LeaderPost

Welcome to the SMEI Leader Blog!

This blog is designed to keep you, as an SMEI leader, up to date on SMEI programs and services and to share information and best practices.  Please use the RSS button to subscribe using your favorite RSS reader and you'll be automatically updated each time there is a new post on the blog.

SMEI Website Maintenance September 11

Affiniscape will be taking a planned maintenance outage beginning at 8:00 p.m. CDT on September 11th to upgrade the Members24x7 underlying technology. 

Anyone attempting to access the SMEI and chapter/affiliate web site will receive an "Under Maintenance" message asking them to return later in the day.  The maintenance window is planned for a maximum of 24 hours.

Security Enhancements for SMEI Website Mean Planned Outages on 6/15/09

Upgrades to the SMEI website will be deployed Monday, July 15, 2009. In an effort to enhance protection from malicious attacks and attempts to acquire personal information, several improvements are being introduced.

• The first update will be deployed at 7:00am CDT on Monday, June 15, 2009. Your site will be unavailable for 30 minutes during this planned maintenance outage. Additional details about the the Members24x7 release are posted as a tech alert on your Members24x7 Site Administrator page. This will impact all content pages on the website.
• The second update will be deployed at 9:00pm CDT on Monday, June 15, 2009. Your site will be unavailable for 60 minutes during this planned maintenance outage.This will impact all event registration and membership renewal/signups.

Minimum password strength requirements will be enforced for all member-created passwords. Passwords will be required to contain:

          o A minimum of 7 characters
          o Both alpha and numeric characters

Members will be prompted to update their passwords when they sign in.

Membership Campaign & other Updates

I hope you are enjoying the first days of spring!  There are a few things that I want to update you about as an SMEI leader.

2009 May Membership Campaign
Yes, we have a campaign ready to go!  This is a great opportunity for you to challenge your members to help you grow your organization by sponsoring new members to join during the month of May.  There is a grand prize drawing, $50 promotional coupons for participating members and new members and much more.  Please read the details on our website at http://www.smei.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=502.  There is an opt-in form that must be completed by all affiliates.  This needs to be completed by April 24 to ensure that your members are registered to participate.  Please designate one person to complete the form.  Details and a link to the form are on the website page referenced above.  A big thanks to Mary Tricaso, CSE, SMEI Membership Senior Vice-Chair who put this program together!

DSMA® & Distinguished Sales & Marketing Award®
We just received notification from the US Patent & Trademark Office that “DSMA” and “Distinguished Sales & Marketing Award” have been successfully registered as SMEI’s trademarks. 

Please ensure that when using the acronym “DSMA” that it is shown with the registered symbol: DSMA®  

The full name should be used as follows: Distinguished Sales & Marketing Award®   (Note that the word award is singular, not plural), so in the context of an event title it would be:  Distinguished Sales & Marketing Award® Banquet  (or dinner, or event, etc.)

Only authorized affiliates/chapters of SMEI are permitted to use the trademark.  Affiliates/Chapters using the trademark must abide by SMEI's policies regarding its use and must use only the approved Victor Statuette™ Trophies for presentation.

Please review any website copy and marketing collateral and update as soon as possible.  If you have any questions about this or the use of the trophy, please contact me directly.  Additional information about the DSMA® program can be found at www.dsmawards.com.

2009 SMEI Conference
Save the date!  The 2009 SMEI Conference will be held in Baltimore at the Renaissance Harborview Hotel on September 25-26th.  The theme of this event will continue our successful "Social Media Road Show" and focus on the use of social media for sales and marketing.  This topic has been very popular and we look forward to a great program in Baltimore.  All affiliates/chapters are encouraged to have leadership in attendance for the Chairman's Award reception.  There will also be a SMEI Organizational Leadership Development (SOLD) Workshop at this event.  For further details, please see http://www.smei.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=581

SMEI Website Maintenance Window 10/16/08

We are planning to release Members360 v3.1.1 to production on Thursday night, October 16, 2008.  Because this release entails changes to both the application and the database, we will need to take a maintenance outage.

The planned outage window will be from 9PM Thursday to 12AM Friday, Central Time.  During this time, Members360 features and functions will not be available.  This includes the event registration and membership application forms.

SMEI Website Design Upgrade

The SMEI website at www.smei.org will be undergoing a major renovation on October 8, 2008 and will be offline for maintenance for a few hours.  Watch for the new look!  If your affiliate/chapter has questions about the new design and how it will impact the affiliate/chapter subpages, please get in touch with the SMEI office.

