Summer is almost here. People will be in and out and more difficult to get ahold of as the beach calls for summer vacations. It’s important to get your contact lists updated now so you know you can get in touch if you need, especially with those members and volunteers who serve in leadership roles. This is also a great time to suggest that if a volunteer knows he or she might be out during a meeting (if that meeting won’t be discussing sensitive materials), a co-worker could be sent in his or her stead. It’s a wonderful time to expose potential volunteers to the work that the Chamber does on a daily basis. That sub at the meeting might just turn out to be your next best seller in your total resource campaign. Summer is also a great time to touch base with your volunteers and remind them that you value the work they are doing. There are some fabulous ways to let your volunteers know how important they are without breaking the bank or taking a lot of your staff’s time. Send an unexpected email to your volunteer list – not on your regular email newsletter day – […]
The children around me have got a serious case of Spring Fever. Did your kids enjoy Spring Break but then have trouble refocusing on school? Or are they still anticipating their Spring Break, little bundles of energy all anxious with excitement? Sometimes we get a touch of Spring Fever ourselves as adults and professionals, even if we might not want to admit it. But instead of fighting it, why not indulge it and let it work for us? Most Chambers do a regular newsletter. Why not allow your April newsletter to spotlight a different segment of your Chamber membership? This gives your communications staff (or your president if you have a small staff) a bit of a breather in terms of the task of writing the newsletter, and it lets your membership shine. It also exposes your overall membership to fellow Chamber members they might not have met yet. There are lots of ways to use guest posts. Ask your contact at a larger corporation to suggest an individual who has a strong sense of community pride or activism. Ask that individual to write about that love of community. Chambers, at their core, are about community, after all. If you […]
Spring is beginning, and I love to see the flowers beginning to bloom. Is there one house on your block with a perfect lawn? If it’s your lawn and garden, 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. As you hold events throughout the year, review them in light of their future sponsorships. Did you value the sponsorship appropriately in this year’s […]
