Join more than 200 trade association professionals to hear from expert speakers, share knowledge and network at TAF’s one-day conference at the prestigious County Hall in Central London.
Attending will equip your team with skills and knowledge to drive your association forward and deliver more value to your members.
Annual General Meeting for TAF members including the review of annual accounts and votes on new Board members.
The Annual General Meeting of the Trade Association Forum is a formal requirement of our Articles of Association and allows for the election of new members of the Board, hear a report of the work of TAF and provide accountability of our accounts.
Members are encouraged to submit any questions for the Board and executive team in advance. If a member can’t make the meeting, proxy forms are available and will be sent out to the lead contact at each member association.
Certass discuss their approach to member engagement that was recognised at the 2022 TAF Best Practice Awards.
These sessions have been designed to showcase award winning best practice of TAF members, and to facilitate discussion and knowledge sharing.
Membership Engagement: Using facebook to drive member engagement
Certass represents local SME glazing installation companies across the UK. Certass launched their Members Facebook Forum at the beginning of the pandemic. Within 48 hours of launch, there were 150+ members, by the end of March 2020 they had 400. Today it remains a lively, engaging community with 850 members who regularly attend Certass Facebook Live events, ask questions of other members and engage with the team.
Contributors:
BPCA talk through their award-winning events programme and how they dealt with the challenges of the pandemic.
These sessions have been designed to showcase award winning best practice of TAF members, and to facilitate discussion and knowledge sharing.
PestExtra 2021 was a 3-day online event attended by almost 1,800 people from all over the world. The judges were impressed by the scale of the ambition shown by BCPA, bringing their sector together during a difficult time and delivering an event of impressive size and scope.
The event managed to maintain strong revenue streams and sponsor support despite the move to online, and delivered lots of innovations that they will take forward to future iterations of the event.
Join the team at BPCA for a discussion about how the pandemic has reshaped the way that they use events engage and support members in the future
Contributors
Hear from the Bingo Association about their lobbying campaign that won them the 2022 TAF Award – TBC
These sessions have been designed to showcase award winning best practice of TAF members, and to facilitate discussion and knowledge sharing.
The ‘Save Scottish Bingo’ Campaign was launched in 2020 to help bingo clubs in Scotland impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The judges were very impressed by the real-world impact of the campaign, notably the release of £2.3m of direct Government funding that helped 47 businesses survive the impact of lockdown as well as securing an earlier reopening date for bingo halls.
Given the lack of pre-existing relationships in the Scottish Government, the judges praised this as a remarkable result and particularly liked the use of consumer voices in the campaign to bring it to life.
Join the team that delivered the campaign to hear how they achieved such a significant result for members, and what lessons they learnt along the way.
Contributors
Our first panel session will provide an overview of the challenges facing the UK economy, providing associations with a way to contextualise the issues being faced in their sectors and an opportunity to put questions to the speakers.
National Chair, Federation of Small Businesses
Interim CEO, Trade Association Forum
Director of Policy and Corporate Governance, IoD
Head of Trade Associations, CBI
Small businesses make up three fifths of the employment and around half of turnover in the UK private sector, and ensuring they are well represented and supported to grow is key to delivering UK economic growth. This discussions will explore how trade associations can support SMEs in their sector to grow, with advice from TAF’s government sponsor BEIS.
What does the future of work look like for Trade Associations? This session will look at how associations are dealing with post-pandemic working and the current challenges of recruiting and retaining staff.
Ensuring that your association is build on a foundation of good quality data is key for supporting its growth and development. In this session the speakers will share real examples of how they have effectively built and used their data, sharing tips and taking questions from the audience.
Surveys, polling and focus groups are tools that allow trade associations to better understand and represent their members. Hear from contributors about how to effectively use your own polling and external experts to deliver the most impact.
A key part of the role of a Trade Association is in representing its members to Government, policymakers and regulators. This session will explore the relationship between Government and trade associations and how to build long term impactful relationships and be the most effective representatives for your members
Programme Director, Institute for Government and former Civil Servant
CEO,
British Coatings Federation
Specialist Partner at Flint Gobal and Former Director Of Legislative Affairs at 10 Downing Street
Trade associations have a key role to play in supporting the transition to a greener cleaner economy. This session will explore how Trade Associations can support businesses in their sector to meet their Net Zero targets.
