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7 secrets behind the curtain of event management software

Event management isn’t easy. Event management software can be even more difficult to grasp. Things change so much and so often. I want to give you a look behind the curtain of event management software for this post. 

When it comes to event management and software, there are seven secrets I want you to be aware of. I think knowing these seven secrets will give you the advantage you need to thrive with your ministry or business. 

7 secrets behind the curtain of event management software 

Secret #1: Ask the right questions. 

You no doubt have lots of questions when it comes to event management and software. Let I talked about recently when it comes to online membership management software, asking the right questions for you and your ministry or business is important. Asking the right questions early and often can set you on the right course for success—and have you not get on the wrong track to start with!

Here are just a few questions you should be asking:

  • What do I need my event software to do most?

  • What experience do I want an event attendee to have?

  • Who all is involved in my event—from attendee to manager to post-event?

  • What is each person (or group) at my event looking for?

  • How is my event different from other events?

  • What tools do I need for my exhibitors?

  • What tools do I need for my speakers?

Secret #2: Know the features that matter to you. 

With so many unique features to look for, what should you look for and what features are the things you might consider as part of your event strategy? 

I have a few ideas of some features that are both important and what features that might matter to you: 

  • Turning event attendees into members (memberships)

  • Keeping them engaged after the event in a group

  • Ability to recommend content, exhibitors, and other attendees to participants

Secret #3: Know the tools that get the job done.

There are so many tools. Depending on which software you’re using, it’s tough to know what’s most important. Here are a few tools I’d consider to be core event module tools that are worth your time to review:

  • Analytics and Reporting

  • Financial Management

  • Attendee Registrations

  • Exhibitor Registrations

  • Speaker Management

  • Volunteer Management

  • Email and Communication

  • Live or Virtual Facilitation

Secret #4 It’s about your attendee's experience.

From the start of marketing your event, through the actual event, and on to post-event experience for your attendees, there are many things that are a must for your attendees when it comes to the event experience. 

It’s important you know what type of experience you’re hoping to deliver to your attendees. Here’s teh way to frame your attendee’s experience. I think of the experience in three stages: 

  1. Preparing people well before the event

  2. Creating a great live/virtual experience

  3. Following up well after the event

Secret #5 Have the bigger picture in mind.

This is big! Is what you’re planning just an event or are you inviting people into more? I asked this to a 20,000 person event a few years back—one that has a global legacy—and they said they were simply an event and not a movement. Sadly, I think most events think the same way.  

But if your event is leaving a lasting impression and building a tribe then you certainly might have a movement on your hands. It’s all a matter of perspective. Is your event only about getting the most people to attend that you can? Is an event a one-and-done experience for people or some obligation or is your event a stepping stone to what’s next? Challenge yourself to consider shaping your events for the purpose of creating a movement. What do you have to lose?

Secret #6 Integrations are important. 

Integrating data is important. I’ve listed here a few vital questions worth your time at this state. 

What data do you need to bring over from your events to systems like CRM or automated marketing tools?

How is that data going to move from the event to the other system?

A few examples of what you might use are as follows:

  • API

  • Zapier

  • Manual export and import

What data is actually needed? Seriously, ask yourself what you’re going to do with each and every piece of data before building any integrations. Unless the data is useful, you can get in trouble and spend lots of money and not have useful insights.

What best practices will you want to follow -- that will need integrations?

  • Email automation: Create attendee drip campaigns once registered

  • Contact information: Logging attendee data in your CRM system

  • Text: Sending attendees text messages

  • Event to CRM: Adding attendee to general marketing communications

Secret #7 Know your budget. 

I saved the best for last! Setting a budget is the best thing people forget to start with when it comes to event management software. Don’t start shopping before you have a handle on your budget. Keep that figure close in your pocket. 

