Open Community -- There's Something Happening Here

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I’m taking part in the virtual book tour Maddie Grant [http://twitter.com/maddiegrant] and Lindy Dreyer [http://twitter.com/lindydreyer] are conducting to explore concepts from Open Community: a little book of big ideas for associations navigating the social web [http://opencommunitybook.com].

Want to win a free copy of Open Community? Find out how at the bottom of our post!

“There’s something happening here … what it is ain’t ex-actly clear.” From “For What It’s Worth” by Buffalo Springfield

As a product of the sixties, these lyrics from Buffalo Springfield come to mind as it relates to my work in association management.

For the last year I’ve been expressing to association management company colleagues, and to my staff, the feeling that the association world as we know it is going to turn upside down.

When people asked me: “What will it look like?” My answer is: “I have no idea!" Perhaps I should be said “what it is ain’t exactly clear!”

For me, the questions started after reading Clay Shirky’s Here Comes Everybody and Charlene Li’s Groundswell.

Now, Lindy and Maddie in Open Community have started to frame the answer to how.

What a quick and great read! I measure the value of a book by the number of “sticky notes” on the pages ... this one has many, many!

Is Open Community of any value?

Well, I’m buying a copy for each member of my staff. Guess this blog post eliminates the surprise gift! And, I’m contemplating buying one to give to the president and key leaders of each non-profit we manage.

I’ve avoided reading other blog posts about the book until I had a chance to write my comments. I’m eager to get this written so I can glean what others are saying!

Although there’s much to say about Open Community, I want to focus on the “we are all publishers” portion since it relates to content management/marketing.

As I view the association landscape ...
• I see volunteers struggling to find the time they once had to lead.
• I hear members expressing frustration with the volume of information and lack of time to consume it all.
• I observe the downward pressure on dues and other revenue sources and listen to CEOs, finance and membership directors ask how will we fund our operations?
• And, I watch as Google and other online tools erode the old professional association precept that “if you want our information, you must join.”

Content management serves as an opportunity for associations to grow as thought leaders, serve their members and add value to the association. As Open Community suggests, it gives you an opportunity to help members take advantage of the content without being overwhelmed by it. That means giving your members the opportunity to share with others in the community. And, to serve as a “funnel of/for information” by gathering important information, vetting it and sharing it back to your members.

“The more your community can come to you to find content and connect with one another, the more you’ll be recognized as the glue that holds the community together.” (Page 83)

The authors suggest looking for social objects that will help connect your community with your organization.

Here are three points I noted:

• As a former PR director, I love their thought of engaging your community so you go from “accidental spokespeople” to creating “accidentally-on-purpose spokespersons.” (Page 86)
• As a “messy desk person” I chuckled at the author’s phrase “embrace the messiness” (Page 25) in the section on picking clarity over control (Page 50) and getting to the point!
• To those who have challenged me about the ROI of social media, “It’s not about the tools.” (Page 14) “Social media is useless unless your association can use it efficiently and deliberately to get where you need to go.” (Page 24)

So, the challenge for us – as association managers – is helping organizations determine where they want to go. And, for those of us in the Association Management Company community, it means looking at each of our client associations, understanding their needs and helping them build communities that meet their association mission.

Because of the importance content is playing and will be playing for the future of our partner associations, we recently reorganized our AMC staff to create a content management team that will focus on these topics for each of our clients. The content management team will focus on traditional communications as well as digital media as we seek to build community for the associations we manage.

Want to win a free copy of Open Community? Leave a comment below and one person will be randomly selected!