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Brandon Burton (00:01.57)
Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat podcast. I’m your host, 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. Today’s guest is a dynamic leader and author.
Since 2020, Dave Moravec has served as a president of the Colerain Chamber of Commerce, bringing with him over four decades of experience in business ownership and leadership across diverse industries.
From owning a printing company to leading chambers in both Illinois and Ohio, and even working in educational technology, Dave’s career is a testament to versatility and vision. Under his leadership, the Colerain Chamber earned the prestigious title of Ohio’s Chamber of the Year for Small Chambers in 2021, reflecting his commitment to foster business growth, connection, and collaboration.
Dave is all about meaningful work and creating strategic opportunities for local businesses to thrive. Outside of his professional achievements, Dave is a published author and avid traveler and still hits the field for competitive baseball. His latest ventures include releasing Echoes Across the Tracks in 2024 and two more books in 2025.
Dave, I’m excited to have you with us today here on Chamber Chat podcast. I’d love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the Chamber Champions who are out there listening and to share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little bit better.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (01:41.15)
appreciate that, Brandon. Again, after a long career in for-profit work, I landed myself in the Chamber of Commerce field, not really thinking that this was gonna be a late in life career shift, but it’s turned out really well, and I’m sure we’ll talk about that. Something somebody would not know about me would be that I was on the Jay Leno Tonight Show in 2011.
I have a bar trick where I can balance coins on my elbow and catch them in a snatch form. And they had a segment where they gave out a meal or no meal if you did your trick on stage, so on screen. So they flew me out to California, got to meet Jay, got lots of notoriety at that time, literally 15 seconds of fame.
Brandon Burton (02:23.212)
Okay.
Brandon Burton (02:37.542)
That’s awesome. So how many coins could you stack on your elbow to snatch in that action?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (02:44.362)
Well, not only did I stack them on my elbow, but I also was blindfolded while doing it. So I’ve logged to my LinkedIn page. If anybody is interested, there’s a blog post from back then blindfolded by Jay Leno. Ultimately, I caught 25 coins, 25 half dollars because the studio was so cold. My hand was freezing up. They have the hot lights on the stage.
Brandon Burton (02:51.093)
Okay.
Brandon Burton (03:13.517)
Yeah.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (03:13.822)
So they keep the foodie-o really cold. Well, your hand freezes up and so the producer said, we don’t care how many you catch, it’s just the fact that you’re getting blindfolded by Jay and you’re gonna catch some coins. It’s a silly thing. we just had some fun with it and I’ve been doing it since I was a kid.
Brandon Burton (03:35.215)
That’s awesome. I’m sure there’s a whole story on how you got onto the radar to get on the Tonight Show, but that’s a great fact and I love finding out these little tidbits about people. That’s awesome. Well, tell us a little bit more about the Colerain Chamber. Give us an idea of the size, staff, scope of work you guys are involved with, budget, to kind of set the stage for our discussion today.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (03:55.614)
Sure.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (03:59.624)
Yeah, our chamber’s only 11 years old and I came in five and a half years ago to take over as the first executive director, president, CEO. And we had a previous president that was part-time, had laid the foundation for the logo, the website, chamber master, all sorts of foundational pieces. And my role was to take it to the next level.
I started February 10th of 2020 just as COVID was about to happen. And we kind of threw out the 2020 plan and went a different direction. At the time we pared down our membership because people hadn’t come off of the roles that should have come off the roles. We determined there were about 150 active members at that time. We currently have about 275.
So we’ve not quite doubled in the five plus years that I’ve been here. We manage about a $250,000 budget and our community is 60,000 residents. So the second largest township in all of Ohio. myself, part-time marketing and events coordinator. She does some of the admin work. And then I have a part-time person who manages our green initiative.
We’ve got the largest waste facility in greater Cincinnati in our community and litter and recycling and composting is really important to us. So we’ve made an investment from a staff perspective to have a part-time person that does that. myself and two part-time people.
