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Social responsibility is one of the buzzwords floating around corporate America, and it has spread quickly throughout the meeting and convention world. Service projects, donation drives and volunteer days at conventions are ways for meetings to give back to cities in which they’re held (in addition to the innate economic impact).

Public relations efforts, websites and business plans of large corporations like Gap and Coca-Cola reflect the belief that social responsibility can attract business. Whether it’s a McDonald’s Happy Meal that gives a donation to the Ronald McDonald House or Ethos Water, the premium bottled water company that helps children around the world get clean water, companies not only feel the need to be responsible, but to allow customers to join in.

“How do you create business models that inspire people to engage with you?” Jonathan Greenblatt, co-founder of Ethos Water, asked attendees at the July Destination Marketing International Association (DMAI) annual convention. He suggests that you have to do it from the bottom up, in a tangible way.

“In a world where everything is discoverable,” he says, referring to the 24-hour news cycle, Internet and social media, “you have to be authentic.” Rather than just touting green efforts or charitable donations, many conferences are encouraging attendees to get involved.

CoSIDA President Larry Dougherty, CoSIDA Goodwill Chair Sam Atkinson and workers from St. Anthony's

When the College Sports Information Directors of America Convention met in San Francisco in July, attendees participated in a four-hour volunteer project at St. Anthony Foundation, an organization that serves the homeless and needy, namely those with drug and alcohol addictions. Attendees also donated 400 items, ranging from clothing to flash drives and toiletry items, through a clothing drive during registration.

“We felt several years ago it was important for us to step out from the shadows and roll up our sleeves and help out local charities in the cities that host our annual convention,” says Sam Atkinson, CoSIDA Goodwill Committee chair and sports information director at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. ”We want to show that CoSIDA cares about our host city and that we lead by example when it comes to giving back.”

Harris Rosen, founder of Rosen Hotels and Resorts, is well known around the hospitality industry for his generosity through the Harris Rosen Foundation. In addition to its recent work in Haiti, the Rosen Foundation adopted the community of Tangelo Park in Orlando, where Rosen’s  hotels are located, 25 years ago. Meeting attendees using his hotels, Rosen Shingle Creek, Rosen Centre Hotel or Rosen Plaza Hotel, can volunteer in the community in which Rosen has created nine preschools, helped send hundreds of kids to college and improved the community through clean-up efforts and rebuilding projects.

“More and more groups are asking for charity initiatives to take part in,” Rosen says. “It is amazing the response we get from associations and businesses looking for ways to give back and they are so thankful that we provide something for them to do.”

In July, DMAI welcomed representatives from destination marketing organizations, which are often the connecting point for meeting planners looking for volunteer opportunities in a host city. The convention showed the benefit of providing such projects with a service day of its own. Attendees participated in a service project at Feeding South Florida, a food bank that serves daycare centers, homeless shelters, residential homes for the physically and mentally challenged, assisted-living facilities for the elderly, youth programs, soup kitchens and emergency food pantries. Watch the video below to see the response of some of the volunteers.

All of the videos will soon appear on ASAE’s YouTube channel.

“Connect Marketplace Is Just Awesome” is our version of the Discovery Channel video, shot in a day’s time during Marketplace. Like most video projects, it was a collaborative effort by videographer Victor Albright, his assistant Brian Ellison, songwriter Billy Kirsch, Connect Marketplace marketing manager Emma Pitts and Connect magazine associate editor Jennifer Garrett. Prior to Marketplace, Pitts worked with Billy Kirsch, one of the speakers from Marketplace, to write the script to the video. Kirsch is president of Kidbilly Music, a team-building program aimed to help associations and groups work together to create a song, which in turn teaches them to work together as a team. Creating the “Connect Marketplace Is Just Awesome” video turned into one big team-building exercise, as Marketplace attendees, speakers and Collinson Media staff worked together to produce the video.

Albright shot his first movie on his parents’ Hi8 camcorder, a sequel to a parody of “The Blair Witch Project” that a friend made. After making that first video, he was hooked. “Editing made it feel as if I could control time itself,” he says. He upgraded camcorders, and upgraded again, and spent much of his freshman year of college in Chelyabinsk, Russia, shooting video, which got him hooked on something else: travel. He has since visited more than 24 countries shooting video for nonprofits and mission agencies, much of it for Nashville-based Free Will Baptist International Missions, where he met Brian Ellison. Albright shot the Marketplace video on a Canon 7d, which can be difficult to do alone. Someone has to constantly adjust focus, and audio has to be recorded to a separate device. He says he couldn’t have done the Marketplace video without Ellison and Jennifer Garrett, who organized the shots, cued the singing and worked in a video director role. It took 11 hours to edit, which Albright says is a “short time,” and the video was ready lunchtime of the final day of the conference.

There’s a lot about the Connect Marketplace that our attendees say they love, and that’s what you see in this video. Share it with your friends, and check out Albright’s other work on his website.

The video is just a part of CAK’s larger marketing push to get more people to fly into and out of the smaller airport. The website calls for all travelers to “get happy” like Punchy by registering for a vacation package from Traveline Travel. In September, a winner will be announced and awarded with two roundtrip tickets from AirTran Airways from the Akron-Canton Airport. Maybe you’ll see Punchy while you’re there.

Attendees at the National Restaurant Association Show in Chicago earlier this month had a little fun as the event winded down. On the last day of the show, chefs, culinary students and exhibitors gathered for a flash mob dance to Lady Gaga’s “Just Dance.” Chicago-based dancer Christina Chen came up with the original choreography. Not a bad way to add some fun as an event draws to a close.

The 1950s educational video put it best when it said “It takes more than cooks to make a banquet.” Our own confession: We found this video on the Event Industry Thoughts blog and liked it so much, we had to share.