Edinburgh, Scotland at the World Social Marketing Conference (WSMC)
The iSMA Board held a luncheon meeting June 4th , 2019. Many Board members were attending the WSMC which facilitated in-person attendance.
Business topics discussed were:
The Global Alliance for Social and Behavior Change– iSMA has been invited to join the Global Alliance, with currently no cost to join. The Alliance funding through partner UNICEF may end in September 2019. iSMA Board members were in agreement of the perceived value of an iSMA /GASBC partnership considering the aligned global focus. The position of iSMA will be revisited once the financial and functional future of the Alliance is determined and definitive goals are articulated. A formal vote by the iSMA Board will be taken later in the year to establish iSMA position, once Alliance funding and mission are more defined.
The Membership Data Base– The consolidation of the universal membership database was discussed, i.e. not only iSMA members, but all of the regional association members who also enjoy access to iSMA membership benefits, as any progress on the compilation of that database has stalled. Fuse has kindly agreed to support the effort and has received three proposals. In order to keep momentum going on the project, iSMA will either work through Fuse and their proposal process or initiate a resolution through iSMA control. The membership database is crucial to the completion of the new website as well.
Quarterly Board Meetings re: Time Challenges for Members in Diverse Zones– Discussion about ways to improve Board meeting scheduling to include members from all time zones was held. It was decided to increase the frequency of meetings from the current quarterly, to six times annually, with two identical meetings for each, to include members across the time zones. Another secretary role should be added to reduce the demands on the current secretary imposed by the addition of meetings.
The value of developing a detailed Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) was put forth. The SOP would include governance procedures, e.g. coordinating webinars and invoicing regional association dues, etc.
The 2019 iSMA Survey- The Communication Team has developed a member survey, the first since 2013, to gather sentiment on a variety of ISMA procedures and resources from members. It was decided that the survey would be dispersed in September with access available for a month, and further, to reach out to the SMANA Conference attendees, thus benefiting from a larger pool of social marketers for feedback.
Revenue Generation for iSMA- Discussion was held about ways that iSMA can generate revenue other than membership dues. One option presented was to offer social marketing training courses taught by members and potentially offered through the webinar series. A committee within the board is compiling suggestions to be presented at the next board meeting.
The Annual General Meeting was held the evening of June 4th at the World Social Marketing Conference (WSMC) and included 10 attendees.
Bulleted Highlights:
- The federated model that iSMA has adopted to unify the many regional and local associations was discussed. The Latin American Social Marketing Association (LAMSO) has recently “stood-up”. The Africa Social Marketing Association is close to becoming recognized, and the potential for an Asia-Pacific and a Middle Eastern Social Marketing Association may follow fast upon. All members can enjoy free access to Social Marketing Quarterly, full representation on the iSMA Board, and access to the iSMA website and quarterly webinars; future benefits are under consideration.
- An overview of the 2018 iSMA Annual Report was presented.
- The iSMA financial report was presented
- The Board approved a proposal for the development of an online certificate course in social marketing, taught by Nancy Lee, with a percentage of the proceeds going to iSMA.
- The iSMA Board is a working board. There are approximately four available positions for 2019 positions to be elected, with openings for the Membership Chair and Volunteer Chair to be filled, specifically. Members will be invited to view the nominations and vote for Board members on the website at isocialmarketing.org (Nominations require a statement of interest, CV and a photo). The new Board will be announced late summer.
- The iSMA webinars have switched to the Zoom platform. The June webinar was open to non-members as will the September webinar, to enable a sampling of a prime iSMA resource to promote membership in the Regional Associations/iSMA.