Brandon Burton (05:40.537)
Wow. Well, that definitely helps to get us that perspective. And it seems like there’s been a lot of chamber professionals who were hired in that first quarter of 2020, right before, you know, everything kind of fell apart. So you’re in good company with a lot of others who got thrown into the fire and had to learn, you know, with a lot of stress going on. we’ve…
Dave Moravec – Colerain (06:04.392)
Well, it worked. It worked actually in my favor because of my background in corporate work. You always have to be ready for a challenge. You have to be ready for a paradigm shift. And so when COVID was announced as, you know, closing down the state and it was March 17th, it actually was the day we moved physically to Ohio from Illinois as well. So I’m in a new community, a new situation.
And we just sat down and brainstormed what we could do, what would be allowable under the situation. And we just made it work. And it was just a natural fit. And I’ve told people for the last five years, it was the best decision I made.
Brandon Burton (06:48.064)
Yeah, you know, my family actually moved that same week too. And it gave us a lot of time to hang pictures and unpack boxes and all that with the, you know, being quarantined, but work goes on.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (06:57.33)
Yeah.
Brandon Burton (07:02.444)
But so you have another interesting fact about you that was shared in the the bio, but you’re an author. So Echoes Across the Tracks. Before we get into our topic for today, I wanted to have you tell us a little bit about Echoes Across the Tracks and how it came to be, where the idea came from and what you tap into as you as you write the series. I mean, there’s there’s three books now.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (07:20.67)
Yeah.
Brandon Burton (07:30.53)
But give us that high level synopsis of it and the idea for it.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (07:31.07)
rooms.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (07:34.825)
Yeah. Yeah. And Thanksgiving of 2023. So not quite two years ago. I just had an idea to sit down and tell a story. And the more I wrote, the more it turned into a book. I’ve done a lot of travel as most of us have. We’ve had crazy travel and I had a really crazy travel experience, planes, trains and automobiles type experience over the summer coming back from Colorado.
And so I started writing one, it was the Friday after Thanksgiving. And I just kept typing and typing and by the end of the weekend, I had 10 chapters done. And by the end of the week, the following week, I was done with the book with 17 chapters. Echoes Across the Tracks takes place on the Amtrak train from New Orleans to Chicago.
Main characters heading to the airport as much of us do, we get a flight cancellation notice and we have to react to it. I guess kind of like the chamber reaction in March of 2020. Something had to happen and my cab driver in the story suggests that the main character Charlie take the train instead. And that starts a 30 hour journey from New Orleans to Chicago on the Amtrak train.
The subtitle is Life Lessons Through Unexpected Connections, because you never know where you’re gonna meet somebody. And the train was a good vehicle to be able to talk about networking and meeting people in a professional way and looking others in the eye and shaking hands. The story is told from my perspective. Charlie is an aging business consultant who’s promoting a book in New Orleans. And the story…
takes place over that 30 hour period and it really is just that short a period that the story is told.
Brandon Burton (09:33.241)
So there’s even some chamber connection through the book. As I’ve started reading it, the main character, Charlie, had a profession as a chamber leader. So I love that connection and the tie-in and trying to make, I know if it was your intent, but I like the efforts in trying to make chambers of commerce more mainstream and more front of mind, if we can, to the average person in the community.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (10:01.256)
Yeah, absolutely. We become ambassadors and I’m sure we’ll talk about it as we go through the conversation here, Brandon, but I feel like we can all be ambassadors for Chamber of Commerce, just like we are for a restaurant or for a hotel or for a particular business. And so the last two pages of the book, I actually devote to describing what I call the Chamber of Commerce.
value proposition. And I spell it out really simple in four paragraphs. And somebody who picks up the book, who’s a business professional, may have not thought about Chamber of Commerce as a way to network or to provide marketing support for their business, to get involved in their community or look for ways to compete with larger businesses, you know, in their market space. And so there’s a purpose for, you know, for putting that
piece in at the end. I did so in the sequel that I just recently produced as well. I kept the exact same value proposition in the back of the book to keep it consistent. But Charlie, the main character, has to head back to New Orleans for reasons that I won’t share here because we don’t have enough time. yeah, I don’t want to do that. But the second story is
Brandon Burton (11:20.824)
Can’t spoil the story either, so.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (11:28.242)
think just as interesting and compelling, but doesn’t focus on networking, focuses on customer service. And customer service today in many industries has been taken down a notch because of a variety of different things that business owners aren’t really thinking about. And so I felt that it was important to do so and wrote that into the second book.
