year prior.

But those who tend to their gardens through the year, a little at a time, discover that their gardens blossom greater and greater each year.

In order to properly tend your sponsorships as a garden, you will need to work on them throughout the year, not just during your Total Resource Campaign. If you are just considering a Total Resource Campaign now because of what is going on with this pandemic, consider that if your chamber had conducted a TRC in 2019, all of your funding for 2020 would already have been secured.

In a ‘normal’ year, as chambers hold events throughout the year, staff should review them in light of their future sponsorships.

Did you value the sponsorship appropriately in this year’s sponsorship campaign?
Is your marketing and promotion of the sponsorship appropriate?
Are there any additional sponsorships that you could launch in the future?
Have you discovered that, thanks to the marketing and promotions of the event, the sponsorship should be valued higher (or lower) in the future?
Have you discovered additional layers to the sponsorship?
Are additional benefits available which would increase the sponsorship value?

Considering these questions throughout the year rather than just at the beginning of your TRC allows your sponsorships to be stronger and more appealing to sponsors.

If you have a fall TRC, be using these questions to conduct your strategic planning for your campaign. Think about what areas of your membership haven’t been reached well in the past and need to be approached, what volunteers performed really well in past TRCs, what sponsorships seemed to appeal to your members the most, and how you can take this information and use it to make this your best TRC yet.

Right now, so many chambers are (and have been) in the process of reviewing their remaining 2020 events to determine which ones can be modified to move to a virtual environment and which ones need to be rescheduled to 2021. Be sure to look at your calendars, what sponsorship benefits can still be provided, and to involve the sponsors. Continued communication with your sponsors will ensure that they feel valued and that their interests and needs are being met.

As we all move through this current moment in time, continual review of your sponsorships will allow you to prune the excess, to see areas that can be improved, and to find places where growth is possible in your TRC sponsorships.

Use this as an opportunity to take another look at your sponsorship list, even if you aren’t currently in a TRC – maybe especially if you aren’t currently in a campaign. Even if you aren’t making alterations to a sponsor’s event or initiative, consider just touching base with that business owner, letting them know you are there for them.

Tend to your campaign as a good gardener, and you will be rewarded with a blossoming garden of sponsorships when your next TRC arrives. As always, if we can be of any assistance or offer any guidance, please feel free to reach out to us.

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What Is So Great About a TRC?

April 28 2020 admin Blog, TRC, Uncategorized 0 comments

As you can imagine, I could talk about Total Resource Campaigns (TRCs) until ‘the cows come home,’ as the old adage goes. I could tell you about how TRCs focus on sponsorships, are led by volunteers from the business community, and invite businesses from across your community – both large and small – to participate in greater depth in the life of your chamber.

But today, in the midst of all that is happening around us, there is one benefit of a TRC that is so powerful that it cannot be overlooked.

If a chamber held a TRC in 2019 for 2020, that chamber’s entire budget for 2020 would already be funded. Money would already be in hand for all of 2020.

Think about that for just a moment.

If a chamber held a TRC in 2019 for 2020, that chamber’s entire budget for 2020 would already be funded. Money would already be in hand for all of 2020.

That chamber’s staff would certainly be looking at working from home, virtual staff meetings, and conducting board meetings via Zoom or other virtual meeting platforms. They would absolutely be reviewing their calendar to see what initiatives and events should be postponed and which should be pivoted to a virtual environment.

But they would not be frantically trying to determine how they would fund their budget for the remainder of the year in addition to doing those other things.

Total Resource Campaigns serve as strategic planning on a deeper level than what many chambers have done before. That planning allows chambers to have a greater knowledge of their members and community and a renewed sense of their mission. With that, they are better able to make sure their initiatives and events follow their mission.

Through that strategic planning process, chambers offer sponsorships in the TRC that meet the marketing needs of their members and of the businesses in their community. When chambers do that, businesses response enthusiastically. And successful TRCs allow chambers to fund their next year’s budget.

With those fully funded budgets, chambers have the freedom to focus on assisting their members, especially in challenging times like these.

Those chambers who have done TRCs in the past know the financial freedom a TRC can offer. If you are interested in information about how you, too, can conduct a TRC and experience that for your chamber, please contact us at: info@nullygmtrc.com.

And yes, it is still possible to conduct a TRC this year, despite the uncertainty around us. We have a plan for a full virtual TRC, and we will be there to walk you through the process if conditions require that.

