We're delighted to congratulate the Tech Gurus selected for 2016 and sponsor this important award! One big trend we're seeing is that the definition of "tech guru" has expanded to include association professionals who aren't from traditional information technology backgrounds. Why is this important? It shows that we are moving even moreso into the creative economy where technology is seen as an enabler to business success and not a solution in and of itself.  This evolution is playing out in the association industry before our very eyes!

Just take a look at some of the areas the award winners are focused in and why we view them as a Tech Guru and someone to watch for 2016:

• Donna Reichle, Associated Builders & Contractors--spearheading a national project to better automate communications and reduce operational overhead of email
• Robert Wagner, American Payroll Association--spearheading a digital marketing transformation by adding inbound marketing to the organization
• Amanda Scott, Baccalaureate Social Work Directors--single-handedly running an association using her association management system to the fullest
• Kristen Garman, National Association of College Admission Counseling--in constant pursuit of how to effectively utilize data to improve digital communications
• Andrew Burch, National Federation of Independent Businesses--innovator in employing email automation to increase operational efficiency and increase the ability to measure and predict user interaction
• Melissa Garcia, Society for Neuroscience--facilitating continuous, integrated communication between business units to outfit programs with the technology that will take the organization to the next level

These are just a few of the outstanding tech gurus that we nominated that deserve the recognition for being disrupters and always pushing forward. Speaking of disrupters, we would be remiss if we didn't give a shout out to Reggie Henry of ASAE, Prabash Shrestha newly of AGA , and Ed Beck of NRA all visionaries who lead with the philosophy of "why not try it" and focus on what's to gain through change versus the fear of change.

Congratulations to all the award recipients and we look forward to hosting the award reception on May 18th in Crystal City, Virginia!

Congratulations to two of our recent clients named by Bisnow as being a 2016 association innovator and recognizing their work to advance association marketing. Both award winners were interviewed by Bisnow & their excerpts from how they innovate are as follows:

The Top 2016 Association & Non-Profit Innovators have been announced and will be celebrated the evening of Wednesday, January 27th in Crystal City, Virginia. We are thrilled to see so many of our clients get the nod & recognition that they deserve for pushing association marketing to a new level of excellence.

I can't believe I just caught myself saying that we should change digital to fit the print mindset. It's true, I'm guilty. I'm working into the wee hours because I want change and change doesn't usually fit into the typical 40 (or even 35 work hour week of some associations) hour week. Change is an investment, it's a discipline and it has a voice all its own--even to the change agent. 

The theme of ASAE's 2015 Tech Conference was digital disruption. Everyone seems to be talking digital, change management and now  the word, the process and the people who can cause disruption are hot, hot, hot. I've been the leading disruptor here at HighRoad for the last two years and responsible for not just evolving our own organization through the addition of our Inbound Digital practice, but also in working firsthand with clients to evolve digital communications and association marketing programs. 

We've just gotten this new video infographic from our partners at Demand Metric who captured the key  takeaway messages from our 2015 State of Digital Marketing in Associations study in this video: