Tips for Program Planners from my Experiences

If you are involved in doing program and event planning for your local , regional or other genealogical society, you might benefit from the speaker’s experiences that follow. I invite you to read and take note.

Advertisement

Teaching Genealogical Society Management Skills

A month or so ago I was talking with a member of a local genealogical society in the west about a society management issue. She mentioned that at their annual leadership retreat ( an all day Saturday event) they analyzed the past and planned the future of the society. She mentioned having a speaker come in and talk about an issue like membership, programming, newletters, public relations, fund raising etc. I was impressed. During the day the worked as a group and as pairs or trios on various plans. Then at the annual meeting the published their plans etc. a great idea.

Now my friend Jana Broglin, VP of the Federation of Genealogical Societies is looking for speakers to help such groups. If you can speak to a society on some aspect of society management, Jana wants to here from you.

The Genealogy Educator as Amazon Associate

An acquaintance recenly informed me she had become an Amazon Associate. “Now not only can I sell my self-published book from my Web site” she wrote, ” but I also have topic-specific offerings from Amazon”. The setup process was really easy according to her. She now has their graphics and links embedded on her web site.” And, I’ll get a small commission from anyone who buys from Amazon from my site”, she asserted hopefully.

What do you think? Is it worth it?

Do You Need a Virtual Advisory Board?

Often in the business of genealogy education we need to consult with people to improve our performance, our offerings and our services. some people recommend forming a collegial mastermind group of peers doing similar work to exchange ideas and motivate. While collegial mastermind groups can have a tremendous impact on our genealogy education business, we might also consider forming a Virtual Advisory Board (VAB) with clients from our target market. Here’s how it might work:

Thoughts on Getting a Letter From Steve

Steve Myers sent me a letter this past week. A nice letter but not a happy one. Steve is chairman of the programs committee for the Federation of Genealogical Societies 2007 Conference in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Steve wrote to tell be that my 6 lecture proposals were among the 530 rejected proposals. There were gentle words at the end, boilerplate excuses, I mean reasons, why mine did not make the cut. Perhaps you received one too?

Workshop Registration and Pre-workshop Learner Assessments

For a few days now i have been wanting to comment on these two issues, workshop registration and pre-workshop learner assessment. These are two tasks that are occuring somewhere on th continent as we speak. Local societies hosting events know just how hard smooth registrations are to attain. And speakers and teachers desperately need to learn more about how to get the pre-assessment info early enough to make meaningful adjustments to course/worshop content. There is help on the web for both of these tasks. Let’s look at these.

Can your program evaluation form be a marketing tool?

I came across this idea on SpeakerNet News the other day. The suggestion was to put a question like, “I’d like to learn more about ______.” That seems like a pretty simple idea.

The Hermit Poet and Media Kits

My son, The Hermit Poet, is developing his media kit, an activity all professional genealogists, especially genealogy educators, need to be involved in. As I read over his comments I think  he’s got a few leads we can use in developing our own kits. Here’s what he says:

Push vs Pull: A Communications Challenge

Depicted above is the central challenge of marketing. We perceive a horse, standing. In the buggy are a couple of chaps wondering what the reins are for. Behind the horses head is our honorable anonymous observer. One of those chaps could be me, wondering why Dobbin isn’t going anywhere. Dobbin is my blog or my website promoting me as a genealogy professional. Why don’t those folks anywhere read my blog?  Afterall, in the universe of my target audience 67 is such a small number. The other chap in the wagon suggests we send a message out that there is something of interest here. So he sends an email to folks in the professional genealogy community. Hey presto, Dobbin moves: a walk, then a trot or canter and almst a gallop as 370 folks show up. There is a lesson here.

Program Planner’s Blues: Blue Sky Thinking

In every genealogical society, genealogical library, local history society etc., there is some person upon whom the executive has dumped the responsibility to plan future programs, find speakers, arrange events. Often its the same person who complained last year about the third appearance of Joyce the scrap book lady.