Occupying a rustic city block in the promising Norfolk, Virginia area is a sprawling 35,000 square foot warehouse where O’Connor Brewing Company produces the number one six-pack sold in Virginia. There we meet Kevin and Penny O’Connor, the two founders: one a visionary and the other the marketing mastermind. Next to them sit their right- and left-hand men, Hannah Serrano, and a young and talented graphic designer (whose name escapes me, but art doesn’t).

All this talk about attracting millennials and yet we are missing the giant not-so-subtle-anymore elephant in the room - women. We’ve seen the Women’s March take place for the second straight year, chances are you or someone you know used the hashtag “#MeToo” in solidarity, and we’re all noticing the black attire in the room at celebrity and political events. While we’re not here to get political, we are going to touch on how organizations serving their members can better attract the female professional to grow and compete with emerging trends.

Every year associations set out to achieve a specified goal: digital transformation, growth, increased membership or personalization to name a few. But how do you achieve these goals successfully? There are countless factors that can contribute to a successful year, but at its core, I believe understanding your team, leading by example, creating a more granular outline and adopting agile marketing are the cornerstones to achieving goals in the arena of digital marketing. In other words to reach the goals you need to adopt effective project management skills!

“Associations are backing some of the hottest trends in tech, from the soaring popularity of apps to the strengthening market for robotics—and they’re also helping to raise a future workforce that’s more diverse” -Bratcher, 2017 

As an agency focusing solely on associations, we want to seek out what’s working, make educated guesses with surfacing trends and recommendations about new technologies, so that we can apply methodology specifically towards the needs of the association. If it’s helping to grow a for-profit organization, how can we manifest the same results for a 501(c) 6 depending on membership, events, advocacy, and education for revenue?

HighRoad is here to roadmap your association's digital transformation. We guide associations as they move away from traditional email marketing to email automation as a means to prepare for marketing automation. Adestra is an ideal platform for this transition.