Matrix Group International

Tag: Marketing

  • Does Your Organization Need a Podcast?

    Does Your Organization Need a Podcast?

    I love podcasts! I listen to at least one podcast every single day. And yes, I’m a podcaster. I have two podcasts: Associations Thrive is a podcast celebrating successful associations and their leaders and K Drama Chat is a podcast where my co-hosts and I take one Korean Drama (K Drama) each season and recap and analyze each episode.

    So, does YOUR organization need a podcast? 

    The answer is always gonna be “it depends.” But consider these statistics from Riverside.fm:

    • As of 2022, 62% of Americans will have listened to a podcast ever in their lives. This is an estimated 177 million Americans and an increase from 57%, the percentage of the same statistic, in 2021.  
    • From this figure, 38% of Americans listened to a podcast in the last month and 26% in the last week.
    • 50% of monthly U.S. podcast listeners are aged between 12-34, 43% between 35 and 54 years old, and 22% are aged over 55.
    • Dedicated podcast listeners prefer podcasts about history (37%), news (36%), true crime (36%) and science (34%).

    So why host a podcast for your association? I can think of many reasons:

    • Podcasts are a great way to educate members and keep them up to date about your profession or industry, through a channel that doesn’t require that they be sitting in front of their computers. Podcasts are great for when you’re in the car, cooking, even doing laundry!
    • Audio podcasts are more approachable in terms of cost and effort than video podcasts or video series.
    • Podcast listeners have a greater attention span. Listeners prefer podcasts that are under 30 minutes long, while TechSmith found that 50% of people prefer a video length between three and six minutes.

    If you’re looking for some terrific association podcasts, here a few that I recommend:

    While there are thousands of podcasts, there are probably few or no podcasts in your industry or profession. It’s a great time to create a podcast for your association. 

    Want to talk podcasting? Get in touch with me or find me on LinkedIn. Matrix Group doesn’t produce podcasts but we can help you develop your strategy and implementation plan. If you want execution help, I recommend my friends at Association Briefings.

    And if and when you launch a podcast, please let me know so I can listen and share!

  • Getting Started with Twitter Spaces

    Getting Started with Twitter Spaces

    I’m part of the Mission Matters author network and they’ve been hosting discussions about different business topics on Twitter Spaces. What is Twitter Spaces?

    Twitter Spaces are live, audio-only conversations that happen in Twitter. Twitter Spaces is a direct competitor to Clubhouse, which was the first tech firm to offer audio-only discussions back in April 2020. Here’s how it works:

    • Any individual or organization with at least 600 followers can host a Twitter Space discussion.
    • All Spaces are public, but the host can designate who can speak.
    • Individuals can be invited as speakers and attendees can be promoted to the role of speaker.
    • Hosts and speakers must use the Twitter app on their mobile phone to participate in the discussion. People who simply want to listen can do so from desktop.
    • Hosts, speakers and attendees can tweet out the Space so others can join.
    Twitter Space Screen Shot

    When I first heard of Clubhouse and then Twitter Spaces, my first reaction was, “Oh great, another network. But why audio only when video is THE thing?” But as both services got going AND as I joined more of these audio-only conversations, I realized that audio has its own power. I can see organizations hosting discussions on Twitter Spaces to:

    • Discuss a hot, trending topic.
    • Encourage deeper and ongoing conversations about specific topics.
    • Engage members and customers who may be reluctant to get on a video call (yes, you can always turn off your camera, but some people will be on video and then it gets awkward).

