Aerak

[Aerak]

Hello! My name is Aerak and I’m currently the President of Minnesota Furs.

A bit about me in case we haven’t met. I have been involved with Minnesota Furs since before we became a nonprofit organization – back in the day when the group’s money was kept under a mattress.

My strengths involve administration, business to business communications, and conflict management and mediation. In the furry fandom, I identify strongly as a fursuit maker and fursuit performer. I’m very passionate about both.

I’m hoping, with your support, to be re-elected for another two year term.

I’m also hoping for some questions from the community. You. Ask anything you would like, whether it’s about me, about MNFurs policies, or about hypotheticals – such as what I would do if space monsters attacked. Anything is fair game, and I will respond as quickly as possible! =)

[Aerak]

Really? No questions for myself or my fellow candidates? I was expecting a lively dialog of all things furry. A debate involving where we’ve come from, where we are, and where we are going. Or just questions about what I ate for dinner – Cossetta’s in Saint Paul and it was fabulous! =D

[Kenzo theGrayfur]

How do you plan on improving the event marketing as well as the updating of the facebook page?

Music makes the world go around!

[Aerak]

Kenzo theGrayfur wrote:

How do you plan on improving the event marketing as well as the updating of the facebook page?

Facebook:
I go into this in more detail in a questionnaire the Election Committee had me fill out that will be posted within the next week or two. The main issue here is one of staffing. Our web and social media department is stretched to it’s limits because we don’t have the staff structure to do more. The board is currently working on a org chart and getting an HR department online to fill all of the open staff positions. We are a relatively young organization and until recently our Board was made up of furries with corporate administrator experience, who were able to tackle many things ourselves. It was good for laying the foundation in place, but moving forward it’s going to take more help.

We have a problem in that our convention, which is a charter group of Minnesota Furs, is very well staffed because people like the excitement of helping with a large event, but this in turn creates kind of a black hole regarding volunteers for the parent organization. Also, many people just don’t give it any thought. There is this idea especially with conventions, that, “I sponsored and gave money so I’ve done my part”, and while that’s definitely appreciated, without volunteers to help run an event, it still falls flat.

To summarize, staffing logistics issues + volunteer issues. The solution is better educating the community on what it takes to make something like this tick 365 days a year, and having the Board finish it’s work on the org chart and staffing documentation. These are projects which should be finished in the first half of 2017 and then gradually implemented as find the additional talent

Event Marketing:
We are fortunate that we do have an Events Department staffed by some very dedicated and talented individuals. Unfortunately we aren’t giving them all of the tools they need. I believe the time has come for a major overhaul to this website. And that again comes down to staffing – specially a social media and web. This current website was put together by Kurst Hyperyote, who is now our convention chairman for Furry Migration, and unfortunately he doesn’t have the bandwidth right now for making a new website.

We also need better clarification over which events we can and cannot market. Marketing an event for an individual or a non-profit organization are examples of something we can do, but it gets really tricky when we actively market an event for a for-profit organization. It’s an ethics/perceptual thing. It just doesn’t look good. So yeah. If Drake comes to us and wants to advertise a gaming event at his house, that’s easy. If Como Zoo, which is a nonprofit, wants us to help advertise a new wolf exhibit, again, easy. But if Target wants us to advertise a new clothing line… that gets a little shady. It works the same way with other furry / geek organizations. Most are non-profit, but some are for-profit. So if a geek for-profit is running a night club event… that’s where things get a bit iffy.

So… better staffing, new website. Better understanding of the types of events we can and can’t market.

[Author]

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