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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.
Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community. You’re joining us for a special episode as part of our 2023 ACCE Chamber the Year Finalist Series.
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I’m excited today to have Sharon Mayer with us Sharon is the President and CEO of the Allen Fairview Chamber of Commerce and a little bit of background on Sharon. She was named the President CEO of the Allen Chamber in August of 1997. She began her career in her chamber work career as a part time employee at the Arlington Chamber of Commerce in 1989. She then quickly moved up the ranks and in 1995, she accepted the position as president of the DeSoto Chamber. During her tenure at the Arlington chamber she completed the IOM program in record time and continuing education in chamber work is still important to her today she has to Institute for Advanced Management courses that she’s participated in when an SMU and went to Colorado Springs Institute programs. Working with other chambers and within the state association is extremely important to Sharon. during and following her tenure on the TCC board she facilitated retreats for area chambers and assisted in the planning and facilitation for annual programs and chamber basic courses hosted by that association. Sharon joined the Board of Regents for the Center of Chamber Excellence in 2004, where she participated as an instructor for member bait membership basics, and served as Chairman of the Board of Regents. She also served as board member on the North Texas Chamber Executives which represents over 42 chambers in the north Texas area. And as the 2023 board chair. She is a past member of Board of Directors for WAC II, and Sharon serves on the North Texas Commission Board and their executive committee in 2011. Under Sharon’s leadership, the Allen chamber expanded to become the Allen Fairview Chamber of Commerce serving two very diverse communities in 2022, that marks Sharon’s 33rd year in the chamber business, and 25 years as CEO of the Allen Fairview chamber. In 1997. She married Paul Mayer, who’s the CEO of the garland Chamber of Commerce. Together they have five children and nine grandchildren. Sharon, we’re excited to have you with us today on Chamber Chat Podcast, I’d love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the Chamber Champions and share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better.
Sharon Mayer 4:28
Well, hello, everyone. I am absolutely thrilled to be here with you today and looking forward to our discussion. You pretty much told everybody about my life
Brandon Burton 4:40
secrets, right? There
Sharon Mayer 4:43
are a couple of things that were not included on that. So I have a certification from the University of Texas at Arlington and as a paralegal, which I’ve never used one time in my entire life. I was also I’m a licensed real estate agent and sold one house. But the only reason that I was involved in real estate is because my late husband away, and I owned a real estate company in order for me to keep it going, should anything happen to him? And unfortunately, it did. I had to be a licensed Realtor so that, you know, we built houses. I had a business, especially advertising business that did hand engraving on sunglasses, and our biggest client was Harley Davidson for 1000s of pairs annually. And then guess what they did, they found out that you could go to China and have them stamp for a lot less money. So pretty much tied to that business.
Brandon Burton 5:50
That’s the story of a lot of small businesses these days. Right.
Sharon Mayer 5:53
So so that’s a lot of historical stuff that that I don’t mention in my bio.
Brandon Burton 6:00
Yeah. So tell us a little bit about the Allen Fairview chamber just to give us an idea of the size of the chamber scope of work, you guys are involved with staff budget, just to kind of set the table for discussion.
Sharon Mayer 6:13
All right. So our chamber is right under 600. Members at this time, our budget is a little over 500,000 annually. And I will say that, probably 55% of that goes for staff. Because if you if you don’t invest in those resources, those people resources, then you’re doing your chamber a disservice. I have four and a half, three and a half employees. We have a finance director, a membership director and a programming special events director plus, I am so fortunate to have a part time law student who was actually started with our chamber as an intern when she was in high school, and worked has worked remotely for us all the way through her undergrad, and now her law school. And she’s in her third year of law school. And she works remotely and does all of our social media and marketing and things like that. So and she’s she’s just excellent.
Brandon Burton 7:33
So that was my next question with her working. So I love hearing about chambers utilizing interns first. But then to have her working remote to retain her as she goes through her schooling, what type of stuff she’s doing social media marketing, what other kinds of things do you have her
Sharon Mayer 7:51
to keep the graphics, but she does all the social media stuff. And you know, she does the promotional graphics and things for all of our programming. And I mean, she’s really creative, and does a great job she just completed we just had our annual gala and she did all the collateral for that. And it was it was done as well as the marketing firm that we had been paying $26,000 a year you know, on a contract to do and you know, and she’s she I think she she’s just under $20 An hour and she tracks her time and it’s definitely saving us money plus it puts money in her pocket you know, and
Brandon Burton 8:41
love her find a big chunk of change in the budget like that. Well for our our topic today we’ve titled this episode business building versus networking. And we did that because of the approach that the Allen Fairview chamber takes in approaching their members and, and how they call different things you know, the the Cymatics, if you will, so we’ll get into a much deeper conversation on this as soon as we get back from this quick break.