    So how do you get started with Twitter Spaces? This blog post is not meant to be a full-on tutorial or guide, but here are the basics:

    1. Decide which account (individual or organization) should host your Twitter Spaces.
    2. To start or schedule a Twitter Space, on the Twitter mobile app, click the + to start a new Tweet, then, in the left corner, click on the Spaces icon.
    3. Name your Space, and then start it immediately, or schedule it. Personally, I like to schedule things in advance.
    4. You can also record the conversation.
    5. Once your Space is created or scheduled, Twitter will give you a Share link. Don’t forget to add topics so people can find your Space.
    6. Invite speakers with a calendar invite. Be sure to include the Share link and remind them that they must use the Twitter mobile app to participate as a speaker.
    7. During the actual Space, remember that you can’t see anyone, so as host, you’ll probably need to call on people or otherwise assign an order of speaking.
    8. As with video calls, remind speakers to go on mute when they’re not speaking so that their backgrounds and side conversations don’t interfere with the discussion.
    9. Twitter will notify your followers that you have a Space live, but as with anything else, best to use other means to promote your Space event.

    I have participated in, and listened to, many Spaces over the past few months. I love them because I can be mobile while listening. I can be making dinner, feeding the cats, or even checking my email. I love the variety of topics. And I love how accessible these Spaces are.

    I haven’t actually hosted a Twitter Space yet, but maybe soon! How about you? Are you ready to host a Twitter Space event?

  • Budget for Communications and Marketing When Proposing New Initiatives

    Budget for Communications and Marketing When Proposing New Initiatives

    Last week, I attended and spoke at the International Foundation’s Technology and Benefit Communications Conference, held in Boston, MA. I spoke on the topic of “Next-Generation Tools to Enhance Your Communications,” or next-gen tools to communicate benefits to employees.

    At the end of the conference, there was an Open Forum, during which select speakers took questions from the in person and virtual attendees. The final question of the Open Forum was “what is one thing you would recommend to communications professionals?” I was really impressed with the advice from Megan Yost, Senior Vice President and Engagement Strategist at Segal Benz. Her advice? When proposing new initiatives, include the marketing and communications plan in the project budget.

    Megan’s advice is brilliant. Most professionals budget for whatever technical or operational project they are proposing, e.g., a custom database application, a website redesign, etc. But few include all of the costs needed to properly promote the new initiative, costs like copywriting, email drip campaigns, travel, presentation costs, etc. Instead, these communications costs get rolled into the overall comms budget or request separately once the project is ready to launch.

    If you think about it, a project is more likely to succeed when ALL project components are properly funded, including the marketing needed to promote the new initiative to the proper audiences. I love this advice from Megan, which is why I’m blogging about it.

    The next time you’re working on your digital budget for the coming year, be sure to consider all comms costs and included them in the budgets for individual projects. Don’t risk not having the budget needed to promote your amazing, new initiatives.

  • Using Video to Promote Your Meetings and Conferences

    Using Video to Promote Your Meetings and Conferences

    We all know that video rules. Check out these amazing video statistics from 2021. 

    Non Dues-a-Palooza Pre-Event VideosI recently attended Non Dues a Palooza (NDaP) in Nashville, TN. NDaP is devoted to helping associations and nonprofits learn new ideas for generating non-dues revenue. Yes, I attended in person and it felt great! Teri Carden, the conference organizer and CEO of 100Reviews, uses video to promote her meetings and make them feel special. Here’s what she did for NDAP:

    Ahead of the conference, Teri invited her speakers and attendees to record and share a video about why they were excited to be attending NDaP.  Teri used Gather Voices to make this happen. Check out the video promo page. Maybe I’m just a conference marketing geek, but I found the videos compelling and I wanted to watch them all!

    When I checked into my hotel, there was a welcome letter from Teri that contained a QR code. The QR code led me to a video from Teri, welcoming me to Nashville, inviting me to the pre-conference happy hour, sharing highlights for the next day, and providing me with contact information if I have questions. In typical Teri fashion, the video was fun, authentic and super helpful.

    At the happy hour at the end of the conference, she asked a few attendees to talk about their experience, what they learned, and why they loved the event. These videos were shared in an event debrief put together by Association Briefings (another great touch – more on that later), and it was so fun to hear the takeaways from fellow attendees. And by the way, now she has video marketing material in hand for her next event. Genius! 

    Whether your next conference is in person or virtual, I’m sure you can use these ideas to promote your event, provide your attendees with useful information, and make all of your attendees feel welcome and special.