The TRC is built in such a way that volunteers talk to their business contacts in whatever manner they feel comfortable. Often, they are already dealing with those contacts virtually anyway – via email or text – regardless of the outside circumstances. Moving those volunteers and the campaign to an entirely virtual environment will be more of an effort for the chamber staff than for the volunteers or sponsors. It can be done and done well with a little extra effort on your staff’s part.

And those who have done a TRC in the past know it is well worth the effort. Consider this comment from Amy Britt in Seminole, Okla.

“Doing our TRC in October of last year for 2020 saved us from having to try to ask for donations or cancel events due to lack of funds. TRCs are the best thing we’ve ever done to ensure funding for our next year.”

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Sponsorships in a Time of Uncertainty

April 21 2020 admin Blog, Chambers, Sponsor development, TRC, YGM 0 comments

You had your 2020 calendar all set and were excited about the plans you had in place. And then the world turned upside down, and now you’re trying to determine how to plan the remainder of the year. But it’s really challenging to plan when none of us has a good grasp of what the rest of the year will look like.

And if it’s hard for you to plan as chamber leaders, imagine how difficult it must be for your member businesses. We have some ideas that we hope will prove helpful to you.

One thing to remember, now more than ever, is that chambers working through unprecedented times is not unprecedented. Chamber professionals work through recessions, hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, and more. Uncertain times and adversities are standard operating conditions.

As you begin to review your calendar for the remainder of 2020 with an eye to determining what to keep and what to move or cancel, keep in mind that there is a need for chamber professionals to provide services to members to help those member businesses thrive and succeed.

What do you have on your calendar what would facilitate that goal? Be sure to keep those initiatives.

Review, too, the benefits you have promised your sponsors for the events and initiatives on the calendar for the remainder of the year.

Are there benefits that can still be provided, even if they require a bit of modification?
Could you place a sponsor’s logo as a background on a Zoom gathering which will be recorded and shared on social media? That breakfast might not have to be canceled now. The sponsor will actually gain benefits due to the increased visibility of the logo and the additional presence on social media?
Specific members find specific things they can gain from their sponsorships. Consider why the sponsor chose their unique sponsorships when reviewing how to convert benefits to a virtual world.

It can be tempting to decide not to keep your signature events because they are the largest and demand the most time and effort from the staff. But those events are also usually your largest in terms of funding. Consider how you might keep those while moving or canceling your smaller, less cost-beneficial events like after-hours or monthly gatherings.

You won’t be able to keep everything. You have to look at your calendar with a strategic eye. How much of a burden will it be to move everything? You can’t move everything from this spring and summer to this fall and still have the fall be feasible. You also can’t simply cancel the rest of the year and still have your community view you as a business leader.

Chambers that are positive encourage positive attitudes in their membership. Right now, members are looking to their chamber leadership for positive energy more than ever.

If you need help working through your 2020 calendar and determining what to move, cancel or keep, please get in touch with us. We will be happy to help.

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Tips for Chambers Moving to Remote Work Flows

March 19 2020 admin Blog, Chambers, TRC, YGM 0 comments

As more chambers close their offices and move to remote work flows, it will take some time to adjust to the newness of telecommuting. We are here to help with some tips to get everyone started on how to make the best of this new situation.

Communicate!

We’re assuming you’ve let your member businesses and community know that you will not be present in the offices but will be working remotely. Be sure to make this information readily available on your website and chamber social media platforms. Give contact information as well. While it may feel a little odd to be working from your sofa, you will, indeed, be working. You want people to be able to reach you about chamber business.

One of the most important things to remember, both in terms of interactions with your fellow chamber staff members and with member business representatives, is that tone and inflection are much more difficult to infer via text or email than in person. Don’t take something as rude or angry from someone who would rarely be that way with you in person. Often teasing comments don’t translate well to the written medium. This is a trying situation for everyone. Give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Assume they mean well and that all comments were taken out of context or were meant with the best of intentions. If you are uncertain, ask for clarification.

Remember the Law of 7 Views… You will need to overcommunicate – during this time, your members are going to be hyperfocused on their own businesses, and they may not see all of your posts. You will need to provide access to the information often enough that they might be privy to it.

Work at Home Like You Work at Work (Mostly)

One of the best ways to keep things moving relatively smoothly in a home office environment (even if that home office is your dining room table) is to keep to a few key tips.