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Brandon Burton 11:37
All right, Sharon, we’re back. So as I mentioned before the break business building versus networking, what’s the difference?
Sharon Mayer 11:46
Great, big, huge difference. So everyone does not everyone does networking, one way or another, obviously. But the reason that we chose to focus on this building business is because you got to go back to our mission, the mission, our mission is to advocate educate and build relationships that enable our communities and our members to prosper. So everything that we do to us back to our mission, and changing the name of what we at one time called Allen net, that was when we were teeny tiny and there were 12 people in the room networking, and then we changed it to Tuesday morning Live, which everybody still calls it Tuesday morning lab, at least those who have been around for a while it has transitioned to now it’s coffee and connections. And so we wanted to use the connecting and the building and all of that together. And it is now grown to around 90 in attendance every week. And these people understand the value of building a business network, which is not the same thing as networking, they do not spend their time shoving their business card in somebody else’s nose under their insight, you know, here, I have something that would benefit you. And you know, just going on and on and talking about yourself. What’s really interesting, if you attend one of our networking’s is that you find out that they’re not talking about themselves. They’re talking about everybody else in the room. They’re talking about how Joe really helped Sammy over here, you know, find a plumber, and it was an emergency he needed somebody. And, and they also have I mean, they have fun with it because they make up silly sayings and silly names about their other businesses. And they just, they make it fun. And I think if you talked about the whole atmosphere, around our business building, whether it’s the morning or whether it’s a an after hours event, or whatever it might be, you’re gonna find that people talk about us as a family, not as a membership organization, because they are all so connected, and their friends and they invite others to come in all the time, which is the reason that it has grown the way that it has. And it all goes back to the to what we originally said is you’re in these seats and in front of these people to build your business. But the best way to build your business is to and we’ll use the word network to network with people that you know I can trust and the people who are in that room Boom, know, like and trust one another. And a byproduct of that is that they know, like and trust staff know, like and trust the organization. And it just, it helps us to increase our influence within the community. But it also helps us when we’re building our membership.
Brandon Burton 15:20
Yeah. So I know, I get the sense that networking is like a four letter word there that now in Fairview chamber? How did you successfully go about changing the mindset for people as they’re set on? Using that four letter word, networking, and converting that to business building?
Sharon Mayer 15:43
We just stopped. We didn’t, we never, we don’t ever tell anybody anything. We just sort of start using a different term ourselves, and move on from there. And it just catches on.
Brandon Burton 16:00
So about how long ago did you guys make the shift from calling these networking events to build business building events? Well, it
Sharon Mayer 16:08
started during and right after the pandemic. You know, that was, you know, well, that was a really horrible time in our lives. And thank God that we’re, you know, on the other side of that, it was also from our chamber perspective, and our engagement. And like I said, our, I guess we’re influenced within the community, probably the best thing that’s ever happened to us. Because our chamber had to keep connecting people, but we had to do it the, you know, like we do now, with Zoom calls a lot of times. And so that was when we thought, you know, okay, we’re not, we’re networking, but we’re not networking. And we’re not doing this face to face thing. So let’s just kind of change the way that we present this and the way we said, so if they became business building opportunities, and we’ve just kind of hung on to it after that.
