Donna Sanford Wants to Engage with You

Posted by: Donna Sanford

Monday, August 13th, 2012

Donna Sanford brings her 27 years of experience in the event industry to Engage365.

Hi everyone! I’d like to introduce myself as the new Community Manager for Engage365. My name is Donna Sanford, and I’ve been in the event industry for 27 years. I started as a meeting planner in my father’s association management firm, moving later to associations and for-profit trade show firms. I’m also the founder and former publisher of EXPO Magazine.

Since leaving EXPO two years ago, I’ve spent nearly all my time on technology projects – mostly in the virtual and social media space.

Serving as Community Manager at Engage365 is a dream gig for me since it combines my passion for the event and association industries with my love of technology. It also gives me a place to spout my opinions whenever I want – which, as many of you know from my years writing editorials, is fairly often.

But I don’t want to have all the fun! I’m really hoping we can make Engage365 even better than it is today. I’ve been a member for a couple years, and I see it now as a great repository of information – and I would never change that. But I’d like to see more activity from more people. Yes, everyone’s busy, but think of your community as way to save you time. Three recommendations on E365 could save you weeks of checking references on a new vendor. Advice from a peer can make you money. Horror stories from a member can save you from the same fate. That’s what a community is about. Be ready to interact – and don’t be surprised if I call on you for input!

So what I need now are ideas for how to make E365 even better. I’ve got a bunch myself, but this isn’t all about me (as hard as that is for me to acknowledge). I need for you to send me ideas for how to make this community more useful for you. What would help you do your job better, faster, smarter? What would engage you? What would be fun? Let’s talk about it.

When I said I love technology, it’s true, I do. But that doesn’t mean I always understand it, or have experience with it. What I love is what technology can do for me. But be patient with me while I learn. I’m not a big Tweeter and I’m learning the backend of this community’s software as I go. If I make some mistakes, bear with me.

Looking forward to interacting with you all. And seriously, if I can get Words with Friends embedded in E365, you’ll be able to find me online 24/7!