We're halfway through Membership Month!

International membership month is almost halfway through.  Remember that for every new member referred by an existing member, the existing member gets entered into a drawing for the IABC Golden Ticket. This ticket is redeemable for registration to any or all IABC events put on by the international headquarters for an entire year. New members have their $40 application fee waived.  A true win-win!

We're looking forward to having plenty of referring members to draw from so encourage your chapters to invite new members to join IABC today.

How you can help us make this a success?

  • Check out our exciting Instagram campaign and be sure to make a video and encourage your chapters to do so as well! We'd love to have a variety of answers to the all-important question: What does IABC mean to you? The official montage will be used to encourage new members to join IABC.
  • Use the Golden Ticket image and information from the fact sheet in your member communications. Find these resources in Leader Centre.

Chapter website hosting reminder

As you'll probably remember, in the fall of 2013 we introduced BizzyWeb as the provider for website hosting through 15 October 2014 or gave chapters and regions the option to find a different website hosting provider as we could no longer host chapter and regional websites. IABC paid for a Basic package with BizzyWeb until 15 October 2014 for each chapter and region website.

To update you on this process, we'd like to outline where we are today and provide a few important reminders:

  • Almost all websites are migrated off of our servers and many of you have made a decision on whether to stay with BizzyWeb or find an alternate host.
  • If your website is hosted with BizzyWeb, you should have an agreement document from them which needs to be signed by you and returned to BizzyWeb if you haven't done so already.
  • Your IABC-paid package with BizzyWeb expires on 15 October 2014 at which time your contract renews with the Basic package (US$250 per year).  If you'd like to stay with BizzyWeb hosting, you will work with them on the terms of your service. You also have the option to go with another website hosting provider.
  • If your website is hosted with BizzyWeb, we want to clarify that you have entered into an agreement with BizzyWeb and they will be your go-to for website questions, concerns and issues.  Please feel free to contact them at iabc@bizzyweb.com, or find them on Twitter at @IABCIT.
  • If you have an alternate provider, you probably have support with that provider so please continue to work with them on your website hosting.

Our servers are breathing a sigh of relief as most all sites are migrated off and we're able to better serve members and leaders with our new capabilities.  Thank you for your support!

Chapter/regional awards branding

We’re currently working on an update to the IABC branding guidelines that will cover “naming rights” and obligations when it comes to chapter and regional awards, specifically any kind of individual recognition award like a “Communicator of the Year”.

It’s important that any recipient of such an award is clear that the designation needs to be “IABC Chapter/Region Name Communicator of the Year”, and not simply “IABC Communicator of the Year”. This relates to the recent media controversy about Kelly Blazek, the winner of the Cleveland Chapter “Communicator of the Year”, who (amongst other things) was found to be incorrectly using the title “IABC Communicator of the Year”.

If you have questions or input for us as we work on this change, please feel free to contact Melissa Dark at mdark@iabc.com.

IABC Annual General Meeting (AGM)

Tuesday, 10 June 2014
Sheraton Center
Toronto, Ontario, Canada

At this year's Annual General Meeting delegates will be asked to vote to ratify the 2014-15 Executive Board slate and approve changes to the IABC by laws. Notifications on the approved board slate will be sent on 25 April 2014, 45 days before the AGM.

It is important that we have a member from your chapter listed as your voting delegate. If you do not have a member attending, you may assign your vote to your Region representative, or to any Executive Board member. You may request a proxy form by emailing Mari Pavia at mpavia@iabc.com. The form must be returned no less than 10 days before the AGM, 1 June 2014.

Please confirm your chapter's name and voting delegate by emailing Mari Pavia at mpavia@iabc.com no later than 25 April 2014.  Only chapters who designate a delegate will be able to vote at the AGM, so assign one today!

Staying connected

Member contact information

Members are often changing jobs, last names and email addresses. Please remind your members to make contact information changes on their IABC profiles so they don’t miss out on future updates.

This can be done by visiting: http://www.iabc.com/members/ and clicking “Manage my profile” in the upper right hand corner to update member information.

Leader Letter distribution

Occasionally the Leader Letter can end up in a junk mail folder. Please be sure to remind your fellow board members that this email came today and share your copy or remind them to check their junk folder. Subscribe and the Leader Letter will always end up in your inbox, too!

Linked In groups

Remember to join our Linked In chapter leaders and membership directors groups to stay up to date on the latest from our team. You can join these as subgroups of the larger IABC Linked In group. We post useful information, have great discussions and keep chapters and leaders connected across the globe.