Matrix Group International

Author: Joanna Pineda

Even Your Kids Need a Password Manager

I’ve blogged in the past about password managers and why I think everyone needs one. Yes, everyone. Even your children.

Not convinced? I asked my 8 year old about his various online accounts. Turns out he’s got about a dozen accounts already, between Spanish, Math, school blog, Minecraft, Fornite, etc. How does he remember them? He doesn’t. His teacher manages the students’ passwords and he asks me for his password when he has to log in to Fortnite.

My 14-year old has even more passwords and he was making the mistake many adults make: in order to reduce complexity, he was reusing passwords. OMG!

So what did we do? About a year ago, we set up a LastPass family account. My husband, two boys and I each have our own logins. LastPass is on our computers and phones (no, the 8-year-old doesn’t have a phone, but he does have a computer). We have taught the boys to not reuse passwords, to always let us know when they are creating new accounts, and to have LastPass generate strong passwords or to get help from me or my husband.

Even your kids can become victims of identity crimes. Keep them safe. Set them up with a password manager, show them how to use it, and insist that all of their passwords be in it.

Do you have a family password manager in place already? What service are you using?

March 28, 2019
How to Make Your Conference Speakers Feel Special
I get asked to speak at industry and professional conferences throughout the year. While I appreciate the opportunity provided by every organization, I want to give a shout out to the International Foundation of Employee Benefits Plans (they call themselves the International Foundation, let’s call them the Foundation in this blog post).

I don’t get paid a big speaking fee by the Foundation, but I always enjoy speaking at their conferences for one simple reason: I feel special, extra special, in fact. Here are some of the things the Foundation does really, really well for their speakers:
- While I handle my own travel, they handle registration and hotel reservations, which reduces some of the friction associated with being a speaker.
- I’m always assigned a designated moderator and that person always reaches out to me ahead of time to get to know me, brief me on the conference, answer my questions, and ask how I’d like to be introduced. I always, always ask for a brief introduction because long, boring introduction take the energy out of a room.
- I get demographic information about the attendees, and the results of any industry surveys recently done. For example, I’m speaking at the Foundation’s Institute for Apprenticeship, Training and Education Programs this week, and a week ahead of time I received a copy of their most recent survey: Top Trends in Jointly Managed Apprenticeship Programs from 2018. This survey is gold; I will be able to better tailor my remarks to my audience!
- When I check in, I’m warmly welcomed. I get a special thank you from the Director, who makes a point of telling me that his attendees attend his conferences because of speakers like me. There’s a speaker ready room, and there’s a speaker thank you reception the first night of the conference.
I bet it doesn’t cost the Foundation very much to do these extra things for their speakers, but they go a long way toward making me feel welcomed and valued.

So shout out to Tom DeRoche, Director of Educational Programs, and his team at the Foundation!

Since so many of you say that it’s the educational content that draws people to your conferences, what are YOU doing to make your speakers feel special?
January 14, 2019
Make These Your 2019 Resolutions for your Website and Web Marketing
It’s the start of a new year. Did you accomplish all of your digital goals from 2018? Did you complete every project? If you like Matrix Group, or most of my clients, you didn’t meet all of your goals, but you gave it a good try. As you ponder the new year, I hope you’ll think about adding these resolutions to your digital to do list for 2019.

Evolve Your Website.

If the idea of a full website redesign scares you, why not consider evolving your website instead? Here at Matrix Group, we tackle a section or feature of our website every quarter. We might redesign just one page, redo a form, or update the language on a bunch of pages. Last year, we:
- Updated my blog home page
- Updated our Contact Us form
- Redesigned our Recent Projects page
- Updated our presentation template
- Refreshed our About Matrix Group blurb, and
- Changed our webinars to have co-presenters from outside the company.
Because we tackled these initiatives in pieces, it didn’t kill us and we got a lot done.

Tidy Your Website Content.

If you’re friends with me on Facebook, you know that two years ago, my husband and I read “The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up” by Marie Kondo. If you haven’t read the book, watch the show on Netflix. And this year, resolve to declutter your website so that only the content that will spark joy in your members and customers will be on your site AND your search will work better.

Look at Your Analytics!

I know, seems obvious, but many organizations don’t look at their analytics regularly. If you don’t, how do you know what content is connecting with your audiences? To get started, just do these three things:
- Look at your analytics once a week
- Never, ever send out a link without Google UTM codes so that traffic on your site can be attributed to your campaigns
- Put in annotations and note when you send out mass emails, mailed out your magazine, or ran an AdWords campaign.
Get Started with Marketing Automation.

