MADISON, Wis. - To better keep its 4,600 members in close contact, the CUNA Councils have developed a “professional Facebook” – a networking site that gives users the ability to find news, advice and other information about members across the country.
“Listservs have been around for several years now,” said David Rohn, CUNA Councils vice president. “What we were looking for was something more dynamic that would have the resources to carry (members) through the next several years.”
Message boards for the CUNA Councils, of which there are six, have been extremely active, but many discussion threads were simply users trying to find others who are interested in the same fields, are in the same geographic area or have similar asset sizes. With Councils Connect those searches take mere seconds with instant results–a far cry from posting on Listserv and praying for a response.
“What they were doing before was a shotgun approach. This is really a rifle-shot approach,” said Rohn. The new site is complete with member profiles that include contact information, the size and reach of the members’ CUs, areas of expertise and industry suppliers. Perhaps the site’s most unique feature is the people map, which gives a user a visual representation of what other members share the most in common with him. It was that feature that convinced the CUNA Councils to pull the trigger on the new application and sign with Leverage Software, a firm that also does business with corporate powerhouses like Microsoft, Apple, Sun Microsystems and Lucent Technologies.
“This was the one that really caught our eye and when we showed the leadership of the council they said ‘Wow, this is something that will really help our members,” said web manager Christopher Morris.
The old Listservs remain in place, but the new site already has 50% of the CUNA Councils’ members online–an impressive feat as the site was launched just over two months ago. With about 2,300 users online, much of the discussion has already moved to CUNA Councils Connect’s blogs, discussion forums and chat rooms. The “web 2.0” tool has taken off, noted Rohn, who pointed to an Associations Now magazine report that only about 1% of members of associations are using such products. We’re early on in this, but we are confident that this will continue to build,” said Rohn.(c) 2008 The Credit Union Journal and SourceMedia, Inc. All Rights Reserved.http://www.cujournal.com http://www.sourcemedia.com