The panel aims to explore the UK’s changing relationship with the world, especially the EU, in the wake of Brexit and the focus on ‘Global Britain’. Trade associations have historically played an important role in helping their member businesses understand, engage and lobby the EU and worldwide (often via the UK gov) and many are now trying to refine their purpose in this space, especially as many have withdrawn from their EU trade associations or closed offices in Brussels.
Making decisions about investment in technology to support the growth and development of your association, help to deliver better services and support to your members. This session will explore the latest development in tech that are supporting UK Associations, and provide top tips for how to make sure your investment delivers long term value.
This session will examine ways that Trade Associations have successfully diversified income streams. Thes session will include a case study of how NAPIT and Partners& have developed new income streams from the development of sector specific products.
This session will explore how Associations can drive improvements in Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in their sectors. We will hear examples of how trade associations have delivered real impact and discuss the role of trade associations in promoting EDI.
This session will present the findings of a new survey, looking at trends in professional membership communications. Conducted by Think Publishing, it is the largest survey of its kind and has been segmented specifically by trade associations. This data hasn’t been released anywhere before so this is exclusive new content to this event. provides really in depth insights and knowledge so that organisations can benchmark their own strategy against their peers
This session will explore how new ways of working pose challenges and opportunities for the governance of trade associations and why governance must remain a priority of any trade association leader.
Top Trade Association Marketing Professionals will give their top tips for membership marketing. Join us for a discussion about how to get the basics right and ask your question to the experts.
After a busy day at the conference, a chance to unwind and network with attendees over a glass of wine. We will also be drawing the winner of our raffle and closing off the conference with short speeches to thank attendees.
Vice-Chair, Trade Association Forum
CEO, CIPR
Tickets are available on a first come, first served basis with discounts offered for earlybird reservations and for groups.
TAF members also benefit from discounted tickets to the conference, if you work for a UK trade association but are not yet a member of TAF then you can find our more about joining our association of associations here.
You can see the breakdown or costs and deadlines below, tickets are available to purchase on the TAF shop or via invoice.
All prices are exclusive of VAT
Founded in 1948, the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) is the professional body for public relations practitioners in the UK. With over 10,000 members involved in all aspects of public relations, it is the largest body of its type in Europe. The CIPR advances the public relations profession in the UK by making its members accountable through a code of conduct, developing policies, representing its members and raising standards through education and training.
Find out more – https://www.cipr.co.uk
Partners& is the next generation of insurance advisory – specialists in working with trade associations and developing tailored insurance products for association members. Partners& offer expert advice that really makes the difference – across business insurance, risk management and employee benefits.
Find out more – https://www.partnersand.com/
Vuelio helps organisations make their story matter by providing monitoring, insight, engagement and evaluation tools for politics, editorial and social media in one place. Our technology is used by more 3,000 organisations across the world, from large enterprises and communications agencies to public sector bodies and not-for-profits.
Find out more: https://www.vuelio.com/uk/
oomi – CRM for any NFP anywhere A new approach to CRM – freedom to change, engage and grow. A fully integrated Engagement Management System for the NFP sector – combining CRM, Website, Collaboration, Engagement & Social Media. oomi is available anytime, on any device and truly agile for your changing organisational needs.
Find out more – https://www.oomi.co.uk
Think is the UK’s leading membership agency, creating effective communications on behalf of our 48 clients. We create content that delivers engagement and drives loyalty for membership bodies and consumer brands. Our teams create award-winning emails, SEO-driven content, podcasts, magazines, books, interactive content, downloadable resources, virtual events, webinars and conferences. We also generate revenue by pairing content with effective sponsorship, partnerships and advertising sales.
Find out more – https://thinkpublishing.co.uk/
Watch this space for more announcements!
The TAF Best Practice Exchange 2022 will be held at County Hall on the banks of the River Thames. County
Hall is a prestigious central London venue, just across the bridge from the Houses of Parliament and formerly
the headquarters of London County Council.
County Hall is a short walk from Waterloo or Westmister stations in Central London. BPEx is being held at the etc Venue in the building, the entrace is on Belvedere Road.
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