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Membership Advisory Group – September–March 2022 Report


The group met 4-6 times this reporting period.

Recent Activities

First Activity
Monthly emails to new members. These emails are personalized by each member of the committee to welcome new members to PLA and encourage them to become active members. When applicable, committee members are matched to people who live in their region.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Leadership, Organizational Excellence

Second Activity
In collaboration with the monthly welcoming members, committee members continue conversations with new members – answering questions when appropriate and directing them to the appropriate PLA staff member when necessary.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Leadership, Organizational Excellence

Third Activity
Volunteer opportunity to review conference scholarships was presented to the group. After committee discussion, a committee member volunteered to assist. The committee recognizes the importance of conference attendance to new PLA members.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Leadership, Organizational Excellence

Fourth Activity
Committee is organizing greetings and activities at ALA/PLA booth at PLA Conference, including button making and pairing up new attendees with veteran conference goers. It was recognized by the committee that many new members join due to their attending the conference. It is the hope of the committee that being present and welcoming members at the ALA/PLA booth will help forge a stronger connection to the organization and help retain members past their initial year. We also hope to assist with the virtual Intellectual Freedom Forum.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Leadership, Organizational Excellence

Fifth Activity
Volunteer opportunity to participate in ALA Membership Promotion Task Force was presented to the group. After committee discussion, a committee member volunteered to assist. The committee recognizes the importance of ALA membership and its impact on PLA membership.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Leadership, Organizational Excellence

What will your group be working on for the next six months?
Continued new member emails
Booth at PLA

Does the group have any policy recommendations, ideas with financial impact, or other items to bring to the PLA Board for discussion or action
While focus is often made to bringing in new members, the committee suggests that more attention and recognition is given to continued membership. Small ideas include special badges or buttons at conferences for members (for example: button reading 10 year PLA Member!)

Do you have any suggestions for future products or resources (excluding conference programs) to be developed based on your group’s work?
A week of a free preview of PLA benefits (access to prof dev, etc.)The Medical Library Association does this for the entire month of February. Non-members are able to try out tools and resources, explore new communities, and meet peers from different areas of health science information.

Are there other PLA/ALA committees your group might collaborate with to benefit the work of all?
ALA New Member Round Table

Have there been any issues related to meeting participation/attendance for any of the group’s members?
No

Is there anything PLA could have provided during this time that would have helped your group with its work?
Small budget for conference giveaways or access to “swag” PLA has already purchased.

Submitted by Kim DeNero-Ackroyd on 02/17/2022

Posted on

Membership Advisory Group – September–March 2021 Report


The group met 4-6 times this reporting period.

Recent Activities

First Activity
Monthly emails to new members. Initially these emails were sent bi-monthly or quarterly. We decided as a group to
send monthly emails to a smaller list. We also separated the list to match the committee members to people who lived
in on near their state. The thought was that new members would be more likely to contact those who live in their
region.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Leadership, Organizational Excellence

Second Activity
Planned a virtual Happy Hour during ALA Annual. We used the new member survey to determine what break out
sessions to coordinate for the new members, what types of PLA trivia we should ask and professional development
discussions.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Leadership, Organizational Excellence

Third Activity
Advised PLA staff on the drip campaign for new members. We used the new member survey to determine if a
campaign giving small amounts of information over a period of time would build excitement in new members and
garner more participation/volunteerism.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Organizational Excellence

Fourth Activity
Advised PLA staff on the New Members' Survey. The survey helped the committee decide to have the virtual happy
hour and assisted with drip campaign ideas.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice, Organizational Excellence

Fifth Activity
Committee member represented PLA at the Small Oklahoma Libraries Round Table. She marketed the benefits of
joining PLA and being a member.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Advocacy and Awareness, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice

What will your group be working on for the next six months?
Continued monthly emails to new members.
In person events for PLA in March 2022 and ALA in June 2022.

Does the group have any policy recommendations, ideas with financial impact, or other items to bring to the PLA Board for discussion or action
Commit to regular new member events at conferences such as breakfasts, happy hours, gatherings at entertainment
venues. New and old members should be invited in order to facilitate networking.