Brandon Burton 17:09
Yeah. Yeah, I know, a lot of people networking can be a very intimidating phrase, if you say, to a new member, for example, Hey, we have this networking event coming up. And you see the sweat start coming down their foreheads, I got to talk to people and get uncomfortable and do you know, pass out business cards and be sold by everybody in the room, versus changing that and saying, we’re having a built a business building event, come and learn how you can grow your business. And it’s a totally different perspective for the similar kind of outcomes. But it changes that perspective coming into it for a different objective
Sharon Mayer 17:47
does and in fact, if I were to tell you something else, about myself and my husband as well, that nobody that we interact with, when believe is neither one of us are extroverts. We are not, we would rather than being alone in the office door closed, nobody bother you. But you, it’s so it’s not a natural thing for us to do. But at the same time, this is something that we have to learn in our positions, and we put ourselves out there so we can really understand. And I particularly can understand the reluctance of someone to just show up cold at a networking event. So what we have done other than Chase, or is that we make sure that there is someone there to greet them and someone to take them and say, Come over here, let me introduce you to these people, you know, and our members do not sit with their friends, because we tell them when you’re sitting with your friends, you’re not building your business. So you just sit with someone that you don’t know. And the best ones to sit with. And the ones that you get to know really well as time goes by is that if you’re the first person that that a new person that comes to one of our events meets, then they automatically feel like if you’re open and welcoming, and all of that they feel like okay, they’ve made one friend in a group of 90. And so it’s a little less intimidating that way.
Brandon Burton 19:12
Yeah. So I’ve recently heard a term when you’re in a situation like that social setting, that you tend to see the circles of people, right that stand in the circle and talk. And the idea was instead of creating circles to create horseshoes to where it’s open for newcomers where you can be welcoming for newcomers to join the conversation. They don’t feel shut out because they’re looking at everybody’s back. And you purposely leave an opening.
Sharon Mayer 19:38
Yeah, and our volunteers, basically our ambassadors, our business success advocates, both of them. Both groups are really really good about taking a member or a visitor under their wings. And they don’t talk to them about the chamber but they they actually stay And during the 32nd commercials, and they do the first commercial for them, so that they actually feel more comfortable the next time they come back.
Brandon Burton 20:09
Okay. Yeah, I like that having the volunteers there to just help make sure that they have a good experience that they’re meeting people getting connected with those right individuals that will help build their business. So. So you also take a different spin on some other vernacular than your, in your chamber. For example, members versus investors. You had another one it had to do with sponsors, that have sponsors, partners, and so the sponsors, talk to us a little bit about the the thought that goes into those names.
Sharon Mayer 20:48
Well, my staff gets worried when I start thinking. And because I like changing things up, because I think everything gets old, it gets stale. So we may do the same series of Legends, or breakfast meetings. But we don’t call them them. I mean, you know, so So I sit down and I go, Okay, let’s see what would be start, let’s start your day. And then I go start smart topics and relevant themes. So I mean, you know, everything has a meaning to me, I have to have that. So. So we changed the name of start. And then we changed the name Merlin engines to bold bol D stands for nothing, just bold topics, okay. And speakers. So that led to the whole thought process of Okay, now we’re looking for sponsors for these events. And why not just say, hey, come partner with us on this event. Because partnerships, in my opinion, are a much closer, more personal relationship than a sponsorship, sponsors write checks, partners get involved in the whatever event it might be. And we involve them ahead, we promote them like crazy, but we involve them by asking them to come in and introduce the speakers, give them time on the program, you know, to talk about their business. And that’s how we refer to them. So and then you talk about the the member versus investor. So members are easy to lose, investors are a little bit harder. Because what you’re doing is you are working within your organization, but you’re you’re drawing them in, and when you refer to them as investors, then they see that what they’re doing with those dollars, is that they’re investing not in the chamber. They’re investing in their business. And they’re investing in the community and economic growth within our communities. And we use those terminologies all the time, invest in your business, invest in your community.
Brandon Burton 23:12
I like that. Yeah, the investor definitely brings a level of commitment, where a membership is like, you know, see how it works for me see what’s in it for me, right?
Sharon Mayer 23:22
We still get a lot better, you’re always gonna get what’s in it for me.