If you typically reported to work at 8 a.m., plan to begin your workday at or close to 8 a.m. at home as well. Keep your normal schedule.

Even though we are being urged not to leave home and it’s tempting to stay in pajamas or comfy workout wear, get dressed. Even if it’s just casual wear. You will likely be on video calls at some point in the day, and you don’t want to be on camera in your college band tee shirt, even if it is your favorite.

Set timers. Take breaks. There are fewer places to go at home, so you’ll be moving less (unless you are also home with your children who are not in school… but that’s a different topic). Set timers for every hour, and get up and move. Do jumping jacks. Take a quick walk (unless you live in an urban setting and that’s not possible). Do a few yoga poses. Do something to get moving.

Plan those snacks. You thought there were lots of snacks in a chamber office! Snacking just got way easier at home. Don’t be tempted every time you walk by the fridge. If you need an extra coffee or some fruit mid-morning, go for it. But don’t leapfrog into 12 cups a day just because you now have the coffee pot at home with you.

Video Call Best Practices

We’ve all seen funny videos of videoconference fails. Here’s how to avoid being one.

First, prepare. Do you have children or pets in your home with you? Is there a room you could go into for the video chat that has a door you could close so you can take your call while a caregiver watches your child? If so, plan to use that room.

Next, practice. Turn on the camera on your computer and do a few tests. Where in your chosen room has the best lighting? How can you best adjust the camera to show your background? Look closely at the background… is there anything you would prefer someone not see? Some video conferencing platforms allow you to select a generic background, and the platform will drop that in behind you rather than having your location background appear.

Play with that until you are comfortable. Turn on the audio & do an audio test. Again, the platforms will all allow you to do these tests prior to an actual call so you can ready when the first call happens. Try it with your staff before you have video calls with member businesses.

During your calls…

Be dressed appropriately
Don’t have music or tv playing in the background (it can be distracting to others, and, again, this is work)
Have all of your material ready when the call begins so you don’t have to leave to get items to take notes or to present your information
Keep your mic on Mute until/unless you are ready to speak
The ‘chat’ box is only for work-related/call-related topics. Never use it to talk with a friend. Typically, everyone can see the chat box.
Make sure your desktop is free from anything you wouldn’t want everyone to see. If you need to share your screen, everyone will be able to see anything on your desktop, including folders and their names.

Communicate

Communication is going to be the key that makes remote flows successful. Set aside a few minutes at the start and close of each workday to review and respond to emails. Make sure you are on top of those communications as they will prove to be important to the success of your interactions during the day.

With some basic common sense efforts, your team can make the most of this time of remote work flows. You may discover that it turns into a time of innovation.

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Help your Chambers deal with information overload

March 18 2020 admin Blog, Chambers, TRC, Uncategorized, YGM 0 comments

Part of what we do at YGM is monitor various things (we’re nicer than the hall monitors of your childhood, but we’ve still got our eyes on the pulse of what’s happening).

We monitor your chamber social media accounts. We monitor your event advertising to view your sponsorship benefits. We monitor your balance of “event inviting” versus “business informational sharing.”

What I can tell you from my recent monitoring in the midst of COVID-19 is that everyone is overwhelmed. I also know all of you are deeply concerned about providing your member businesses with information that could be beneficial to them. Social media is a great informational sharing tool, but we all need to make sure we use the platforms appropriately.

It’s great, for example, to share which restaurants are doing curb-side pickup or delivery. It’s also important to share which nonprofit organizations are providing meals for school children. However, just “sharing” each of these individual posts can be overwhelming to your members, your businesses, your citizens, your community. It may also prove frustrating when someone wants to go back to find a particular bit of information but it is lost in the trove of other information which has been shared.

The chamber is a convener, a place for information sharing. Take the time to position your organization in the right way – in a way that best helps your community.

You are likely thinking it will take extra time to write your own posts or listing pages rather than simply sharing the information. And you are right. It may. But the time you spend will be valued by your members.

Create a place – a post that you pin to the top of your Facebook page, a webpage, or a unique page on your chamber page – for all information that is localized to your community. It doesn’t matter where… just have one central clearinghouse page and make that page easily accessible.

