Happy Friday! Who’s ready for the weekend? (I know I am – despite freaking out about tomorrow’s half-marathon!) I’m all ready right now with five of my favorite posts from around the association community this week. There was quite a good variety of topics, so let’s get right to it!

1. Jeff Hurt discussed problem solving and how association professionals can “get unstuck and out of corners.” I think often people don’t necessarily attempt to think of new solutions when faced with a problem, but Jeff provides a good five-step process for problem solving and ways to solve those “wicked problems.”

2. At the Effective Database Management blog, Wes Trochlil provides some great information about why it’s important to understand the total cost of ownership (TCO) of your association management software. The software’s initial cost isn’t the only thing you should factor in when making an AMS decision.

3. Jeffrey Cufaude’s leadership limerick this week deals with experimentation and why it’s so important for association professionals. He writes: Call it what you will, but organizations must move beyond analysis paralysis and release pilot efforts in which real-life members and consumers interact real-time with the program or service being created and offer feedback to hep refine the initial iterations.

4. The Associations Live blog provided some great, tried-and-true tips for logos, graphic standards and style guides. Although there is no “right” and “wrong” style when it comes to your association’s brand, it’s crucial to maintain consistency throughout all platforms.

5. Conor McNulty at the Acronym blog posted an interesting question this week: why do we fear failure? Personally, I was terrified of failure growing up, and only recently have I begun to develop a healthy appreciation for constructive criticism. Is the association profession conditioned for failure? What do you think?

From everyone at MemberClicks, we hope you have a fantastic weekend!

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After a successful Technology Conference, I wanted to share some of the great info that the MemberClicks team picked up. Wes Trochlil and Mike Murphy had a great presentation about selecting an association management software and the key things every association should consider. We’ve always been huge advocates of associations finding the right fit when choosing a software  - after all, it’s often the backbone of your association and a critical tool you use every day.

The following are the seven key steps shared by Wes and Mike:

1. Identify objectives: What are you trying to accomplish with the software?

2. Needs analysis: What features are must-haves? Which features are nice-to-have?

3. RFP development: Don’t be afraid to be as specific as you need.

4. Identifying potential vendors: This can take a lot of research and be daunting, but it can pay off.

5. RFP response review

6. Product demonstrations: Seeing the software in action will give you a sense for how you’ll be using it on a day-to-day basis.

7. Select/Contract Negotiation

Choosing a new AMS can be a very daunting, time-consuming process, especially if your board is extremely involved in the selection. I think it’s most important for the people who are going to be using the software every day – your staffers and administrators – to have a say in the software. Depending on the size of your organization, this could be just a few people or several.

What do you think is the most important factor when choosing a new AMS?

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Happy Friday! How are things in your area of the world? Cold? Warm? Busy? Laidback? Wherever you are, I hope things are going smoothly for you and your association. I’m sure you won’t be surprised to hear that there were tons of great posts in the association community this week, and as usual, I’m sharing five of my favorites. Feel free to share your own favorites in the comments!

1. Lindy Dreyer wrote an insightful post counteracting what many people (myself included) have said about mobile applications. She argues that they’re a waste of time for associations, as most people use applications to play games, get the news and weather and as navigation tools. There’s often a huge barrier to entry with mobile applications and many members just aren’t interested. What do you think?

2. At ASAE’s Acronym blog, Joe Rominiecki points to a post by Brian X. Chen and my Monday post (thanks!) to ask, why wait until a crisis to reflect on what your organization could be doing better. He’s right, of course – if you wait until your circumstances force you to change, it may already be too late.

3. Jeffrey Cufaude had a great post that pointed out something we all probably realize is true, but can be difficult to be put into practice. If you act like a situation is a big deal, it becomes a big deal by nature. However, if you stay calm under pressure, others around you will stay calm too.

4. I always enjoy Wes Trochlil’s blog because he’s able to accurately discuss technology for associations in “layman’s” terms. This week, he discussed the necessity for a translator of sorts during a new technology’s implementation. The association’s staff and vendors may not always be quite on the same page, so sometimes, communicating can be tough.

5. If you’re an executive director, how do you manage others? Do you manage other people’s expertises, or do you try to force yourself to be the expert at everything? (Hopefully, it’s the former.) Erik Lanke discussed management by collaboration at The Hourglass Blog this week and it provided some great ideas about how younger people need to rise to this challenge.

Wherever you are, have a great weekend!

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Happy Friday! My favorite posts this week all had to do with technology in some way or another. It’s what we’re consumed by here at MemberClicks, and we love the idea of technology making someone’s life easier. So let’s get right to it!

1. I tweeted this post earlier this morning, but I want to draw everyone’s attention to Mobile Millennials Leading the Way. For many young people, their entire lives are on their cell phones. It’s a “24/7 lifestyle.” Regardless of your organization’s size, being cognizant of mobile is crucial — even if you don’t have a “mobile strategy.”

2. I’ve really been enjoying Joe Flowers’ series about his small staff association’s web redesign. Part 4 chronicles telling a vendor that their relationship is ending and the concerns of migrating their information. Any association can probably relate — we realize that dealing with vendors can be stressful! But hopefully your vendors are understanding and professional.

3. A recent post by Wes Trochlil got me thinking: people, process and technology. For any web project to be successful, you have to have a delicate balance of the three. But no matter how awesome your technology is, if your people (i.e. your staffers) aren’t on board, it won’t succeed.

4. OK, this one is technically neither a blog post nor about technology, but it is about small staffs, which automatically makes it awesome. In the latest issue of Associations Now, Teresa Evans-Hunter discusses how a small staff organization staffs its conference. It can be tricky to host hundreds (or even thousands!) of members with a limited staff, so this is a good read.

5. Last but not least, the crew at Association Tech shared a post about a website revamp. There are many challenges involved in such a huge undertaking, so it’s crucial to know your objective and work with the right people. What are some of the challenges your organization has faced during a website revamp?

From everyone at MemberClicks, have a great weekend!

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Have you heard about the new Twitter.com?

I wanted to hold off on writing about Twitter’s upcoming new features until I received them myself, but that hasn’t happened yet (unfortunately). Last week, though, Twitter announced a slew of new features in an effort to encourage more people to use Twitter.com rather than a third-party application, such as TweetDeck, HootSuite or CoTweet.

Check out this video from Twitter that shows how the company plans to integrate multimedia (video, images, maps, etc…) into the homepage, and also shows what new profiles will look like.

Twitter plans to include many new features on its homepage, offering a way for users to receive experiences similar to those from third-party applications.

- Rather than just “Retweets,” Twitter.com will features “Retweets By You,” “Retweets By Others” and “Your Tweets.”

- There will be tabbed browsing options, such as Tweets, @Mentions, Retweets, Searches and Lists. Many applications offer tabs like these already.

- Users can preview photos, videos, maps and other multimedia right on Twitter.com, without even leaving the page.

This is all an effort to instantly show new Twitter users the benefit of the social network. Often, people join Twitter, don’t fully understand its capabilities and then become latent users. However, third-party applications (right now, I’m all about Echofon, CoTweet and TweetDeck) allow users to get much richer experiences without ever logging into Twitter.com.

Here are a few screenshots (credit) that more readily show how different Twitter.com will look.

The new homepage

New profile page – with even more info about each user in the right column.

Clicking on a user will bring up a “mini-profile” in the right column.

Multimedia will be shown in the right column.

Do you think the new Twitter.com will lead to more nonprofit organizations and small staff associations becoming active on Twitter? With a richer experience immediately available, do you think the “point” of Twitter will become more obvious?