Marketing automation refers to software and technologies that automate the often repetitive tasks involved in cultivating prospective and current customers and members, and do it in a way that allows for personalization based on time, an individual’s demographics, and/or an individual’s actions. Marketing automation can be used to create personalized members journeys via email and on the web for new members, new primary contacts, prospective members, etc. If you’re not already using marketing automation in your organization, make this the year you explore how it can benefit you.

Revamp Your Content.

If your content strategy hasn’t changed in the last decade or even half decade, it’s time for an overhaul. Your customers are mobile, they are time constrained, they are busy, they are distracted, and what you’re offering is probably available for free somewhere on the web. Take one thing and redo it. Change the format of your webinars, rethink your e-newsletter strategy, convert text to video, consider a nano learning format, get rid of your paper directory.

2019 is the year to test new ideas, be bold, and learn. What are YOU going to do differently in 2019?
January 7, 2019
Ask Your Organization These Questions to Increase Your Membership Renewal Rate
I’m working with a number of associations that are experiencing higher than desired membership churn rates. In some cases, nearly 25% of the membership does not renew each year. That’s a lot of members to recruit each year, just to recover from the previous year’s loss.

What to do? In this instance, we get curious about the new membership onboarding process and we ask these questions:
- Do the non-renewing members share demographics?
- Are there patterns in their activities? For example, we sometimes find that the members who choose to renew after just one year are often accidental members, or people who became members because they registered for a meeting or spoke at a conference. In these instances, these individuals sometimes don’t even realize they are members.
- Are there certain activities or campaigns that generate more non-renewing members? For example, perhaps a certain list that you rent or buy generates members but they tend not to renew.
- Do non-renewing members come from certain segments of your membership, e.g., a certain size company or type of business?
- How does the organization welcome new members? What do they receive in the mail and online? What exactly happens and when?
If you’re not already tracking this information, it’s time to start! You’ll get valuable into who is not renewing and get a head start on getting those renewal rates up. In future blog posts, I’ll share tips and strategies for creating amazing new member onboarding journeys. Make 2019 the year of intentional new member journeys!
December 19, 2018
2018 Top Techie Holiday Gift Ideas from Matrix Group
No matter what holiday you celebrate, it’s a great time to purchase some techie gifts for your family, friends, even yourself. If you’re looking for inspiration, here are some recommendations from the Matrix Group staff.
- The Echo Show lets you watch TV and movies, hold video conferences, see the lyrics of songs, and so much more! My mom has one and she loves it!
- The Apple Pencil for iPad is a nifty gadget for the artist in your life.
- Buy your favorite techie an American-made hoodie sweatshirt that Slate says is the “greatest hoodie every made.”
- Turing Tumble lets kids build marble-powered computers. My 8-year got one for his birthday and he and his brother love this thing. It’s got a great manga-style user manual and it’s serious fun.
- Is it time for a standing desk? We love the sit-stand desks from PCM. Most Matrix Group staff have a standing desk or one of these.
- If you’re more into experiences, my family loves Escape Rooms! Perfect for a family, or a group of friends or co-workers. Pair younger kids with older kids or adults. There are Escape Rooms all over the DC area! Here’s one we like.
- We’re pretty serious about our coffee at Matrix Group and some staff have fallen in love with cold brew coffee. Here’s a popular model from Amazon – the Takeya 10310 Patented Deluxe Cold Brew Iced Coffee Maker
- Ever wish you could control the exact lighting to fit the mood? Now you can!
- We’re intrigued by this Sous Vide Precision Cooker with Bluetooth and App-
- Love this running cap with stereo speakers!
- It’s cold outside but we know you still need access to your phone. How about a pair of texting gloves?
- Need to check the temperature of something on to go? Grab a classic thermapen!
- Accio Programo! Customize your very own magic wand for 2019!
- Ever wish you could turn on your lights? Now you can with the GE Z-Wave Smart Switch that works with Alexa and SmartThings Wink!
Happy Holidays and may your gift giving be full of blinking lights and batteries! If you’ve got a cool techie gift idea, please write a comment!
December 14, 2018
How Do You Compete with Free?

I love Audible, the audiobook app owned by Amazon. I have a monthly subscription because listening to audiobooks with my sons has transformed car rides, plane rides and folding laundry.

I usually have extra credits available because it takes us forever to listen to an 8-hour book in 15-minute chunks. But this summer’s trips have made me burn through my credits as we listened to the entire Percy Jackson series.