Every event platform is different in how they charge, some things to consider:

  1. Subscription costs - monthly, quarterly, annually -- many cases -- the longer you subscribe the lower the expense. 

  2. Contract lengths

  3. Per ticket charges

  4. Exhibitor lead capture charges

  5. Number of contacts expense

  6. API charges

  7. Zapier charges

 

So, we’ve covered a ton in this post. Did these secrets spur you to think? Trust me, if you start with asking the right questions, if you know the features that matter most to you, if you know the tools that fit your needs if you make things about your attendees' experience, if you start and keep the bigger picture in mind, if you understand the importance of integrations, and you keep your budget in front of you, you will thrive knowing you have done your due diligence when it comes to event management software. 

 

5 ways to monetize your communityNeed more help taking your community digital?

You want to have a dynamic and multi-dimensional community that thrives. In order to do that, you need a strategy of both online and offline engagement. This guide will help you think through your approach to engaging a virtual community. Download the free eBook: How to Take Your Community Digital.

 

About the author: Will Rogers is the Founder and CEO of CauseMachine. Will’s career has been spent leading organizations and helping to mobilize communities to a shared vision. He has served in various leadership roles to build community engagement and movements teaching him valuable hands-on skills and experience. Will has developed business and community engagement strategies for dozens of organizations in nearly 50 countries. He and his wife have two sons and now live in Kentucky after two decades in Colorado.

 


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The Nurturing Pathway

So what is a nurturing pathway?  I define a Nurturing Pathway as the journey you are guiding someone through to help nurture them around your vision.  When you think of nurturing, you think of caring and stewarding someone as they become a better person.  You think of a mother with a newborn.  You think of a father caring for a child who was hurt.  You think of a teacher training and equipping their students.  

In a digital environment, a Nurturing Pathway is similar in its feel but different in how it’s executed.  You are looking for ways that you are guiding people to their next step and helping to see them grow.  A Nurturing Pathway is an internal strategy to meet people where they are and help guide them to what’s next.  

I have unpacked the concept of a Member Pathway in other areas… this is different.  A Member Pathway is how you are guiding someone through the stages of becoming a member and the various membership maturity stages.  A Nurturing Pathway sits right on top of the Member Pathway but this specifically looks at how you are caring for them at each stage… or nurturing them.  Another way to look at this is a Member Pathway is how you are moving someone to deeper engagement and through your various tiers.  A Nurturing Pathway is about the development of the person and who they are becoming.  

Let’s spend some time unpacking what this looks like.

  • Think Coffee Shop - I believe one of the best ways to get your mind around what true nurturing looks like is to put yourself at a coffee shop across the table from a person at this stage and think about what you would talk about with them.  Map that out and then explore how to leverage technology to help bring that to life.  

  • Drip Campaigns - You are going to have key triggers of activity that can launch specific communication series.  Drip campaigns are excellent ways to nurture someone who has just made a decision.  Remember that every decision has some level of doubt in it so you’re working to help remove someone’s doubt while helping them know exactly what comes next. 

  • Picture of Success - Build a picture of success… not about your success but their success.  This is a time to paint a picture of exactly what you hope success looks like in their life and on their journey.  This helps you build a baseline and goal as you consider how you are nurturing this person.  

  • Put Yourself in Their Shoes - Take time to put yourself in their shoes and think about how you would want to be nurtured, guided, spoken to, resourced, and encouraged.  Think about frequency, tone, collateral, personalization, and quality.  You’re not doing something to someone… you’re doing something for them.  

You don’t have to spend a ton of time building your Nurturing Pathway, but it’s still very important… especially to help frame our strategies around the betterment of our people.  Take time to map out with your team a simple Nurturing Pathway and continue to build on it.  

 

Cause Machine Solutions

Cause Machine is designed to help guide people to greater engagement within a private community.  The platform helps you implement your Nurturing Pathway and helps automate a number of ways for people to be cared for well in a community.  Schedule a demo today!


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Understanding Your Focus Ryhthm

So what’s a Focus Rhythm?  

Basically… it’s the natural rhythm of your organization and your cycles.  For example, some organizations have an annual event that would have a one-year-long Focus Rhythm.  Other organizations might have a weekly gathering that gives you a weekly Focus Rhythm.  There is something in your organization that gives you a natural (or adopted) Focus Rhythm.  I want to spend some time talking about what to do with these.

