July 2023
July 20 2023, San Francisco
Agenda
Review Agenda & Vote
Vote to approve previous minutes
Discussion Topics
Committee Updates
BFF.fm Podcast Network
Board Meeting Cadence
Closing Items
Open for public comment
Any other business?
Minutes
Present:
Amanda Guest, Chair, Executive Director
Caryn Kesler, Vice Chair, Creative Director
Irving Pham, Treasurer
Brandon Paski, Chair of Marketing Committee
Ben Ward, Technical Director
Absent:
Clair McDevitt, Secretary, Chair of Fundraising Committee
Erika Delgado, Events Director
6:07 pm — Convene, Vote on Agenda & Previous Minutes
Vote YES to approve the minutes.
Vote YES to adopt the proposed agenda.
6:08 pm— Committee Updates
Events
Two items on events, 2nd listening party, just as magical as the first. Winning event, look into more.
Teddy has put together a week of live streams for the 10th anniversary. with businesses that are related to/involved with BFF.fm. Ending Sept 4th
Marketing
Lots of Blogs in the works, listening party on August 29. Outside Lands coverage media pass secured Focus is on 10th anniversary and parties surrounding, Live Remotes with Teddy, Gala.
Fundraising
Elle open to running the gala once again. It will go 8pm - 12am. Offer a VIP early bird session. Welcome drink w/ ppl. Adding entertainment. Fundraising ask on the hour. Presentation with video , wrap up, silent auction. At 10pm we will go into gala after dark. At midnight countdown to 10 years. Main bulk of fundraising will be 8pm-10pm. Sponsorship donation for food and beverage. Craft a NA drink, cider, la croix, Teddy has an in at Athletic Brewing. Brandon to reach out to JW Catering.
At Jake Mann listening party, one attendee had a conversation about hersh (?) Philanthropy. Working a possible connection with them.
How it works: People will create a portfolio of items that clients would be interested in donating to. Then the client decides what they want to fund.
Creates a need for a Case for support document.
Tech
Tech Committee meeting on July 19, new member, getting access. Quiet in regards to infrastructure, technical change with website per google. New stats reporting. Old buckets and new buckets are not quite matching. Data is there, just annoying. Internet connectivity issues seems to be persistent, Forrest is looking into it. Router has been rebooted, but still having missed connections. May be user error, may be service. Have not heard from Harry(?) and reports on analytics. Ben following up. Mini hack day July 30 at the secret ally for volunteer, opportunities to fix small things, get together, slackbot automation, any other projects.
Music
Finance
Need to do some sheet wrangling, but quick update: Since Oct of 2022, we’ve been in the XXX mark. Spike in March and April of 2023, but still hovering around $3000 a month. Some annual subscriptions come in June/July, but outlook good into the Fall. Need to customize categories we have not in the past. Kinful to givebutter seemed to even out with an underwriter.
Underwriting is going to be a focus for fundraising moving forward. If you or anyone you know, that’s interested in underwriting, let Amanda know.
Strategic Plan
6:28 pm— Review Action Items
Vote to amend bylaws to make the board to 11 - DONE
Irving- streamline Category Names in Transaction Log [Still workin’ :)]
Brandon- move fundraising into GiveButter DONE
Clair- Events worksheet dashboard ??
Brandon- reach out to NoisePop after festival is over re: 2023 partnership PENDING
Brandon- Add 10 year anniversary to next marketing committee. DONE
Podcast Network
Status of the podcast network, cadence of meetings is low, no new content, floated the idea of putting the podcast network on hold for the moment. Not getting rid, just a pause and moving how it is displayed on the website. Reason we started, was to have a podcast, but no room on the schedule. At a moment right now, where all podcasters also have a show on the stream. A bit redundant. In the strategic plan, podcast network came up a lot. We thought there would be a bigger flow of content. In 3 years, we’ve had one article come from the podcast network. Wasn’t the energy to keep the flow of content, and the content about the content going. Don’t have the resources to give to support the podcasts the way they want. Network not doing what it set out to do. We are moving to move the podcast network from main menus. Committee will communicate changes to the podcasters and then reevaluate. Amanda is looking for feedback from the committee, but winding it down seems like the right action to take. More detail to come on 7/21 on the tech side on what to do. De-emphasizing podcasts: if you search by talk genre, older podcasts come up, with new talk stream shows show up at the end. Ben and Amanda to discuss details.
Amanda shared links to show examples of tags and how podcasts are emphasized over live stream shows.
3 podcasts existed before bff.fm, so their main listeners are on other platforms. All podcasts launched after the network started are no longer active.
Caryn: is there an SEO advantage to have “podcast” on the main site?
Amanda: traffic to the page is low, so possibly negligible.
Ben: label podcasts just as “shows” and not strictly labeled as a podcast.
Easier to remove links and deal with what we have than do a full re-design of the network page.
Board Meeting Cadence
Item that came up in the last meeting, momentum was lost between sara’s training and the next board meeting. Clair’s suggestions, consider making board meetings monthly again. Even if it’s just during critical times. Bring in a board development consultant, to get the board to where we want and move BFF to the next level we want it to be at. Got a quote from Cathy Hoke (see board slack channel). Assess the board’s skills and see where we can improve, succession planning, and leadership transitions. How we make a healthy pass, and how do we all have a good time and get something out of participating on the board.
Suggested putting together a work plan: what works well, what can be improved, what new skills are we looking for, all bylaws and governance docs are adhered to, are we collaborating?, planning and resource development.
6-8 week process. $2200 budget.
Timing good right now, board members in flux, we are talking about changes in the station, people are interested in joining, we are maxed out on members, do we add more board members.
We are currently a working board, but is it most effective? Do we move to a advisory/governance board? Lots of questions arising about the best way to move forward.
The board has always improved. The way things are structured, it is a big ask of people, so is there a different/better way that is more sustainable.
No harm in changing the bylaws to add more board members. Currently at least 3 no more than 7. Not really a solid answer on what a good number is.
Ben: In agreement on having an odd number of members. 15 seems like a lot, are there 15 director ships or do they have two tech, two marketing, etc.
Amanda: proposal for 11-12 board members. Currently Caryn and Eddie started at the same time, so as an example, if they both left, how would we get replacements up to speed. More members might create a redundancy which would help fill the gaps.
Ben: avoid making up titles and make sure we have people focused. Do we need to bump the number up, to keep a flow of potential members?
Amanda: Yes, difficult to keep a pipeline of people for the board while waiting for members to resign, decline for re-election. 11 gives us some runway for now.
Ben: two use cases to increase the number, which feels like enough for this to be reasonable. Proposes we amend the bylaws to increase board capacity to 11.
Amanda seconds the proposal.
Board votes YES (unaminous) to increase the board capacity to 11 at 7:07pm
Amanda: thoughts on consultant? yes.
Amanda proposes to re-nominate Caryn for a 2nd term. Board votes unanimously to re-elect Caryn.
Fundraising
Is the board open to having a fundraising meeting? Taking an hour to workshop.
Jul 28, 2023 at 6pm tentative fundraising meeting.
7:21pm — Public Comments
7:33pm - Other Business
7:33pm — Meeting adjourned.
The next meeting of the BFF.fm board is scheduled for 6pm on Sept 21, 2023. See https://board.bff.fm for more information.
Action Items
Update board.bff.fm. Update Caryn’s Term
Confirm availability for Fundraising meeting July 27 - ALL
Confirm board development consultant. - Amanda
Last updated