Brandon Burton (11:52.183)
Yeah, that’s great. I’ve been enjoying it and I would encourage anybody else listening to check it out. Great story and you’ve got a great creative mind to put it together.
So maybe as a little bit of a segue in the book that goes across the tracks, the main character Charlie, he’s learning and sharing business practices that he’s learned throughout his career and in a large way, that’s what the podcast is for, having different chamber leaders on and talking about business lessons and things that they’ve learned through their career. So today we have Dave on the show to talk about creating a
Dave Moravec – Colerain (12:05.544)
Thank you, Brenda.
Brandon Burton (12:35.472)
chamber flywheel. And it’s a term that I’ve heard before, but I haven’t heard in the term of chambers using a flywheel or creating a flywheel at their chamber. So we’ll dive into that and what all that means as soon as I get back from this quick break.
All right, Dave, we’re back. As I mentioned before the break, we’re talking about creating a chamber flywheel today.
What does that term mean to you? Where did this come from and how have you guys worked to implement this at the Colerain Chamber?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (13:09.032)
Sure, we actually have two flywheels. The concept is easy to find if you go to Jim Collins’ book, Good to Great. It’s got a red cover and it has a ring to it. Just like my wife, her name is Patty. So we go by Dave and Patty from Cincinnati. Well, you can find the flywheel in Good to Great in chapter eight. And if you find Jim Collins’ purpose behind it,
He talks about the four to six things that make a business go faster or grow faster or to become stronger But you have to sit down and think about those things and once you come up with those four to six unique Ideas processes Whatever that looks like for your organization and in our case the Chamber of Commerce Then you have to put them in order
and do them in the proper order. So as an example, we might invite people to the chamber and do that really well. And we might do marketing really well. But if we do them in backwards order, we may not get the same result. And so we as a Chamber of Commerce in 2020, I took the Board of Directors through this flywheel process because I didn’t know the community. I was new here.
certainly knew the process of creating a flywheel and using it, but I wasn’t sure what that meant for our Chamber of Commerce. So we did that, we created that flywheel, and then I incorporated a second flywheel. And that’s really what I’ve been teaching on for the last five years, Brandon, to other Chamber leaders. It really has three components. One at the top, where you’re attracting businesses to your Chamber of Commerce.
And if you’re attractive to those chambers of, to the businesses in your community, meaning if you’ve got an outward way about you, your marketing, et cetera, is strong, you’re gonna be attractive and attract others. Well, once you do, you bring them to an event or you show them the value proposition of being involved in a chamber of commerce, you have to engage them. So the second component is engagement.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (15:29.738)
That means coming out to an event, talking to other people, doing something besides sitting in your office and going, well, yeah, maybe I’ll send a check to the Chamber of Commerce. They got to get up and do something. So you have to find a way to engage them. And once you do, hopefully the enthusiasm of your Chamber of Commerce is going to be so compelling that they’re going to become a member or in our case, we use the word investor. So we’re investing in our community. We’re investing in our Chamber of Commerce. We’re investing
in our business community. And once they do and they see that that’s an investment, not a spend, at the end of the month when the monthly dues come around for your chamber, or if you’re on a quarterly or as we are in an annual basis, you’re not thinking that the business isn’t thinking about cutting a check to cover expenses. They’re doing it because they’re investing in the community. And if they are,
and they’re so enthusiastic. The third component is delight. They’re so delighted in what is being offered by the Chamber of Commerce and what you’re doing and what you’re giving back to the community. They’re so delighted, they’re gonna come full circle and attract others that you don’t know. These might be neighbors, these might be business associates, they could be outside of your geography, but see the value of being involved in your community because you have a series of
customers in the community that would be a fit or the business connections or even just the friendships that are developed might be attractive enough that, there you go. There’s the graphic. That’s the perfect graphic. So attract at the top, engage as you come around the lower right-hand corner of the flywheel to the point of delight. And once you’re delighted, you become an ambassador.
just like you would on your fine dining restaurant that you make a suggestion, hey, you got to go to such and such a restaurant when you’re in our community. You’re so delighted you become an ambassador. Many chambers of commerce have ambassador groups. They have a small group of eight or 10 individuals who are charged with wearing a badge on their shirt or their jacket that says ambassador.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (17:52.091)
I want our chamber members to all be ambassadors, because if they’re all working together, that flywheel spins faster and faster and faster than if we just have a handful. And that’s the concept that I’ve been teaching Brandon and that we’ve been promoting as a chamber of commerce for the last five years.