Do you have any suggestions for future products or resources (excluding conference programs) to be developed based on your group’s work?
PLA logoed pens, pencils, bags, note pads to be used as giveaways or prizes.

Are there other PLA/ALA committees your group might collaborate with to benefit the work of all?
ALA New Members' Round Table
ALA New Member Committee

Have there been any issues related to meeting participation/attendance for any of the group’s members?
No

Is there anything PLA could have provided during this time that would have helped your group with its work?
We suggested being able to give out prizes, but were told that there wasn't a budget for that. It would be helpful if we had a budget to do this.

Submitted by Amiya Hutson & Kim DeNero-Ackroyd on 09/14/2021

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Membership Advisory Group – April–August 2020 Report


The group met 0 times this reporting period.

Recent Activities

First Activity
The group held not face to face meetings due to the onset of COVID. In April, I split up and assigned the new membership list among the group members and Welcome emails were sent. I have no information on if all the members completed the task. I did reach out to my potion of the list and received a few thank you emails back.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Advocacy and Awareness

What will your group be working on for the next six months?
I'm currently no longer on the Connect group page so can't access the group. I've reached out to Samantha to explore the issue.

There will be no face-to-face planned due to most libraries having travel restrictions in place, including my library.

Does the group have any policy recommendations, ideas with financial impact, or other items to bring to the PLA Board for discussion or action
None

Do you have any suggestions for future products or resources (excluding conference programs) to be developed based on your group’s work?
None

Are there other PLA/ALA committees your group might collaborate with to benefit the work of all?
N/A

Have there been any issues related to meeting participation/attendance for any of the group’s members?
No

Is there anything PLA could have provided during this time that would have helped your group with its work?
Maybe a vaccine for the virus. 🙂 The restrictions of the virus is what has hindered our work, as it has everyone.

Thank you.

Submitted by Helen Rigdon on 08/30/2020

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Membership Advisory Group – September–March 2020 Report


The group met 1 time this reporting period.

Recent Activities

First Activity
The group was formed in August of last year and our liaison sent the first group of new PLA members. We divided the list of 430 new members up among the committee members and I created a template of a welcoming email for committee members to send to their assigned new members. This was completed in October and the emails were sent out. I received several emails back from those I sent emails to thanking us for the personal welcome.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Organizational Excellence

Second Activity
The group received a second list of 410 new members in November and followed the same procedure. The template was revised and the emails were sent.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Organizational Excellence

Third Activity
We received a list of 430 new members in February and followed the same procedure. Each of the new members received a personalize email welcoming them to PLA.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Organizational Excellence

Fourth Activity
Four of the committee members, plus our liaison, were able to meet on Feb 25 @ 3:30 at the PLA conference.
Attendance: Helen Rigdon (chair), Trisha Burns, Kim DeNero-Ackroyd, Nicole Wilhelms, Samantha Lopez (PLA staff liaison)

Helen started off the meeting discussing the member welcome emails.
Response to welcome emails is low (5-10%), but those who do respond seem appreciative.
The group agrees that welcome emails should continue, but need to have updated talking points to stay relevant. Helen will get from Samantha, and Helen will update the templates when sending out the email assignments.
The group discussed continual emails with same new member assignments, but after discussing how a manual drip campaign would work, it was determined it would be too time-consuming, hard to track, and new committee members would be left with residual emails from committee members cycling off.
Samantha presented limitations with manual email drip marketing campaigns. Have been trying to launch since 2018. ALA is going through an email software clean-up Spring 2020, and is hoping to launch automated drip campaigns once completed.
Challenges of committee cycles means limitations with consistency and continuity with work.
The group proposed chair should have 1 more year to term to help transition new chair.
Group asked where is the value of the membership committee if there's no investment in membership within ALA/PLA tech, etc.?
The group voiced frustration with ideas not going anywhere, and limitations of PLA/ALA
The group should only tackle tasks or ask questions of members where action can really be taken
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Organizational Excellence

What will your group be working on for the next six months?
We will be setting up a post-conference conference call with the committee to discuss our ideas from the meeting. Some of those are listed below.

