APCUG Reports
January-March 2008

• Is your user group looking at ways to expand and grow your membership?
• Does your user group already have members who are developers, IT enterprise professionals, IT consultants, or small business owners?
• Is your user group concerned about the demographics of your UG’s membership, as well as, your UG’s declining membership base?

If your user group has any or all of these concerns, then you might want to consider broadening the focus of your user group to include developers, IT Pros, and small business owners, in addition to your current end user membership base. If your user group decides to broaden your membership base, then you may also want to consider joining Culminis. There is NO Charge for your user group to join Culminis.

The Culminis ALLIANCE is a network of IT Professional User Groups, created to bring these groups together with each other and with leading IT solution providers. Member Organizations are IT Professional User Groups and associations around the world.

Membership is FREE but each Member Organization must meet minimum eligibility requirements.

Information on starting a new user group is provided in the documents section on the Culminis website, http://www.culminis.com/. More information on how to start and operate a user group is offered to the general public and hints and tips on how to make your group successful are available once your membership application has been accepted.

After joining, your user group will have access to tools and resources including:

• A welcome package and annual renewal packages
• Access to private, leader-only Culminis SharePoint sites
• Sponsor provided presentations and events
• Local and national exposure to Culminis sponsors and the community

Since APCUG is already a member of Culminis, please identify your user group as a member of APCUG. If you have any questions, contact APCUG Director Linda Moore at LMoore@apcug.net.

Almost all user groups with an end-user membership base have seen a decline in membership over the past several years. As a result of the internet and tech forums on the internet, end users often feel they do not need to join a user group to get the answers to their problems or to learn about the latest technology.

However, in the current job market, there are many people who work in the IT industry, who are working 50-70 hours a week, who see how belonging to a user group can be beneficial to their IT careers and to their interests in all things computer-related.

In discussions with several user group leaders at the annual convention, I learned that some user groups do not collect information pertaining to each member’s occupation. This is important information to collect because you may already have a number of members who would make your user group eligible to join Culminis. If you are already collecting occupation information on your membership, then look for occupations such as network administrator, system administrator, system analyst, developer, or Exchange administrator. Likewise, you may already have a number of members who are business owners.

Small business owners, which do not have IT employees, are always looking for independent information resources to validate what consultants are recommending. User groups can be an important resource for business owners. In addition, many of these business owners may be willing to do presentations or product reviews for your user group on a variety of subjects.

This becomes a win-win-win situation for your user group, the members of your user group and for the business owner.

Linda Moore
lmoore@apcug.net