Brandon Burton (18:12.29)
But as you delight the people, it closes that wheel where the delight goes back to attract and just it starts that that whole cycle over again with those new people that are being introduced to what the chamber has to offer.
And when I think of a flywheel, think of it’s a way of applying leverage really. I mean, you have a goal and you’re trying to get there either quicker or more efficiently and the leverage that can be provided as you shared with the attract, engage and delight is going to kind of have that focus all around the growth and applies that leverage to the growth.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (18:50.256)
Absolutely. And there’s two significant additional components to this messaging. First off is that in traditional chambers of commerce, there’s a membership director, somebody who’s going out into the community and I’m just going to use air quotes, selling memberships to the chamber of commerce. And somebody can be sold on the idea of being involved in the chamber of commerce, but if they’re not engaged for the right reason, they’re not going to necessarily be delighted. And so when the
time for their reinvestment comes up, it’s a membership, just like a gym membership. I didn’t really use it, I didn’t really see any value to it, so no, I’m not gonna do that again. So we don’t do that. I don’t go door to door, nor does my team go door to door saying, hey, do wanna be a part of the Chamber of Commerce? We let the flywheel just naturally take place. And so the referrals that come in, or the people that are attracted around the
the side of the wheel by those that are delighted are far more interested in being involved, much like a fraternity or a sorority would be. You’re inviting them and they feel welcome. That’s different than selling them on a membership. Second thing is that it eliminates a sales funnel. A lot of businesses look at a sales funnel and they go, let’s get as many people in the top part of the funnel as we can. And then we’ll do something in the middle.
to try to get them out at the bottom as a new member or as a client. Well, once you get them, so to speak, you gotta go do something else with them. And getting them doesn’t sound like it’s very attractive. I see the look on your face. You don’t sound very sold on that idea, Brandon.
Brandon Burton (20:38.446)
Well, and I’ve heard different business owners, different from a wide array of different types of businesses. But if when they have that focus of the sales funnel, they always have to keep upping the ante of what’s that next level that we can sell? What’s that next? And then you get into the, especially with online business, you see a lot of this where they have their high ticket items. It’s a $20,000 mastermind membership or something.
And something ridiculous that only, you know, one or 2 % of anybody who enters that funnel is going to get there. But as long as they spend money, they keep finding what’s that next level that we can keep extracting money out of them is what it ends up being rather than providing that value and showing them that there’s a reason that you’re here and this is what we’re doing for you and keeping that going as a circle. So yes, that’s resonating with me very well.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (21:37.331)
Yeah, and what ultimately happens is, again, couple things that are hugely beneficial. Number one, your rate of retention is significantly higher because they see it as an investment and a continuation of a relationship. You also decrease the amount of chasing that you’re doing to phone calls. Hey, are you interested in joining the change? Hey, did you get my email?
Hey, you know, it sounds kind of cheesy, but it’s far more professional if you’re inviting a friend to a business networking event or to a women’s luncheon or to, you know, to a large fundraiser or awards dinner. If you’re inviting them as opposed to selling them on the idea of, you know, you hear the difference there, Brandon? Yeah.
