Information technology (IT) for associations initially revolved around hardware and software, but we have now moved into the online age (the ‘cloud’), to websites and, increasingly, hosted applications for associations management and member self-management.

Delivering this combination of online marketing communications and IT projects for associations is exactly what LCubed live and love to do. As we do not own a technology, we are free to implement and manage a wide range of platforms, including Australian made, open source, and social networking platforms.

In fact, we have assisted associations and not-for-profits (NFPs) achieve a wide range of objectives, including:

• Financial: our systems and processes have aided one NFP make over $16,000,000 in two months online
• Process automation: reducing join and renew processes from over an hour per member to almost completely automated
• Event management: supporting the automation of complex bookings online, that would otherwise be handled manually.

Our clients consist of associations, institutes, societies, research corporations and government institutions, and range from organisations as diverse as The Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW), the Medical Indemnity Practice Society (MIPS) and Dairy Australia.

We also provide free resources for the sector. This includes the metrics calculator (www.membershipcalculator.com.au), a tool for helping member-based groups understand and measure key metrics such as member tenure and lifetime value.

Our new free online tool, ‘The Big One!’, will make detailed specification of complex web and database projects for associations easy! It will be launched at
www.associationsmanager.com.au in the next few weeks.

It may seem like a strange concept, but the internet really does provide benefits for NFPs. We have written about this match online on our Association Websites portal:
www.associationwebsites.com.au