I find that most organizations place 90% of their energy toward their #1 Focus Rhythm.  This often leaves a great opportunity in another Focus Rhythm stride.  

Before we dive into how to manage and leverage these, I want to challenge all of us to identify our natural rhythm and to explore how else we could engage our audience.  Just because we have a rhythm doesn’t mean it’s the best rhythm or it can’t change.  

 

Step 1: Know Your Rhythm

The first big thing to tackle here is just knowing your rhythm.  I’ve seen it most common where there is a primary rhythm and then a few secondary rhythms.  But rarely is there a competing primary rhythm.  Be honest with yourself here.  There’s a temptation to want to fight this and be something you’re not.  For example, most weekly rhythm organizations don’t have strong long-range cycles of engagement (or intentional pathways of engagement).  That’s okay… we just need to know our baseline here.  

 

Step 2: Explore Opportunities

You could spend some time mapping out all of the things you do in your natural rhythm, but here I want to focus on what other opportunities you have.  The goal here is to find a presence where you may not be actively engaging.  For example, an annual conference might have great engagement once a year but are there opportunities for monthly engagement and having a new rhythm for more ongoing engagement?  Or, for weekly rhythms, is there an opportunity for quarterly focuses or annual themes?

 

Step 3: Try Things

This might not be easy.  Most organizations have an engine around their primary Focus Rhythm so building something else takes effort.  May I encourage you to think about beta testing?  Get out and try seeing what other rhythms might work with your community. You might stumble on finding a huge need from your community and untapped potential.  

 

Cause Machine Solutions

The Cause Machine platform allows you to engage in multiple engagement rhythms and the opportunity to try others.  The foundation here is your strategy… Cause Machine is a means to help you bring your vision and strategy to life… no matter your Focus Rhythm.   Schedule a demo today!

 


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7 real-life ideas for how to monetize a blog that actually work

If you’ve been blogging for any real length of time, you know there’s a bunch of bad ideas out there for how to make money from blogging. You know the ones. It’s the same folks who’ll tell you it’s quick and easy to blog and make a fortune. 

Well, there’s another ditch to run face-first into as well: the it’s-too-tough-to-make money from blogging. Here’s the deal: not long ago, it used to be super difficult to make any money from blogging. Remember all of the disjointed tools? Then there was the cost of all of those disjointed tools. And, you pretty much needed an advanced degree to actually use the expensive, disjointed tools.

Nowadays, many folks make money from blogging. And, honestly, lots of people don’t. How much money can you make from blogging? Answer: it depends. I’ve heard stories of bloggers who report making millions of dollars per year—or better yet—while they sleep. While other bloggers make, actually almost 90 percent of bloggers, make an average of less than $10,000 per year. 

I have no idea where you are on this scale or where you want to be. But, you’re here, which means you’ve probably been blogging for a while and figure it’s time to go pro. Another guess is you have a decent amount of page views. But, you also get that a lot of barriers exist - you’re crunched for time, you don’t have a ton of money to throw at this whole thing, and you probably don’t have the technical expertise that’s necessary for running all of the different systems it takes to be even a little bit successful (see my rant above about disjointed tools). 

Anyway, you’re here. You’re looking for help. You understand the challenge is not can you monetize, but how? Maybe you already know some folks who are making money blogging. So you aren’t questioning that. But, you have no idea where to start related to how to monetize a blog. Which approach is right for you? When should you start said approach—right this second or wait until you have one billion followers? And, let’s say you start within the hour and you make a few bucks. What now? At what point will you know if this whole thing is actually working?

There are a bunch of methods you could use to monetize a blog. I’m not pretending this post is exhaustive by any measure. But, my hope is the following list will either remind you to try one of these ways—or—jumpstart your thinking and try one or more of them out for your blog. 