Sharing information from the CDC, ACCE, US Chamber, etc., are good ideas, but it is especially valuable to share local information. The real trick, though, is to sift through the information and pull out only what is really valuable to your local community. Your member businesses are struggling at the moment to adapt to this ever-changing landscape. They don’t have time to read all of the posts if you simply click ‘share’ on all of the great information you come across.

You need to digest and distill the information for them. Make it locally relevant. You want to promote and encourage engagement with your local member businesses. Local information is vital.

In order to accomplish this, divide and conquer. Use your Chamber staff and their respective divisions:

have events division work on options for virtual meetings for chamber networking as well as virtual options for businesses to interact with their clients
have your governmental affairs/economic development division work on breaking down the information for small business loan relief … also suggest working with a local banker to discuss how to qualify for these loans
have your membership division work on benefit options for small businesses in this uncertain time

With just a little planning and effort, you can be of tremendous assistance to your member businesses.

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TRC as a Strategic Plan

March 01 2020 admin Blog, Chambers, TRC, YGM 0 comments

“We have a strategic plan. It’s called ‘doing things.’” – Herb Kelleher

No offense to Mr. Kelleher, known to many in the business world as an American icon, most businesses (and chambers alike) need a more structured plan than simply ‘doing things.’

As we move forward, chambers are going to want more initiative-based programming rather than primarily event-based programming. From our perspective at YGM, a Total Resource Campaign is a tool to implement and affect your strategic plan wrapped in a sponsorship drive.

In talking with chamber professionals around the country, we hear them say over and again how they just keep doing the same things every year but are frustrated with how to break the cycle.

Taking the time to do the difficult strategic planning, looking at your chamber with fresh eyes is the best way to break that cycle. Be clear about who your chamber represents and what your mission is. How can you walk that line between staying true to your mission and making enough money to carry out your programming?

Are there events in your book of business that you hold simply because ‘it’s always been done that way?’ Look at those. How well are they attended? What types of businesses are represented? Is it possible you could discontinue those events and replace them with an initiative that might reach a broader audience?

Taking a critical eye to the way you do things and to the events you have is a necessary element to successful strategic planning. And successful strategic planning will lead into successful total resource campaigns.

The two together can put your chamber in a place where you can dream for and set into motion new and innovative initiatives that will benefit your chamber members and your community at large.

“Vision without execution is just hallucination.” Henry Ford

Commit to setting aside dedicated time for you and your staff to work on your upcoming strategic plan. Execute your vision for your chamber and your community.

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The Best Engagement Plans Start Close to Home

February 07 2020 admin Blog 0 comments Tags: Engagement, TRC

If you have been involved in a Total Resource Campaign with YGM, then you know that we talk a lot about engagement.

Everyone in the chamber world (the business world in general) knows that we all work with and engage with a wide arrange of people and constituent groups. And while the benefits of this are great, the challenges can also sometimes be great.

I think about the following quote a lot when I think about how we interact with those constituent groups.

“It all came down to employee engagement. It all came down to recognition. It all came down to leadership, which led to every sailor feeling ownership and accountability for the results. You can ask a team to accomplish a mission but you can’t order excellence.” –Mike Abrashoff, Commander USS Benfold (retired)

Real engagement is necessary to be successful whether we are in a chamber or in a small business or in a megacorp. And in all of those places, that real engagement begins at home, with our own employees, our own team members.

At YGM, we like to think of ourselves as being on the same team because a team works together. We succeed together, and we pick one another up when we fail together. Much like Commander Abrashoff suggested, all of the sailors have a sense of ownership in the process and thus, give their very best.

We recently hired Michele Trice as YGM’s first Director of Engagement. She will be working directly with clients to assist them in engaging their volunteers, members, and communities in new and innovative ways.

I have known Michele personally and professionally for more than 20 years. Some of you may know her from YGM as she has worked with us some for years. She has a background in communications, both in corporate and non-profit environments.

As each of us think about our own environments, whether chamber or business, this quote speaks to what we need to focus on first.

“Engaged employees are in the game for the sake of the game; they believe in the cause of the organization.” – Paul Marciano, PhD

Michele has believed in YGM for years, and we are all going to benefit from her talents. Take a moment today to spend some time thinking about those in your organization who are really engaged. Do they believe in the mission of your cause? Are they fully engaged? Do you recognize them for that engagement?

As a leader, do you encourage them to have a sense of ownership in your organization? Are you a team?

If not, how do you change that? It’s an old adage, but it’s true – teamwork makes the dream work.

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