Brandon Burton (22:32.706)
Yeah, yeah, it’s selling versus inviting. Like, what do you want to be involved with, right?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (22:38.472)
Yeah, exactly. And again, it’s something that we’ve actually been tracking is the number one reason, and this goes back to the good to great flywheel. Among the first things we realized was that each chamber member has a different reason for being involved in a chamber of commerce. So somebody who comes for our ancillary benefits and insurance programs or workers comp may not be interested in networking. And somebody who’s interested in networking
may not be interested in giving their time back to the community and engaging with nonprofits or becoming a board member. Each has a different reason for being involved. So we actually track that in our CRM and in Chambermaster. And the second part of our flywheel is actually engaging them and making sure that that component is fulfilled. So if we’re not providing enough networking opportunities for those that are
interested in networking, they’re going to naturally go away. If we’re not providing enough marketing opportunities to sponsor and get people’s logos out in front of the community, they’re not going to see the Chamber of Commerce as having value. So we make sure that we’ve not just identified what it is, but fulfilled the promise that we’ve made to them and we’re going to create that value.
when we add value to it through innovation and through relationship building, all of a sudden there’s more value associated with that membership or that investment. And that value adds to the flywheel. And the last component of our flywheel is actually being able to tell that story through marketing. Because if we’re not attracting others by telling that story of, hey, you can be involved in this networking thing and
We had a chamber member not too long ago, sold her first million dollar account. Well, being able to tell that story to other people and that she could share that on our sales summit, all of a sudden people go, wow, hey, what can I learn from this person? And it just attracts more attention and more people to us.
Brandon Burton (24:58.862)
Yeah. So one thing that comes to mind is with the flywheel and trying to get people engaged. the attract and then engage. I’ve heard it said before that trying to find a quick win for somebody, you somebody comes into the organization, they’re testing out a business, whatever it is. What can you do to provide a quick win for that individual to where they immediately see that there’s value in them being there?
and participating. So as you guys have implemented this and practiced this flywheel concept, have you been able to identify ways to create a quick win? maybe within the first three to six months, maybe six months might even be too long, but maybe within the first three months to be able to provide a quick win for these investors that come in and join the chamber and are engaging or trying to engage.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (25:29.563)
Yeah.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (25:57.683)
Yeah, I’m gonna answer it two ways. First is the traditional way. People are looking for ROI, right? They’re looking for that quick win from a return on investment. They’ve spent $500 on their membership and they need to get $500 back in value, so to speak. And that’s what you’re speaking about from a traditional perspective. That depends on the type of business that you have. If you’re a roofer,
and you get introduced to 10 people in the community or 20 businesses and none of them need a roof, you’re not gonna see a quick return on investment. I just don’t need a roof right now. So we actually talk about three-year investment in the chamber. Our minimum level is $340, so times three, that’s $1,020, just rounded to $1,000.
Brandon Burton (26:36.385)
Right.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (26:52.926)
If you’re not willing to invest $1,000 in your business over a three-year period as a small business, when there are so many other more expensive options, then we actually take it off the table. We suggest that you not get involved and not invest your money at this point in time. And people have actually looked at me and said, what? Well, no, no, no, I want to join the chamber.
I didn’t mean that. And so we’re talking about it as an investment. The second thing is that many chambers of commerce miss an opportunity by welcoming people before they actually join. So we actually encourage people to take a test drive, invite them to multiple events, not turn them away when they come to a second or third event and go, hey,
You gotta pay up if you’re gonna attend our event. No, not that way at all. So our quick wins are engaging them with the right people at the right time and the right place. And if you do that, all of a sudden they feel, yeah, I’m wanted. Nobody wants an email directly to them after an event that they came to and says, thank you for coming to our event. We hope you’ll attend another event.
Brandon Burton (28:16.854)
Yeah
Dave Moravec – Colerain (28:18.814)
Nobody wants that. But if their film number is on their thing, a simple text that said, hey, this is Dave. Thanks for coming to our thing last night. Appreciate it if we can help in any way, give us a holler. That simple. And people go, that’s a person. That’s somebody who’s actually thinking about me. And lastly, this is a good friend of mine, Bob Berg. In fact, I talked to Bob this morning.
He’s written a book called The Go Giver. There are a series of 10 questions that he has that you can ask somebody during your engagement when you’re meeting somebody at a networking event. But the number one question he poses is what would be the ideal referral for your business? And all of a sudden people are now asking themselves,
He’s not telling me about his business. He’s asking me about mine. And so now they can feel engaged by saying, well, a commercial, we’re do 90 % of our work is commercial roofing. And we look for businesses that before they’re actually needing a roof because oftentimes if the roof isn’t repaired properly or taken care of, it leads to damage on the inside of the building. I’m just using an example here.
