AIMS Canada

Business opportunities in China

I've talked to 2 AIMS members in the last couple of months that were looking at potential business opportunities in China. And then just last week I was sent an information package from a group that are organizing a business delegation to China in September.

The China Access 2008 program will look at investment and business partnering opportunities. It will include a particular focus on information and communications technologies and the 'creative' industries.

Full program and contact details are on the China Access 2008 website and blog.

Can you recommend an email marketing vendor?

The following question was sent in by a member looking for a vendor recommendation.

"I'm a lapsed AIMS member (freshly returning from mat leave) and am looking for eCampaign list vendors (i.e. companies that manage email lists). I'm early in the research phase but I'm looking to investigate an eCampaign management system or provider like Yes Mail but someone who is local. Can you recommend any?"

Anyone have any suggestions?

Searching for the Perfect Poll Widget

Thanks to everyone who voted, commented, and emailed me regarding the design for our new website. Lots of good discussion.

As a sidenote I wanted to comment on my quest to find the ideal poll tool. Much more time consuming than expected but of course I can't complain too much as it was *free* tools and widgets I was seeking.

First stop was www.blogpoll.com. A serious problem with speed. When a visitor hit the site it took more than 10 seconds for the poll to load on the page. And if they got that far and decided to vote...well I'm not sure what happened as I have up waiting. Perhaps just a temporary glitch but it didn't seem to be fixed a few hours later.

Next stop www.majikwidget.com. Nice and easy but for some strange reason they track who has completed the poll based on IP instead of cookies. So only one computer per network would be able to vote. Not good.

Next on the list was www.visu.com. I must have been getting tired by this point and not reading the fine print. I went through the process of setting up the poll only to find out it lives on the visu site and doesn't generate the code needed to host on the AIMS site. arghhh.

Final (thank goodness!) stop was www.blogflux.com. Easy to set up, multiple users on a network can vote, speed is good, and for an extra bonus it maps the location of voters. Surprisingly we had 3 votes from Europe!

Blogflux is the definite winner at the moment but I'm interested to hear what polling tools others have used?

Which Creative Do You Prefer?

We're getting very close to finalizing the creative for the new AIMS website. Would love to know what ya'll think of these 2 options... (click on thumbnail to open full size view)

OPTION #1

OPTION #2   

New Website Coming Soon!

A couple of months ago we started looking at options for the AIMS website. The look and feel of the site needed updating and the navigation needed an overhaul. And of course we still needed the ability to promote events, maintain the membership database, and sell memberships and event registrations.

We looked at a few options and made the decision to go with Wild Apricot. It's a new product from Bonasource that was developed specifically for associations. My favourite part? The fact it was developed specifically for associations...it means there's little customization required and not much I need to do beyond writing the content for the pages. Which means I can focus on getting the fall line-up of events organized...but more on that later...

Dmitry (chief apricot) and the talented folks at Wild Apricot are working hard at having our new site ready for August 4th. In the next couple of days I'm going to publish 2 design mockups and ask everyone for feedback.

What a great group of volunteers!

A few weeks ago I sent out the regular AIMS newsletter and I included a call for help. WOW! What a response. Over 60 people offered to pitch in and help! With so many people it was easy to divvy things up so it's not too much time for anyone. We have four committees:

- Pre-event organization - We've moved around a lot lately so these volunteers are looking for a new 'home' for AIMS events.

- On-site registration

- Marketing & Promotion

- Speaker & Event topics

And this doesn't include the board of directors, search engine council, web analytics council...and a host of others that 'help out'.

Thanks everyone for the great response and for volunteering. Thanks to a solid group effort our events and activities will be relevant, timely, well organized, and full of great discussion.

The AIMS Summer Social?

I've had a few people ask about what's happening with the annual summer social. It's 34 degrees by 9am these days so it's no surprise that cold beer is top of mind!

We decided to postpone the usual summer get together until mid-September. (We promise the beer will still be cold). We've been heads down this summer getting a bunch of stuff lined up for the fall: new website, events, volunteer committees, the list goes on.

So we figured mid-September would be the perfect time for a big ol' bash. Everyone's back from vacation and with so much change and growth going on out there it's a good time to get together and celebrate! I'll have more details and a date coming soon...

What's Happening at AIMS

Well this new blog for one thing! I'm thinking of it as a combination of blog and discussion forum (a blogum?). A place for members to interact and discuss ideas, challenges, and best practices with other members. (Sound familiar? If you’re a long time member you’re probably remembering the AIMS Discussion List aka ADL right about now).

Since I started working at AIMS a few months ago I've had a lot of people ask me about the ADL. While we don't want to use that technology again the desire for member communication is as strong as ever. Which is great because helping members talk and share with other members is a big part of what AIMS is all about.

We’ve seen dramatic changes in the online landscape and there’s never been a better time to talk about what we’re experiencing. The good, the bad, and what we’ll remember for next time.

Similar to the ADL, members can send in their question to the moderator (me). I’ll post it for comment and discussion.

Submit A Post

Have something you'd like to share with fellow AIMS members? Send your questions, ideas, challenges, best practices, or random thoughts to me at admin@aimscanada.com.

We used to have the AIMS Discussion List (ADL) where members could bounce around ideas and get feedback on particular challenges or questions needing to be solved. Now we have the AIMS blog - same idea, different format.

Submissions can be anything that's on your mind. A perspective you would like to share, a question you would like to ask, or a challenge you're trying to solve and would like to put out to the group. Whatever it is you can drop me a line at admin@aimscanada.com. Look forward to hearing from you!

Contact Us

Drop us a line anytime at admin@aimscanada.com.