The group brainstormed engagement topics for post-PLA Conference:
Non-conference year discounts? "Bridge rate" or 2-year discount
Increasing PLA presence at ALA Annual
Barriers include limited number of program slots for hundreds of PLA proposals
Financial limitations
Post-conference survey for new members – what can we do to get you coming back? Emphasis should be on engagement/what they want from the committee (more communications? Etc) and not what do they want from PLA (assumption is free, or discounts)
Follow-up email linking to membership videos? Where will those live?
PLA will post on website, Samantha to follow up
Where do small libraries fit in? Association for Rural and Small Libraries (ARSL)?
PLA and ALA have had a long history of not being able to reach or recruit small and rural libraries
PLA supports ARSL Conference (exhibitor & sponsor), emphasizes free products and services they can utilize
Overall, hard to reach population and assumption is they can't afford ALA+PLA membership
How to target non-members who attended conference?
About 60% of regular conference attendees are members
List is easy to pull for non-members
Curating content that's a member perk for people who couldn't make it to conference
Question should be – Is PLA actually offering things that engage members?
Should the committee also serve as ambassadors of PLA?
Previously, this committee would go to local conferences to promote PLA
How can committee members use their own networks to be ambassadors for PLA?
State conferences?
PLA ads in library state or association conferences?
ALA's New Member Round Table – ask them what they do that works for them? Best practices?
Follow-up from conference – contact last 6-months, "did you know PLA does/has…", ask how we can better support them?

Does the group have any policy recommendations, ideas with financial impact, or other items to bring to the PLA Board for discussion or action
Group asked where is the value of the membership committee if there's no investment in membership within ALA/PLA tech, etc.?
The group voiced frustration with ideas not going anywhere, and limitations of PLA/ALA. We feel that we cannot make promises to new members without there being definite follow through from ALA/PLA.

Do you have any suggestions for future products or resources (excluding conference programs) to be developed based on your group’s work?
PLA and ALA have had a long history of not being able to reach or recruit small and rural libraries
PLA supports ARSL Conference (exhibitor & sponsor), emphasizes free products and services they can utilize
Overall, hard to reach population and assumption is they can't afford ALA+PLA membership. We would like to see some more outreach with smaller public libraries, if possible.

Are there other PLA/ALA committees your group might collaborate with to benefit the work of all?
New Member Round-Table

Have there been any issues related to meeting participation/attendance for any of the group’s members?
Yes (if yes, PLA will contact you for more information)

Is there anything PLA could have provided during this time that would have helped your group with its work?
More information for first-time committee members on hos this all worked – that we would be in a big room. Also there was no signage for our committee.

Submitted by Helen Rigdon on 03/11/2020

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Membership Advisory Group – April–August 2019 Report


The group met 1 time this reporting period.

Recent Activities

First Activity
The main activity of the Membership Advisory Group was to write and send welcome emails to the new registered members of the PLA organization. All advisory group members sent emails to new PLA members across the United States and Canada. Advisory members also answered any questions new members had about the PLA organization.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Organizational Excellence

Second Activity
PLA Membership Advisory Members also promoted PLA activities, upcoming events, and workshops through the welcome emails to inform new PLA members about what the organization has to offer them.
Meets PLA’s strategic goals for Advocacy and Awareness, Organizational Excellence

What will your group be working on for the next six months?
The group will be continuing with the welcome emails as we have received appreciative feedback from new members. Also advisory members will be planning a members-only event for the 2020 PLA Conference.

Does the group have any policy recommendations, ideas with financial impact, or other items to bring to the PLA Board for discussion or action?
Not at this time.

Are there other PLA/ALA committees your group might collaborate with to benefit the work of all?
PLA 2020 Conference Committee

Have there been any issues related to meeting participation/attendance for any of the group’s members?
No

Is there anything PLA could have provided during this time that would have helped your group with its work?
No – we enjoyed communicating through ALA Connect.

Submitted by Kimberly Hagen on 08/19/2019