Joe Abraham

Reinventing Your Chamber In Real Life

// October 23rd, 2009 // Next Gen. Chamber of Commerce

A few months ago, I wrote a couple of posts about Reinventing the Chamber of Commerce.
Article 1 – What Happened to the Original Social Network?
Article 2 – Reinventing the Original Social Network

But I wanted to go a few steps further than just talking about it. I wanted to actually do something about it.

So let me introduce you to my guinea pig Casey Steinbacher. Casey is President and CEO of the Greater Durham Chamber of Commerce, a 900+ member chamber with 10 employees and a $1.5 million budget. Casey is also the incoming chair for the 2010 year for the American Chamber of Commerce. (She’s a real go-getter, that’s for sure!).

Casey and I connected after she read the first 2 articles on Chamber Reinvention. Interestingly enough, she was neck deep into transforming the strategic plan for her chamber already.

So a few phone conversations later, I caught a ride with my favorite airline and headed for Durham, NC to see if we could turn my “rhetoric” into some tangible results.

So far, we’ve spent an intensive day doing business development strategy. I simply took Casey and her team through a series of exercises that we take startups and small businesses through. We covered everything from brand positioning to customer loyalty.

The most important exercise we went through (as it turns out) was one that helps a business identify it’s target audience. It’s part of the brand positioning exercise.

You’ll hear Casey talk about it in the short video below. It was hard work for Casey and her team to get through the exercise.

Why?

Because Chambers (more so than most small businesses), are completely and totally confused about who their real “customer” is. The pressure to keep membership dues flowing has forced them to coral so many different people with so many different agendas that it will make your head spin.

Kudos to Chamber Presidents who have dealt with this mind-numbing pressure for so long. But it is NOT a sustainable business model. Casey knew that intuitively, but this exercise helped her confirm it.

Over the next two months, I’ll continue to work with her to prepare them for an exciting 2010 launch. Enjoy Casey’s feedback.

Call me crazy, but I’m waiving any fees for this project so that we can do our part in helping chambers succeed. If you are a qualifying Chamber President, and want to experience the same service, I’ll do the same with/for you during 2009. You just have to be willing to be a guinea pig

Those who wait till 2010 when I speak at the American Chamber of Commerce event, can dip into their pockets to access the program (and rightfully so!).

If you’d like the full version of the interview (about 23 minutes), contact me and I’ll get you the mp3 version to download.