I go, I’ve got a chamber member who I can introduce you to now, who may be in that situation, maybe not, but all of a sudden they go, well, he’s interested in me because he made that introduction before it was even necessary. At our networking events, people don’t go around the room and tell themselves about, our members don’t stand around and tell about their business. We actually engage the new,
Brandon Burton (30:00.035)
Yeah.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (30:13.766)
attendees to have them tell their story and have them be more attractive before they leave the room. So somebody will come up and say, you got a dog sitting business or you’ve got a craft brewery. We’d love to know more about that. But if they don’t know it because they’re standing in the corner of the room by themselves, shame on us for not allowing that.
Brandon Burton (30:41.9)
Right. Yeah, I think a lot of times these quick wins, don’t need to be that, you know, complete ROI on that, you know, that return of the investment upfront, but being able to get them a feel and a kind of light the path of this is how you will get that return on your investment, you know, by making these connections, by getting to know these people, by getting involved, you know, in a committee of some sort or helping to further the chamber’s mission, you know, in this way.
So there’s, think there’s a variety of different ways that they can feel like there’s a quick win because going back to your, your comment about just being genuine and asking about their business and learning about them, they’re going to realize, okay, Dave’s working for me too. So that’s a, that’s great piece of advice.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (31:31.122)
We also use the individuals in the room to help make that happen. So if there’s somebody that’s new in the room, I might introduce them to somebody who’s just joined the chamber in the last three months and say, hey, Bob, meet Sue. Sue can tell you what her first experiences were better than I can. And then exit stage left.
Brandon Burton (31:53.209)
Yeah.
And I guess, you know, having your whole staff just being aware of anybody who might be new as well. think that would be the worst thing is somebody comes and nobody talks to them. No chamber staff, nobody even addresses them. Chances of them coming back and engaging and getting onto that flywheel is not going to happen. So, very good. Well, Dave, as we start to wrap things up, I wanted to ask for those listening who are trying
to take their chamber up to the next level, what kind of tip or action item might you suggest with them in trying to accomplish that goal?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (32:34.106)
Well, as I mentioned earlier, a funnel of prospective members and chasing them down is for me the least attractive way to grow your Chamber of Commerce. My understanding, and this is a statistic that I was told and it’s to a certain degree proved to be true, is that if a Chamber member joins and in the first year then
drops their chamber membership, just like a gym membership on January 1st and February 1st, go, I’m not going to do that. My understanding in the chamber world is that it’s five years, five years before they’ll consider joining the chamber again. And if that’s the case, then I can call on them every day for the next five years and say, hey, you want to come back? And they would say, no, had a bad experience.
So we want to have that first experience to be strong so that year over year over year, you create a long-term value. And the value add that I will share and the bonus for me in the long-term value proposition of for-profit businesses is that if somebody is happy with membership initially, eventually they’ll sponsor an event. Eventually they’ll become a sustaining sponsor.
Eventually, they’ll become a board member. Eventually, they’ll become a legacy provider to your chamber of commerce. But if you haven’t done the legwork on the front side to build the relationship, none of those things will happen in the proper order. And again, I think the lessons I’ve learned in the SaaS world, selling software solutions, is that if somebody is really attracted to what you’re offering,
The other things that you offer will just naturally happen. You don’t have to upsell. You don’t have to tag them for the, it’ll just naturally happen. We had five sustaining members when I came in. At this point, we’re approaching 30 sustaining sponsors that invest a significantly higher amount than just dues. And that’s because of relationship building and them seeing value in their logo being
Dave Moravec – Colerain (34:59.696)
everywhere and anywhere through the chamber. So that’s my tip for the day, Brandon.