SMEI Goes Live with New Website Software!

You may have noticed in previous information that SMEI has allocated significant resources to upgrading the website at www.smei.org.  On the surface you won't notice much change yet, but we officially went live with the AMS (Association Management Software) that runs the membership database and back end of the website on July 1st. 

The biggest change that members will see is the member profile.  www.smei.org > My SMEI > Member Profile.  This new interface will give each member a personalized snapshot of their membership and certification status as well as feeds from our event calendar, and any open invoices. 

Other changes include the incorporation of multiple merchant accounts in the payment processing area which allow for SMEI to collect payment for affiliate events, batch the payments daily, and send them directly to the affiliate bank account.  If your affiliate has not yet completed the merchant account form to make this happen, please contact admin@smei.org as soon as possible so that we can provide you with timely event payments.  This is an additional added value benefit from SMEI at no additional charge.

Later this month we will launch the new look and feel of the main website.  The new site will take better advantage of screen space and provide a more dynamic experience for members and prospects.  If you would like a look at a site that will be similar (designed by the same company as SMEI's new site) please visit www.chicagorealtor.com.  SMEI Affiliate sites will have the same look and will maintain the same navigation, and affiliates will still have complete control over the actual content on their pages.

Effective July 1, 2008, all SMEI Affiliates must comply with SMEI's branding standards which includes hosting their web pages on SMEI's web platform.  There are a number of reasons for this, which include the ability to maintain a unified brand, and to create search engine optimization enhancement (SEO).  SMEI is very aware of the importance of SEO and its impact on web traffic, and our efforts to date with SEO have paid off handsomely.  By aggregating all of the affiliate/chapter traffic with the SMEI main pages, the ranking of the entire organization is enhanced, allowing prospective members and the public to find our site in the top rankings of search results.  This means more traffic for each affiliate site than a stand alone website would be able to generate.

Debra Lindsey-Wayt CME Installed as 67th Chair of SMEI

June 24, 2008, Shreveport, Louisiana, USA:  Debra Lindsey-Wayt, CME, was installed as the 67th Chairperson of Sales & Marketing Executives International, Inc.  Debra has been a member of SMEI since 1995 and has served in many volunteer leadership positions since that time.

Officiating for the installation was Melissa Medley, CME, Immediate Past Chairperson of SMEI, and Chief Marketing Officer, State of Mississippi.  View a video of the installation and remarks by Debra here:

Developing Your Association Strategic Plan

As you prepare your strategic plan, one of the best practices is to retreat for 1/2 to 1 full day with your board and include your new board members and executive director.  Here is a suggested outline of topics and a framework for your plan:

1.       Membership – how will you define success at the end of the new fiscal year, and what metrics will you use to measure outcomes:

a.       Membership Retention

b.      Membership Growth

c.       Specific Companies Targeted

d.      Specific Job Titles within Companies Targeted

e.      Financial Contribution of dues revenue

2.       Events – how will you define success at the end of the new fiscal year, and what metrics will you use to measure outcomes:

a.       Quality of Programs/Speakers/Theme; educational, social, etc.

b.      Percentage of attendance by Members

c.       Percentage of attendance by Board Members

d.      Marketing Exposure, impressions through email, sponsored adds, etc

e.      Satisfaction rating by attendees

f.        Quantity of programs

g.       Role of Certification and metrics

h.      Financial contribution and expense

3.       Financial

a.       Budget Forecast vs. Actual

b.      Financial commitment to meet SMEI Charter requirements

c.       Scholarship(s)

d.      Investment(s)

4.       Leadership

a.       Board Positions filled

b.      Board Positions vacant

c.       Participation by board

d.      Succession Plan & Attendance at SMEI Leadership Events

Website Maintenance Notice

We will be performing maintenance on the system database tonight, Wednesday April 30^th beginning at 11:00PM CDT.  This maintenance is expected to take about 1 hour.  During this time, the site will display an "Under Maintenance" message and will be inaccessible.

SMEI Launches India Affiliate with Official Charter Signing

April 23 - 25, SMEI representatives Debra Wayt, CME, Chair-Elect and Willis Turner, CAE CSE, President & CEO traveled to Bangalore and Mumbai, India to participate in the inaugural events for SMEI India.

Speakers at these events included personal branding expert Lesley Everett from the U.K., Barry Trailer of CSO Insights from USA and Dr. Seema Gupta, IIM Bangalore. 

SMEI India Chairman and Founder Subhakar Rao and Lt. Col. (Retired) Govinder Rajulu hosted the events in both cities.