  • Why New Member Onboarding is So Critical to the Member Journey

    Why New Member Onboarding is So Critical to the Member Journey

    Welcome Aboard Life preserver Imagine this. A person (or company) has made the decision to join your organization. What happens afterward? Does she get a giant welcome packet that she won’t read? Does the packet contain current or outdated information? Does he get nothing for a few weeks while you process the application and add him to lists? Does he immediately begin to get all the newsletters and promotions for the various products and services you offer?

    Last week, I did a webinar with the wonderful Jonathan Cooper from the National Association of Episcopal Schools (NAES), a longtime Matrix Group client. Just over a year ago, NAES replaced its paper welcome packet to a digital onboarding campaign for new staff at member AND non-member Episcopal schools.

    NAES used its existing membership database, MatrixMaxx (from Matrix Group, yep, my company), and MailChimp to welcome new staff with carefully crafted messages over a 90-day period that introduce the association, the staff, the Biennial conference, key publications, the staff, consulting services, the daily meditation, and so on. The emails are NOT all about selling. They are meant to welcome new staff and show them how NAES can help them in their jobs.

    What kind of results is NAES getting on this onboarding campaign?

    The emails are getting amazing opens and clicks. One email gets close to a 90% open rate! Yes, the list is small, but they never previously got this rate of opens on other emails.

    NAES members regularly email back after receiving an automated email. The key here is that the emails are really well-written, they are warm, and they sound authentic.

    NAES is seeing increased use of their library and increased registration at featured meetings. For example, a webinar designed for new Rectors usually get 7 or 8 attendees. This past year, this webinar had 19 attendees!

    Marketing automation is extending the reach of this small-staff association. To me, well-crafted automation actually ends up being more high-touch because members get more frequent, relevant, customized communications. There’s simply no way that NAES could send out this level of communications if the messages were manually crafted and sent out.

    AssociationsNow did a nice write-up of the webinar. You can read it here.

    What happens in the first 30-90 days of a member’s journey with your organization matters. Really matters. Because it’s during those first few days, weeks, and months that your new member decides to engage with you in a meaningful way. They made the decision to join. Now it’s up to you to help them make the decision to stay.

  • How Your Digital Marketing Should Change in 2020

    How Your Digital Marketing Should Change in 2020

    Your website, social media pages, videos, email newsletters, email campaigns – they’re all elements of your digital marketing toolbox. It’s the start of a new year. How should your digital marketing change in 2020? I queried my staff and here’s what we came up with:

    Experiment With a Mix of Short- and Long-Form Content

    Is short content better for social shares? Is long content better for SEO? If you’re not being intentional about the topic AND length of your posts, you should be. Here’s a great analysis of short- vs. long-from content from CopyHackers. TLDR summary: Great, long content is incredibly difficult to write, so shorter is probably better for most organizations, but you need to be intentional AND test your content with your audiences.

    Video on All Of Your Social Media Pages

    Facebook, Twitter Instagram and LinkedIn LOVE video. According to Animoto, video is consumers’ favorite type of content on social media. Facebook and LinkedIn prioritize posts with video. If you’re not posting original video (as opposed to embedding a YouTube link) on social media, what are you waiting for?

    Podcasts Are Huge and Growing in Popularity

    There’s no doubt about it: podcasts are hot! According to Podcast Insights, 51% (144 million) of the US population has listened to a podcast – up from 44% in 2018 (Infinite Dial 19), and 16 million people in the US are “avid podcast fans” (Nielsen Q1 2018). Podcasts give you the ability to reach your audiences in a new way, they allow you to share serialized content in a convenient way, and they are easier to produce than video. Could this be the year you launch a podcast?

    Expect Some Turmoil In Your Communities During This Election Year

    Nearly every association and nonprofit will say they are nonpartisan. BUT politics has infiltrated every aspect of our lives. Just in case comments and conversations about the economy, healthcare, trade, or the environment (name your topic) turn rancorous in your communities, be sure you are prepared with monitoring and policies. What will you do if an online discussion about manufacturing best practices turns into a nasty exchange about trade with China? Be prepared!