Brandon Burton (35:05.728)
I like that. But, and to your point where somebody drops their membership, it may take up to five years or more for them to consider rejoining. The other side of that coin is if somebody, if you can, you know, provide that ROI, show the value of the chamber, get them in the flywheel. And I think the stat is three years. If you get them in for three years, then the chance of them being life members, like for the life of their business, drastically
increases to like 80 or 90 percent if you can get past that third year hurdle. I think implementing a flywheel is a perfect way of being able to get past that point and be able to have them be ambassadors for you and be promoting the chamber everywhere they go.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (35:53.151)
I would agree with that. And one other point is that negative talk comes from people that you’re gonna tell a negative story 10 times more than you’re gonna tell a positive story. And if you’ve had a negative experience, you’re not attracting others that you know. And somebody says, hey, do you wanna join, or should I join the Chamber of Commerce? Nah, I didn’t really have a very good experience. Well, you wanna have those ambassadors that you were creating on the delight side.
that are telling your story over and over and over again. And what we’re seeing is that those that provide referrals provide multiple referrals. So they’re telling the story far more times than they would tell otherwise.
Brandon Burton (36:34.072)
Yeah, it’s great marketing. I love it. Right. Yeah.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (36:37.212)
And there’s no cost to it. We can talk about that for another day, but there’s no cost associated with it either. You just have to be genuine.
Brandon Burton (36:46.924)
That’s right. Well, Dave, as we look to the future of Chambers of Commerce, I always like to ask, how do you see the future of Chambers and their purpose going forward?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (36:58.578)
Yeah, I think you’ve had Matt Appenzeller on your show and I’ve gotten to know Matt. Okay, you are great. Matt is awesome. And he and I subscribe to the same mindset from this perspective. And what I’ve seen in talking to and I don’t wanna say evaluating, because I’m not an evaluator. I don’t put one here and one there. But as I look at the future of Chambers of Commerce, I think the challenges if…
Brandon Burton (37:02.648)
Coming up, yeah, he’s coming up, yep.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (37:26.738)
you’re not running the Chamber of Commerce like a true business, you’re putting your Chamber of Commerce at risk. And by that I mean if your expenses are more than your revenue, you’re eventually gonna run out of reserve. If you aren’t planning for tomorrow the way a for-profit business does, when they know that the shelf life of their laptops is gonna be five years, five years from now they’ve gotta have the money available to replace those laptops.
And I think those kinds of concepts are missed oftentimes, number one, because the chamber leader doesn’t know any better. They haven’t been mentored or shown that those things are important. But secondarily, they have boards of directors that close their eyes and ears to the fact that their for-profit businesses have to survive that way and forget that their staff, the people that are running the Chamber of Commerce,
have to be that way. If you’re not increasing your dues, you know, over a period of time, eventually it’s going to come up and catch up with you. And I think that that’s the risk that all of us have is not treating the business, treating the Chamber of Commerce as a business and looking at it as a nonprofit.
Brandon Burton (38:47.608)
Yeah, I think that’s a great piece of advice as well. Not too different from running your household finances. You take those lessons of having healthy balance sheets. Well, Dave, I wanted to give you an opportunity to share any contact information for listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you and learn more about your books or about the flywheel or anything we talked about today. Where would you point them and what would be the best way for them to reach out and connect?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (38:56.734)
Absolutely.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (39:17.298)
Well, I have put in my resignation for the Colerain Chamber of Commerce. So you can reach me for a period of time at president@colerainchamber.org. But you can otherwise find me at DD, Dusty Dave is my nickname, moravec, M-O-R-A-V-E-C-5@gmail.com (ddmoravec5@gmail.com). My phone number 309-838-1947 will get me 24 seven. And I will pick up the phone 24 seven.
Brandon Burton (39:52.679)
There you go. And the books, Amazon, anywhere in particular you’d point them?
Dave Moravec – Colerain (39:57.82)
Yeah. Yeah. You can find them at salesmanagerforrent.com on our media site. Amazon will have them. Look up Echoes and Moravec and I’m the only guy that M-O-R-A-V-E-C with Echoes associated with it. If you like the books, recommend them to others. Write reviews. First time and new authors.
That’s their biggest challenge is having people to review them so that others see them and are attracted to it. So yes, I appreciate that. And yeah, thanks for the plug. I appreciate that.
Brandon Burton (40:37.842)
Absolutely, you bet. It’s my pleasure. But it’s been fun having you on the podcast today. I appreciate you spending your time with us and your experiences and lessons that you’ve learned at leading the Colerain Chamber and just from your business experiences through your career as well. So thank you.
Dave Moravec – Colerain (40:55.432)
Great to be here.
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