Compuco sponsored the Associations UK Congress 2023 last week. It was a fantastic event with representatives from many membership associations across the length of the UK. We were there talking all about CiviPlus - our simple out of the box version of CiviCRM that’s specially tailored to help nonprofits of all sizes succeed.
To give you a flavour of everything that went on, we thought we’d give you a quick overview of 5 of the things that made the event so special!
1. People
The best thing about any event is the people who attend! And it’d be fair to say that we met a great deal of fantastic people while there! There were so many interesting associations represented, from the sciences, to the arts, to professional bodies, it was truly inspiring learning about the work the people we met did on a day to day basis.
What made the connection with all of these people extra special was the community feel from all staying in the same hotel complex! That meant not only were they there to interact with during the day, but they were also the people who we would share a drink with at the bar at night providing more opportunities to find out about the fantastic work everyone was doing.
2. The meetings
One of the great things about the conference was the number of people we got to speak to face to face about their digital challenges. As well as having a number of pre-scheduled appointments, we were also able to have various ad-hoc ones as well! All this was done in our comfy exhibitor area where visitors could help themselves to a CiviPlus stress ball and some of our free chocolates!
3. Food!
It’d be remiss of us not to mention the amazing food we were served while there. During the evening networking events, we had the opportunity to sample some really good cuisine. The first night offered the chance to visit different stations with food from all around the world. The second night meanwhile offered a special 5 course tasting menu put on from locally sourced food. From the empty plates left at the end it looked like everyone thoroughly enjoyed what was on offer!
4. Entertainment
Not only was there great food put on for us by our hosts, we were also treated to some exciting entertainment. One of the highlights was a stunning LED light show which was slightly mesmerising to watch. Another standout from the line up was a contortionist who was capable of some pretty amazing feats of flexibility which we certainly would not like to attempt ourselves! All of this helped create a vibrant atmosphere for ourselves and the other guests and set a great mood for the evening networking sessions.
5. The sessions
And finally, it’s impossible not to mention all of the fantastic sessions and workshops ran across the couple of days. From talks about engagement, to talks on strategy, analytics, and more, there was a very wide variety of different talks available which seemed to really resonate with all the delegates of the different memberships associations we talked with.
While manning the stand meant we didn’t quite get to as many as we’d have liked, what we did see made it clear that the presenters were experts in their field and highly knowledgeable about the areas they were discussing. Seeing such knowledge shared so that it can be put to good use by other organisations was something we find incredibly exciting and we can’t wait to see how it impacts the sector!
In summary
It’d be fair to say that we had a really good time at the Associations UK Congress this year and met a fantastic group of people. We can’t wait to speak to some of them again and see how they take forward all of the exciting things that were discussed at the event.
It was also a fantastic chance to have some more in-depth discussions about CiviPlus and how it can help underpin membership associations’ digital strategies. If you’d like to find out more about what CiviPlus can do for you, you can get in touch with us here!