Brandon Burton 23:26
Right? Right. So another terminology that I picked up on is you don’t necessarily call your volunteers or ambassadors these, you said six business success advocates. Yes. Is that are those essentially ambassadors or do you have ambassadors as well,
Sharon Mayer 23:44
we have ambassadors as well. But what we’ve done is we’ve taken some things away from the ambassadors and given it to this new group that we’ve had in about two years now. So our ambassadors are still the meters in the greeters and the the ribbon cuttings and you know, open houses, all of that. Our business success advocates are BSA as we call them, are focused on retention. And they are focused on building relationships after someone joins Not, not when they show up at one of the coffee and connections or that sort of thing, because they’re the ones that will, will call members, especially first year members every three months. So they’re kinda like a mentor. They tell them about not chamber events, but they tell them about chamber benefits, particularly at whatever level they have joined it because we have a, you know, tiered dues investment schedule. And they forget, they join, they choose this level, and they think, oh, yeah, I’m gonna do this. I’m gonna do that. Well, we track what they do and what they don’t do. And so our Business Success Advocate which is really hard to say. I actually have a list and they know what the expectations were when that member joined. And they can relate to them. Because I mean, they’re members themselves. And so they’re peer to peer. And it’s a lot easier. And a lot, it’s really a lot better and more impactful conversation when you’re talking to someone who is is your peer, rather than you’re talking to this chamber staff person.
Brandon Burton 25:28
Yeah, absolutely. So I’m curious, the question comes to my mind, as you talk about these PSAs business success advocates. There, they’re there as mentors to help guide these new investors along their path at the chamber. As a new business joins the chamber invests in their business and their community, are you having the opportunity to evaluate where maybe they can get involved with whether it’s a committee or as a weather ambassador, or Business Success Advocate or partner, whatever it may be?
Sharon Mayer 26:09
Yes, but we do have some rules. You need to be a member for at least a year, before you can join either the investor group or the business success and this good group X PSA Group. But those are the only two where we really have a rule. I mean, we have a dei committee, we have a legislative affairs business advocacy committee. So those were, if that is your, what you’re interested in, then you can join immediately if that’s what you want to do. And we introduce them to these things gradually. It’s all in their membership packet that they you know, but the other thing about membership packets is, you know, they’re drinking through a firehose, instead of, you know, a water fountain or a water bottle, whatever it might be. And they forget and so that’s what the BSA is, do they remind them that you know, here’s an opportunity to hear but also don’t forget, you know, you get on the chamber podcast at your level of membership, you get three minutes on the you know, the podcast, you get a free hole at the golf tournament, you get all you know, other things, the
Brandon Burton 27:28
podcasts that you guys have in your chamber, right.
Sharon Mayer 27:33
Past Al Anon action, don’t ask me why didn’t say Fairview in action, but it started out Elden an action. And that’s the way it’s remained. So yeah. And it’s kind of fun, because we get to talk about our members. And we do and they get to participate depends, like I said, depending on their level of sponsorship members, what’s that word investment? Yes. But yeah, it gets a little tongue twister when you get right down to it. But you know, we have, we have not a huge audience. But we do have our regulars who listen all the time, we have a little over 600 that, you know, that subscribe to the podcast, very easily found right there at the top bar website, on the left hand side, along with our blog, and all the other things that I add to it continually.
Brandon Burton 28:28
That’s great. I’m a big fan of chamber soon podcast, as you can imagine, so glad to hear you’re using that as a platform to tell the stories of your members and, and highlight them. So I’d like these, you know, taking these old terminologies freshen them up a little bit, maybe giving a more meaningful definition to them, to allow these investors to really get more bang for their buck to really build their business stronger, and to see their involvement with the chamber on a different level. So I think this has been a good exercise, and hopefully chambers listening or jotting down, you know, some of their own terminologies that they use, they might be able to freshen up a little bit.
Sharon Mayer 29:13
If you if you don’t look at things annually, whether it’s the name of coffee and connections to you know, whatever it might be and thinking, Okay, we’ve been doing that for two or three years that’s getting really old. Let’s put a little zing in it. It’s like our new member orientation, it was called a new member orientation. And we’re going to call it chamber 411. And guess what time of day, we’re going to have it for 11 at the end, and our battle fab after hours battle. People know people remember those times that are odd, you know, that are off kilter. And they remember for lemon and 505. So that’s what propose things to I mean, there is nothing too small or too big in your chamber that could not stand a little refurbish refresh at once. No. Well,
Brandon Burton 30:08
absolutely. So Sharon, I wanted to ask you if for those listening who would like to take their chamber up to the next level, what tip or action item might you share with them to accomplish that goal?
