{"id":551,"date":"2015-08-13T13:40:00","date_gmt":"2015-08-13T17:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/4-takeaways-from-the-2015-asae-annual-meeting-expo\/"},"modified":"2025-02-07T10:30:29","modified_gmt":"2025-02-07T15:30:29","slug":"4-takeaways-from-the-2015-asae-annual-meeting-expo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/4-takeaways-from-the-2015-asae-annual-meeting-expo\/","title":{"rendered":"4 Takeaways from the 2015 ASAE Annual Meeting & Expo"},"content":{"rendered":"

As a Michigan based company, we were thrilled when we heard the \u201cSuper Bowl of trade shows\u201d was coming right to our city of Detroit. If you couldn\u2019t guess, I am of course referring to the ASAE Annual Meeting & Expo where over 5,000 association professionals gather for networking, education, and business solutions.<\/p>\n

Described as the nation\u2019s Comeback City, Detroit is sure to benefit from this national event. As stated in the Detroit Free Press<\/a>, this event could potentially bring $500 million in convention business for the city over the next five years.<\/p>\n

For those who were unable to attend like myself or just want a refresher, here are 4 takeaways from the recent ASAE Annual Meeting & Expo.<\/p>\n

1.) Members Define Engagement, Not the Association<\/h2>\n

Tuesday\u2019s Learning Lab presented by the American Nurses Association and Culture That Works was titled \u201cEngagement Is More Than a Buzzword.\u201d We\u2019ve all heard the term engagement, but what it really means is another story. And that story can only be defined by members rather than the association.<\/p>\n

As the article states, \u201cIn other words, each and every member has individual and unique reasons for engaging in an association and preferred methods for doing so\u2026 The association must work to understand what those definitions are and aim to serve them, but it doesn\u2019t get to determine the stakes of the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Books\"2.) Content Strategy is More Important Than Ever<\/h2>\n

Clarke & Company\u2019s session \u201cUsing Content Marketing to Engage Members and Grow Your Organization\u201d drew in quite the audience size. Meaning, associations are well aware of the importance of having a content marketing strategy. However the struggle isn\u2019t creating the content itself, it\u2019s using it to influence member engagement.<\/p>\n

One thing to keep in mind, \u201cAs consumers absorb content on the web more and more through third-party apps and not dedicated niche sites (like association websites), that challenge will grow more complicated and require more sophisticated tools, skills, and measurement.\u201d<\/p>\n

3.) Trade Associations and Individual Membership Organizations Can Learn a Lot From Each Other<\/h2>\n

A recent membership benchmarking report<\/a> by General Incorporated found associations who offer both company and individual membership models doubled between 2011 and 2015.<\/p>\n

One trade association by the name of CompTIA shared how they created an open-access model to their content. In just one year, this change added over 50,000 people to its community of 2,000 member companies.<\/p>\n

Also, the author mentioned ASAE\u2019s announcement of introducing an organizational membership option starting in 2016. As an organization that traditionally follows an individual membership model, this change will hopefully pave the way for other associations to broaden their membership models.<\/p>\n

\"Lock4.) Data Security<\/h2>\n

Although we hear about them in the news on the regular, many associations don\u2019t consider themselves at risk to a data breach. The presenter of the Learning Lab \u201cHelp! I\u2019ve Been Hacked!\u201d explained how associations can\u2019t live under this false assumption. \u201cEverybody\u2019s going to have a breach. Everybody\u2019s going to get hacked,\u201d he said. \u201cAssociations are not immune to this problem.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even more so, associations consider data security an IT issue. But when you consider the devastation behind a data breach, is it fair to assume it\u2019s only an IT issue? Instead, associations should take an organizational approach to protecting their information.<\/p>\n

Did you attend the Annual Meeting? If so, do you have any thoughts or ideas to share? Maybe even some different takeaways of your own? Drop them in the comments below and let us know!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The 2015 ASAE Annual Meeting & Expo, one of if not the biggest association gatherings in the nation, just concluded last week. A recent post by Associations Now<\/a>, the official magazine of ASAE, discussed four key takeaways from the conference. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":555,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14,15],"tags":[21,22,23],"class_list":["post-551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-associations","category-events","tag-asae","tag-membership","tag-security"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=551"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":677,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551\/revisions\/677"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/appnet-dev.com\/resultsathand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}