Here are seven (7) real-life ideas for how to monetize a blog that actually work:

1. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is the process of earning a commission by promoting other people’s (or company’s) products. There are many different affiliate marketing networks to use. One of the biggest affiliate marketing networks Amazon. Point is: you find a product you like, promote it to others, and earn a small percentage of the profit for each sale you make.

2. Advertising

This can happen a lot of ways. One great way is selling advertising to businesses because your blog has a good number of page views.

3. Selling digital products 

Selling digital products on your blog might mean selling anything from eBooks as short as a few pages. As long as it’s helpful, there’s often a market for quick and helpful eBooks. But, it’s not limited to this. You can also sell any resource that’s helpful to your audience. It could be any content you can put into a PDF. Write it down and sell it!

4. Selling courses

Depending on your audience and the content you create, you should consider creating courses to walk your followers through step-by-step on how to do something or get better at something else. You might not think you are online course material but you might be surprised. We often ask people what they find themselves explaining to others all of the time. There you have it! That's your course.

5. Selling Services

Consider what questions your readers are asking you all of the time. Can you package some consulting services and sell them? What about your teaching or facilitation? What if you trained others in how to do something in person or online? One of our clients offers services to onboard new clients and has packaged these services to be simple, understandable, and yes, even desirable.

6. Sponsorships

This idea is not often thought about. But, consider selling sponsorship placement on your blog. This could mean selling sponsors on any of the above mentioned ideas or on certain pages of your blog. As long as the brand or sponsor fits yours and they want your audience to see their business, you have an opportunity to sell sponsorships. That actually is you “making money while you sleep”! : )

7. Membership

I’m not going to lie. This isn’t easy. But, if you have the traffic and you’ve written lots of content, then it might just be time to consider creating a space and content that your readers have to pay to access by membership. We've seen many learn to how to take their communities digital and grow their memberships or tribes launch a membership program - both with great success. One community has built a community of tens of thousands of individuals which turned in to over 800 groups around the world. This is when membership has some real teeth.

Now that you have seven ideas you’ve either been reminded of or thinking about for the first time. What now? How in the world will you decide which one to do? And when? Well, I mentioned that I’m here to help!

So, here are three questions you can ask yourself right now to help you pick the right method for you:

1. Which monetization method is reasonable to achieve today (and not sometime out in the future)?

2. Which method gets you the most excited?

3. Do people trust you as a guide?

Now, here’s the biggest secret: Don’t overcomplicate things.Your natural tendency, because this is your passion—will be to overthink it. Don’t! At this stage, it’s way more important to just get started. Just start. Pick one of these ideas and run. You’ll figure it out on the way. I’ll be right here to help as you learn. Remember, to try and fail is to learn. Try some one idea. Even if you only make a few dollars, that’s better than nothing. You never know what might happen after that. Who knows, one of these ideas might actually work in your real life.

5 ways to monetize your community

Need more help monetizing your community?

You want to have a significant impact on the world AND generate revenue. In order to do that you need valuable resources and a means to deliver those great resources. Download the free eBook: 5 ways to monetize your community.

 

About the author: Will Rogers is the Founder and CEO of CauseMachine. Will’s career has been spent leading organizations and helping to mobilize communities to shared vision. He has served in various leadership roles to build community engagement and movements teaching him valuable hands on skills and experience. Will has developed business and community engagement strategies for dozens of organizations in nearly 50 countries. He and his wife have two sons and now live in Kentucky after two decades in Colorado.


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How to create content that Google ranks you for. Seriously.

So you blog all of the time. Maybe you're starting to monetize your blog. Great. I have bad news. Ready to hear it? No one’s reading your post. Yes, that post you care deeply about. The one you spent days thinking about writing. The one you waited forever and pressed publish with one hand over your eyes because you were nervous and loved it so much. It was your baby. 

I want to be nothing if not honest. No one saw that post. And, think about it, what’s the point in spending all that time if no one’s going to find it? 

I understand. Each post is your baby. You care deeply. You want folks to see it. I’ve written posts that embarrassed me because of the little amount of page views. Then, I’ve had posts that have done pretty well. Here’s the thing: I don’t doubt for a second that you have great content. You’ve spent time polishing that content. And, you know what you’re talking about. 