Sharon Mayer 30:24
accreditation through the US Chamber, we have gone through the process three times. And we moved from being an accredited chamber to a four star chamber. And then last year, we are awarded our five star chamber recognition. And every single time you go through this process, you have to take a really in depth look at your chamber and what you’re doing. And while a lot of chambers will involve a large group of members, in going through each of these different aspects, we do not and we did not. And we had one or two of our board people involved. And what we found out is volunteers unless you’re in a smaller chamber, or a really, really large chamber, and they understand the benefit of this will drop the ball every single time. So as much as I love them, God bless them, don’t count on them. And so they what it really has done for our chamber and our staff is it’s made us look internally, instead of externally. And, and the feedback that you get from the US Chamber on when we got our four star accreditation. The one little Hickey that we had was Governmental Affairs. And I had four years to fix that. And and what was that mission statement again, advocate, educate and build relationships. So we went to the top of the page. And now we have a very, very, very active business advocacy committee. So it’s, that’s that’s really and that’s important to me, especially in the state of Texas, because we’re kind of crazy here right now.
Brandon Burton 32:21
That is a good tip to go about the accreditation process.
Sharon Mayer 32:26
And you know what? I mean, it’s so gratifying because let me tell you what it did. I have been talking about getting my CCIE and God knows I’m putting this out there to public for 30 years. And after that five star came in, I went okay, that’s checked off my list. Now it’s time for the CC anything. So I am everybody listening
Brandon Burton 32:49
can help keep you accountable to that.
Sharon Mayer 32:54
Email me, Sharon and LM Fairview chamber.com. Wish me luck and ask me how it’s going. And I’ll be happy to share the good, the bad and the ugly.
Brandon Burton 33:02
That’s good. So I like asking everyone I have on the show about how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?
Sharon Mayer 33:10
You know, what really bothers me is when people say chambers are becoming obsolete, that the younger generation doesn’t know what a chamber is. I was in Austin yesterday. And I was at a legislative affairs thing. But I had a little bit of time. So I went to the mall. And I am walking into the mall next to this young man, and he’s very places how’s your day? Go nuts. Have fun. How’s your son? He said, Are you just out shopping? You’re on your way to work? And I said, No, I’m here for a legislative session. And he said, What do you do? And I said, I run a chamber of commerce. And he looked at me and he was like, I said, you don’t know what Chamber of Commerce is, do you? And he said, no, no. And I said, most people your age No. And most people who are a lot of them who are older than you don’t. And I said, but let me tell you what we do. We advocate educate you build relationships, and keep going back to that. And we are a business association that works on the local level within a town in a community to help businesses thrive. And to help them with so many business issues that are coming up right now. One of the things that and I’m gonna throw this in there you didn’t ask. I’m really proud of our legislative affairs stuff, but I am exceedingly excited about our diversity, equity and inclusion committee. And the fact that we are making such strives to get not only our work with our city and our school districts and to get the word out that this is what we’re doing. But we are working towards getting minority veteran Now, women on LGBT queue businesses certified so that they can actually do business with our local municipalities or county state and beyond that program, once we get that launched is really going to be what will be remembered in our community and within our membership as something that was done well and is extraordinary for them. So
Brandon Burton 35:30
that’s fantastic. So Sharon, before we go, I wanted to give you an opportunity to share any contact information for listeners who want to reach out and connect or keep you accountable and your CCE, you threw your email out there already, but what would be the best way to have someone reach out and connect with you?
Sharon Mayer 35:49
Well, the very best way to is to email me because I will probably answer it at two in the morning. So it’s sharon@allenfairviewchamber.com.
Brandon Burton 36:03
And I will get that in our show notes for this episode. So it can be nice and easy as someone’s listening before they go to bed and they want to send you a message that you can respond to at 2am. There you go. Oh, Sharon, I appreciate having you on the show today and setting aside some time to be with us and share the approach that you guys take there at the Allen Fairview chamber. I think that’s something that’s kind of been on the radar for a lot of chambers. But it just made me that reminder that they needed to keep things fresh, keep things with purpose, to give the best experience for their remember investors.
Sharon Mayer 36:38
I have told you all about our mission statement. I didn’t tell you what our vision is to be an indispensable resource to Allen, Fairview and Collin County businesses. And that’s what we’re continuing to work towards to be indispensable.
Brandon Burton 36:53
I love it. I love it. Well, thank you for for being with us today and sharing your example. I do appreciate it.
Sharon Mayer 37:01
It was my pleasure anytime.
Brandon Burton 37:05
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