Tonight, as I faced a mountain of laundry and with no Audible credits available until later this week, I had a conundrum:

Listen to something again, buy more credits, or borrow an audiobook from the library?

I decided free was the best solution for tonight. I love the Overdrive app that lets me borrow ebooks from my local Alexandria library. But I had never borrowed an audiobook. How hard could it be? Turns out, very.

I did a search and found a bunch of great audiobooks available to borrow, even though Crazy Rich Asians has a waiting list a mile long. I downloaded The Wishing Spell with no issues. Trouble was, I could not figure out HOW to listen to it via the Overdrive app. There’s not an easy and obvious play button. I turned to Google. I was directed to try Overdrive Listen, which I couldn’t find in the app or the app store. I tried the website, I verified my account on my computer and iPad. Still no luck. I kept trying.

After about 20 minutes, I gave up. I bought something on Audible and I will likely stick with Audible in the future. Because even though my local library has audiobooks, Audible makes it sooooo easy and such a wonderful experience to listen to audiobooks.

In his book, The Inevitable, Kevin Kelly says most content these days is free, if you are willing to spend the time looking for it.

If content is free, where’s the value?

In the case of Audible, the value lies in the user experience. It’s so easy to log in to Amazon, find an audiobook and pay for it. Within a second, the book is on my phone and iPad. Within a minute, I can be listening. If I start listening on my phone and then switch to my iPad, Audible knows and lets me jump to the right spot. In this case, even though I could have gotten the same audiobook for free, I chose to pay for the user experience.

How do YOU compete with free?

September 12, 2018
What REALLY Matters for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
I do a lot of SEO consulting for clients. Clients want to know: how to optimize their websites for Google, how to drive more organic traffic to their sites, and what keywords they should focus on for optimization.

At Matrix Group, we spend a lot of time on the mechanics of our client sites so that search engines can easily find them and index content.

But here’s the single, most important question I ask clients to ask themselves when developing their content and SEO strategy:

What are people typing into Google where YOU and YOUR SITE are the answer?

Because most people want to go direct to content AND because Google is so darn effective, a huge chunk of your members, customers and potential customers simply type a natural language query into Google. They will type questions like:

When is the ABC conference?
What do I need to do to become a ….?
What is the best training for (fill in the blank) professionals?
How many credits do I need to become a ….?
How much does it cost to…?

If you don’t know what your members and customers are typing into Google, find out by:
- Looking at the incoming organic search terms driving traffic to your site. Most of this information is blocked by Google, but it’s worth looking to see what’s available in your Google Analytics and Google Webmaster Tools.
- Looking at the search terms and phrases people type on your site search. If you aren’t logging this, start now and look at the report monthly.
- Asking your customers what they typed into Google recently where they either expected to find a link on your site or expected a resource related to your profession or industry.
- Going to https://trends.google.com and researching the top queries related to your business.
Once you have a collection of these valuable search queries, make sure you have content (and lots of it) that matches those queries. Heck, you should be writing blog posts, news items and FAQs that perfectly match your most important queries.

Yes, your website should also be mobile-friendly, be well structured, have clean CSS, have permalinks, have alt tags, yada, yada. But all of these technical requirements mean nothing if you don’t have the content your target audiences are looking for. Give it to them and make it easy for Google to match your content with your customers.
September 5, 2018
GDPR: Do You Really Want to be Forgotten?
Guest post by Tanya Kennedy Luminati, MatrixMaxx Product Manager

We’re almost two months past the GDPR deadline, and we’re all still alive! (Well, mostly.) Just because the deadline has come and passed doesn’t mean the fun is over, though. As I’m sure you’ve heard, California has a new GDPR-inspired privacy law coming down the pike, and many organizations are into the real-life situations of members asking for copies of their personal data. And some are even asking to be forgotten!

To make matters even more interesting, several of our clients have reported getting fake GDPR deletion requests via email. Yikes! FYI, from what we’ve heard, the subject is always “Data Removal Request,” and the body text is always “I hereby withdraw my consent for you to … ” Please keep your eyes out for messages like these!

This underscores the recommendations that many of you (especially our MatrixMaxx clients) have been hearing from us since we started diving into GDPR and GDPR compliance: You shouldn’t just delete someone based on a voicemail or email. Always call and ask: “Do you really want to be forgotten?” This is a great chance to open a conversation with this individual, learn more about why they want to be forgotten, warn them of possible negative repercussions, and perhaps help your organization improve future communications. And, you know, save yourself and your organization from a potentially disastrous situation.