    Focus on Storytelling for Authentic Content

    I’m rewatching The West Wing and I’m struck by how effectively the show uses storytelling to frame policy positions. Storytelling is effective because stories create connections with real people and they create memories. Here’s a great post from Brandignity about the advantages of using storytelling in marketing.

    Create Personalized Prospect Cultivation Funnels

    We’ve all done this: signed up for a white paper and then gotten endless, automated follow ups from a random company. This is marketing automation gone bad. Marketing automation will only work when your emails and landing pages are thoughtful and personalized for each member, customer or prospect.

    Coordinate Your Platforms Better

    No one web page, email or social post will cause the conversions you need, whether it’s membership signup, meeting registration, publication sale or advocacy involvement. So it’s time to really deepen your awareness of all the marketing channels you own and how they work with one another. No longer can you have the meetings team sending out emails that the web and marketing teams don’t know about. An editorial calendar is a good start. Charting user journeys through your systems is another.

    How will your digital marketing evolve in 2020?

  • 5 Reasons NOT to Rebrand Your Organization

    5 Reasons NOT to Rebrand Your Organization

    In my last blog post, I discussed the 7 good reasons to rebrand your organization. But when does it NOT make sense to rebrand?

    Here’s what my friend Jane Barwis, CEO of BRG Communications, and I have to say about this topic. We recently did a webinar on rebranding because many of our clients are rebranding or thinking about rebranding.

    • Significant brand equity – If your name, logo and other corporate identity pieces are so well known and have really positive brand recognition, we recommend not rebranding. The money you’ll spend updating your brand and then marketing it to your stakeholders may be cost-prohibitive and you may never achieve the same level of brand equity again. Imagine if Coca-Cola changed its name, or changed Coke to something else, or started using blue as its color. How much brand equity would be lost?
    • Celebrating a significant anniversary – We see this a lot. Organizations are coming up on their 50th or 100th anniversary and they decide to rebrand. In our mind, celebrating an anniversary is not good enough reason to rebrand, unless other factors come into play, including the reasons we listed to rebrand, e.g., your audiences have changed, your industry has changed significantly. If this is the case, then it makes sense to use the anniversary as an opportune time to present a new brand.
    • Board feels it’s time to “shake things up” – Sometimes, Boards are unhappy with their organizations because membership is on the decline, meetings revenue is flat, members aren’t happy, yada, yada. Trouble is, a new brand will not fix those problems, which often have to do with poor leadership, strategy and/or execution. By all means rebrand if your organization is making strategic changes and needs to craft a new image, but don’t think that a new name or logo will fix your problems. When did a new logo alone ever fix declining revenues?
    • New leadership wants to “make their mark” – I love this reason. No, not really. Rebranding to make a mark is all about the people wanting to make a mark, and less about the strategic needs of the organization. If you go down this path, your new name, logo, or whatever, will reflect the tastes of your current leadership. What happens when that leadership is gone? Wouldn’t leadership rather be known as the regime, for example, that fixed the organization’s revenue problems, ushered in a new membership model, created a new incentive program for staff, made the decision to go international?
    • Other organizations are rebranding – If other organizations in your space are rebranding because of fundamental shifts in the industry or profession that you must address, then yeah, rebranding makes sense. But if those other organizations are rebranding for any of the reasons above, I say let them spend their money while you focus on increasing membership and revenues.

    Do any of these criteria apply to your organization? If so, I suggest finding ways to respectfully ask your leadership to rethink the reasons. Better yet, redirect them to address more pressing organizational issues, like membership, fine tuning your message for the upcoming election, etc., etc. Good luck!

    In the next blog post, I’ll talk about how to deepen brand equity and recognition. Stay tuned!