But, the truth is, for most posts you publish, maybe your spouse or mom reads it. Actually, they’re busy. They aren’t reading your posts either. I said I’d be honest! : ) 

All things in balance, the posts where I’m intentional about creating content with these seven things in mind—the stuff Google will rank you for—has the best chance of getting the most eyeballs on it—both now and long term. 

Here are seven (7) ideas for how to create content that Google ranks you for:

#1 Don’t start with what you want to talk about.

This is a tough one for me. I often think to myself that I have great ideas of what others need to know. But, it always amazes me to see what comes back from them when you ask. For a great mix on doing this well, start by asking your current audience. 

First, start with your followers’ problem. How can you know your followers’ problems? You simply need to ask. Create a simple survey. We’ve talked about some parameters around a survey in how to monetize your blog. Here’s the point: can you clearly articulate your followers’ problem and do you have the resources to help solve those problems? 

Not sure where to start with all of your followers’ problems? Make a list and prioritize the list. Consider organizing the issues or questions into buckets based on how many people share the same problem or category of issues.

#2 Be human.

Use natural language in your content. For example, when trying to use keywords, be sure you’re speaking like a follower would speak. People don’t think like robots, so be sure to ask questions and speak common language your followers would type in search.

Here’s one example: notice in this blog post, I could have titled the post “Google’s Blog SEO Strategy & Algorithms”. Guard against this type of robotic speech. Instead, focus more on how you would talk when searching. You would type something closer to “How to Create Content that Google Ranks You For” or something similar that’s more intuitive to how you would naturally ask the question.  

Now, let’s talk about writing content specifically as it relates to creating content for ranking purposes. Here are a few of the key ideas you should consider as you write content to get ranked for.

#3 Be clear.

Make your content clear, simple, and accurate to what you say you are offering. Always try to use less words instead of more. Think your post is wordy. Then it is. Cut words. 

#4 Use keywords but don’t go crazy.

You can go overboard here. Be careful not to overstuff keywords. Google will know! Make sure they fit what you’re talking about. Again, be as human as possible here!

#5 Your meta description matters.

This snippet shows up in search. Resist the urge to copy and paste the title here. Do a bit of work to make the idea and goal of the post stand out in a few punchy words. 

#6 Don’t forget your images.

Most bloggers overlook this. You’re done with the writing. So, you think you’re done with the post. You’re not. Many searchers will find your post because of the image you use—if it’s optimized. Be sure the file name of your image includes the keyword or phrase of your post. And, depending on what marketing tools you’re using, be sure not to forget the alt image text of your image.    

#7 Consider your posting rhythm.

It doesn't matter the size of your digital community, you need a content-publishing rhythm that works for you and your content. It may be weekly, every other week, monthly—and here's the thing—stick to it. The goal here is more about your frequency than volume of posts. 

Don’t set a standard you can’t keep up with. Readers will follow your lead, but don’t make it difficult to follow you because your posting doesn’t have a rhythm. 

Protip: Don’t write from a blank slate. Try and stay ahead of your posting schedule by at least three to four posts. You can always change up posting based on timing or culture or news. But, I’ve found it’s better to have ideas in the hopper so you avoid the blank white empty space of a blog post. 

Now, there are more than seven things to consider in ranking for Google. But, these are a few of the key ideas you should be aware of and start with as you write great content.

 

5 ways to monetize your community

Need help monetizing your community?

You want to have a significant impact on the world AND generate revenue. In order to do that you need valuable resources and a means to deliver those great resources. Download the free eBook: 5 ways to monetize your community.

 

About the author: Will Rogers is the Founder and CEO of CauseMachine. Will’s career has been spent leading organizations and helping to mobilize communities to shared vision. He has served in various leadership roles to build community engagement and movements teaching him valuable hands on skills and experience. Will has developed business and community engagement strategies for dozens of organizations in nearly 50 countries. He and his wife have two sons and now live in Kentucky after two decades in Colorado.


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