Data Informs Decisions: ASAE’s Community Goes Beyond Member Connection
The Opportunity
ASAE uses multiple systems to collect member data, but they couldn’t compare or analyze valuable member activity across these systems. There was no clear way to track retention, understand satisfaction, or analyze member engagement.
The Solution
ASAE partnered with Association Analytics to integrate all data in a consolidated architecture, including connecting their Higher Logic Community, ASAE Collaborate. Now they can cross-analyze member engagement data to build a rich picture of overall member engagement and participation.
Data Insights
Active community users generate 5x more revenue
Event attendees are more active on community
Active community users are more likely to renew
“Everyone talks a lot about ‘member engagement,’ but we’re actualizing that at ASAE, and the community is one of the key components.”
Julie Sciullo
CEO, Association Analytics; Founder, AcumenAI
Community Grows Revenue & Informs ASAE’s Decisions
ASAE knew their online community, ASAE Collaborate, was a strong member benefit, but the insights they gleaned from their Higher Logic Community data and Association Analytics’ Acumen tool proved that the value of community extends beyond just a place for members to interact:
Revenue: Community users with at least 1 activity per month generate 5x more revenue than users with one activity or fewer per month.
Event Registration: Users who attended the annual event had over 6 times more community activities than users who did not attend the annual event.
Member Retention: Members who renewed had over 50% more community activities than members who did not renew.
The ability to see, analyze, and use all their member data has been a big improvement for ASAE. Staff liaisons can now easily access information from across their tech stack and perform timely analysis, since data is updated at least daily and involves all activities – including community membership group composition, discussions, and any details.
The Future of Data is Insights
ASAE’s community data also provides insights into what their members want. Staff can now export data from the community, including trends on popular discussion topics and content, and plan engagement outreach accordingly.
“When we started aggregating data, GDPR was strongly searched and frequently discussed in the community,” said Reggie Henry, CAE, Chief Information and Performance Excellence Officer ASAE’s. “So, we created a group and started pushing more GDPR content and resources based on the data we had collected. This was well before the regulation went into effect – we knew we had to be proactive. We put together a GDPR program much faster because we saw it growing early.”
ASAE’s former Associate Director of Online Communities, Megan Kuhman, added “We hear people say they are part of an association and don’t recognize the benefits. This is a great selling point for community because the data in the community helps us understand the member view component. We can use the demographic data from the AMS and community to steer a member to the right place, where they find valuable, relevant conversations.”
This helps ASAE foster rich discussions in the community and get members involved right away. “If we’re talking about new members, it’s invaluable to get them engaged the second they walk in the virtual ASAE Collaborate door,” said Megan. “This new data analysis helps me get a general idea of conversations occurring across the larger member community, so I can better navigate those members to their cohorts. There is still so much potential in my day-to-day community work.”
And beyond ASAE Collaborate, the industry at large is also reaping the benefits. ASAE’s Tech Council can now get insights in real-time and look out for trends and patterns – including keeping an eye out for upcoming shifts in technology and legislation in the field.
“The future of data is insight. We don’t want to measure how well we did against old strategy, because it’s constantly changing. We have these stereotypes in our minds about how to use data analytics – as if it’s still based on reporting and meetings. But your data can actually influence the day-to-day fabric of your organization.”
Reggie Henry, CAE
Chief Information and Performance Excellence Officer, ASAE
Integration Makes Data Actionable
So how did ASAE do it? Association Analytics developed an integration with Higher Logic’s Activity Sync to bring community activity data into its data platform, Acumen, in near real time, where it’s linked to member data from ASAE’s multiple systems. Additional data includes community membership and discussion content for text analysis, which enables them to automatically categorize discussions and derive other valuable information.
“Since Higher Logic is a standard integration, we were able to quickly and easily integrate community data into the rest of this new ecosystem, bringing to light different trends, ways to look at preexisting data, and a plan to prompt further actions. And that’s a big part of the value – collecting data is cool, but what are you going to do with it?”
Julie Sciullo
CEO, Association Analytics; Founder, AcumenAI
About The American Society of Association Executives (ASAE)
The American Society of Association Executives (ASAE) is the essential organization for association management, representing both organizations and individual association professionals. They are a premier source of learning, knowledge, and future-oriented research for the association and nonprofit profession. With the support of the ASAE Research Foundation, a separate nonprofit entity, ASAE provides resources, education, ideas, and advocacy to enhance the power and performance of the association and nonprofit community.
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