  • 7 Reasons to Rebrand Your Organization

    7 Reasons to Rebrand Your Organization

    A brand is not a logo. A brand is not an identity. A brand is not a product. A brand is a person’s gut feeling about a product, service or organization. — Marty Neumeier, Author and speaker on all things brand

    I recently did a webinar on branding and rebranding with good friend Jane Barwis, CEO of BRG Communications. We decided to do the webinar because many of our clients are rebranding or thinking about rebranding.

    Before we go into when it’s time to rebrand, let me tell you that rebranding will not fix your organization, increase event registrations, or increase membership. Rebranding could be part of a larger initiative to address organizational challenges, but rebranding on its own will not fix your problems.

    So when IS it time to rebrand? Jane and I think it’s time rebrand or seriously consider a rebrand when any of these apply:

    • Acquisition and/or merger – You’ve merged with another organization, you’ve been bought, or you’ve bought another organization, and together, you want to create a larger, differentiated identity.
    • Industry/profession has evolved – Perhaps your field has undergone some major changes, and you want to demonstrate that your organization has changed with the times and continues to be highly relevant.
    • Audience has expanded or changed, or you want to reach a new audience – Some of our clients now want to communicate directly with the public, or students, or customers of their members. Or maybe they now want to reach Capitol Hill. Targeting new audiences often requires a redo of your core messages and overall brand identity.
    • Products and services have changed – If your organization offerings have changed significantly, you may need to show a new brand to explain the why behind the new offerings, to tie them all together.
    • Need to distance from a negative image – Some organizations rebrand to start over and make a clean break from a scandal, a large misstep, or bad leadership.
    • Need to differentiate from competition – If the competition is fierce and you’re all looking about the same, a rebrand can help you distance yourself from the pack. A rebranding effort will force you to hone in on your (new) core mission, values and benefits, allowing you to more clearly communicate why you are different and better.
    • Geography change (state to national, domestic to international – Going from a smaller to a larger audience often means transitioning from a local or hyperlocal image and mesaging to a broader one. It’s a tricky transition, for sure!

    Do any of these criteria apply to your organization? If so, then you may be ready for a rebrand.

    In my next blog post, I’ll take about when it’s NOT time to rebrand and what you can do if your brand doesn’t need to change but your identity is looking a bit dated!

    What brand challenges is YOUR organization facing?

  • The Best Way to Develop an Elevator Speech for Your Organization

    The Best Way to Develop an Elevator Speech for Your Organization

    people holding speech bubblesI conduct a lot of branding and strategy workshops. My Creative Director Alex and I conduct them and we cover a lot of ground. We ask about the history of the organization, what they stand for, their signature benefits, why individuals and organizations join and why they remain, and so much more!

    My favorite part of the workshop comes when we ask clients how they describe their organizations to:

    • Their mom
    • Their neighbor at a BBQ
    • A 12th grader
    • A 5th grader
    • A legislator

    The discussions usually begin with talk of mission, vision, and values. We dissect a lot of industry jargon and we unravel a lot of acronyms.

    Inevitably, the best descriptions come when staff and members tell us how they describe their organizations to 5th graders. There’s something about stripping away the acronyms and the jargon that usually produces a succinct and compelling elevator speech.

    Some of my favorites from over the years:

    • A trade association: We help our members make money and stay out of trouble.
    • A union in the construction trades: We make the buildings in our city beautiful.
    • A company that manages a database of government RFPs: We help the federal government get the highest quality work, for the least amount of money.
    • A professional society in engineering: Our members make the world’s waterways safe for commerce and travel.

    The next time you’re struggling with a way to describe your organization, try talking to a 5th grader. Then capture the language that resonates best with said 5th grader, make it graceful, write it down, and train your staff and members to use that language.

    What’s the Matrix Group elevator speech? We help associations and nonprofits create amazing member journeys. We do it through web, mobile and social.

    What do you think of our elevator speech? What’s YOUR elevator speech? Please share!

  • Make These Your 2019 Resolutions for your Website and Web Marketing

    Make These Your 2019 Resolutions for your Website and Web Marketing

    strategy planning in notebookIt’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?