Here are our recommendations for vetting requests to be “forgotten”:
- Call and ask if the request is valid, and try to learn more about why they want to be forgotten.
- Offer them a copy of their Personal Information. Perhaps all that they really want to know is what you know about them. This would be a combination of the info in your AMS (like MatrixMaxx) as well as any other systems in which you hold data.
- Review the individual’s profile and warn them of potential issues that would come with being “forgotten.” For example, their meeting history will be gone… this could be important for their access to presentation slides or CEU history! Or, if they are actively on a committee, this action will effectively remove them from that committee … is this what they really want?
- Do the needful to comply with their request, if it’s valid.
By the way, if you’re a MatrixMaxx client, our recent 18.2 release was packed full of new features to help you manage Personal Data and Privacy for GDPR compliance. Have ideas for other enhancements that could help you in your journey? We’re here for you, and all ears!

PLEASE NOTE:

This is one of Matrix Group’s installments on GDPR, Privacy, and Security. We at Matrix Group are not lawyers or GDPR consults; these are simply our recommendations for how to best meet your organization’s needs and member’s needs.
July 17, 2018
The Checkbox War is Over: How to Pick a New AMS Partner
I was talking to my friend Ben Muscolino at Benel Solutions. Ben’s company does netFORUM implementations and other AMS integrations. Matrix Group has several clients in common and we love working with Benel Solutions.

Anyway, we were talking association management software (AMS) companies, how the space is pretty crowded, and how difficult it is for associations to choose between vendors. At some point, Ben quipped, “well, the checkbox war is over, so how do clients choose their platform?”

The checkbox war is over.

I think Ben is absolutely right. The AMS market has reached such maturity that nearly all the platforms (MatrixMaxx from Matrix Group included) are able to check off the boxes in the RFPs that we receive. Yep, we let associations manage individual and company-based memberships, meetings, tradeshows, publication sales, digital downloads, sponsorships, subscriptions, fundraising, yada, yada.

So how on earth does an association pick a platform? I think the answer is you don’t. You pick a partner instead.

A partner that can help you:
- Rethink your member experience
- Work well with the other vendors in your digital universe
- Guide your business process transformation
- Get creative with your budget and needs
Is YOUR AMS partner doing all this for you?
June 28, 2018
Does Your Website Need Web Push Notifications?
Let’s face it. As marketers, we’re always wondering how to reach more people, get more opens and clicks, drive traffic, and get more conversions.

Mobile apps have been terrific at generating visits and conversions because of their ability to send push notifications to users. We’ve all gotten used to the notifications on our phone, as well as the numbers next to apps that tell us we’ve got announcements to read.

What if you don’t have a mobile app? You can now use web push notifications to send reminders and announcements! How does it work?
- Websites that have web push notifications ask you for permission to send you notifications when you visit the site. You can either accept or block notifications.
- If you accept notifications, you’ll get little messages that pop-up in your browser when a new article, video or product has been posted AND notification has been enabled for that update.
- You’ll get the notifications no matter what website you’re currently visiting at the time the notification goes out.
To see web push notifications in action, visit www.fmi.org or my blog at TheMatrixFiles.net. If this is the first time you’ve visited the site, you’ll see a red bell icon in the bottom right corner. If you click it, you’ll be given the option to subscribe to browser notifications. It’s that easy!

If you subscribe to notifications on my blog, you’ll get a reminder whenever we publish a new post, regardless of what site you’re surfing at the time. It’s remarkably effective and yet surprisingly not annoying. If you use Google Calendar, you can enable notifications via your browser so that Google can send you reminders about upcoming meetings.

I see more websites employing web push notifications for these reasons:
- They represent another way to get people to convert and give you permission to send them updates.
- Web push notifications are easy to opt in to because they don’t require an email or contact information, just a click.
- Subscribing and unsubscribing is very easy.
- The notifications services can give you good analytics about number of subscribers, delivery and clicks.
Here’s the bad news about web push notifications: they are not currently supported in IE or iOS. They are supported in Chrome, Safari and Firefox, so a good percentage of the web is covered. Apple has announced the web push notification support is in development and the same thing is likely happening at Microsoft with IE and Edge.

Adding web push notifications to your site is inexpensive and easy to do. Contact my team if you want more info. I hope you’ll consider this valuable tool for reaching your target audiences.
June 5, 2018