AAEA Goes to New Heights
Julie Deering, President
By Julie Deering, Editor, Seedworld, AAEA President
This year’s Summit on the Summit in Snowbird, Utah, did not disappoint. The views were stunning, the networking was excellent and the professional development sessions were intriguing. The energy was positive and great discussions were had about the future of AAEA – the Agricultural Communicators Network.
Nearly two years ago, the board was tasked with looking strategically at the future of the association, identifying industry trends and really scrutinizing our value proposition and ability to stay relevant. After analyzing membership data and survey results, the board began sketching out the blueprint for our new strategic plan, of which you’ve started to see become a reality during the past year under the leadership of Mike Wilson.
As president, Mike was responsible for initiating the reformatted version of The Byline, which is now delivered weekly to your inbox and comprises short articles from members about what’s happening within the association, sister organizations, opportunities available, lessons learned and tips and tricks. Anecdotally, we’ve heard extremely positive feedback from members about this, and the numbers back it up. The Byline’s new format has an open rate of 37 percent and a click-through rate of 52 percent, compared to the industry average of 36 percent and 16 percent, respectively. A big thanks goes out to Holly Spangler and Courtney Jackson, our membership services coordinator, for their work in coordinating and distributing The Byline each week.
In addition, AAEA went through a rebranding process, with the help of Rhea + Kaiser. At the Ag Media Summit, members saw the new logo and new name being put to use. Simultaneously, the new AAEA website was launched. Be sure to bookmark agcommnetwork.com in your browser. It has a much fresher and polished look with a new navigation menu. We’ll continue to make updates and tweaks to it, adding more information. Thanks to Jamie Cole, we now have a website that really reflects and showcases AAEA as a professional group of agricultural communicators.
Plus there’s been a new focus on getting early career professionals involved in the organization. This started with the rollout of our Young Professionals Taskforce, which has morphed into a special interest group (more on that later). This group offers professional development opportunities through webinars on a range of topics from fake news to how to advocate for yourself and your ideas. They’ve also got a Facebook group for connecting with each other, asking questions and recommending resources.
Much more is in the works and being coordinated, but these are the big things. I want to personally thank Elaine Shein who led in the development of AAEA’s new strategic plan and Mike who began implementation. I feel as if I’ve got the easy part in just keeping the ball rolling according to the blueprint that’s been carefully designed.
I want to thank you, our members, for putting your trust and confidence in me as your new president. I am truly honored for this opportunity, and I hope to build on Mike and Elaine’s work and capitalize on the energy that was present at AMS.
For the year ahead, I have three primary goals. First, with the help of a special taskforce, we are reevaluating our membership categories and looking to update our constitution. This work is already underway with the help of Amy Roady, who chairs the Membership Committee. Second, we will create a membership drive to bring back old members who didn’t see the value and recruit new members, inside and outside of our traditional members. Finally, we will define, organize and launch special interest groups, which will serve as a home for the different types of members we have and a place where issues and unique needs can be discussed. This is especially important as we seek to bring in new members and widen our scope.
We’ve got a busy year ahead, and there’re many more things happening and in the pipeline. Stay tuned, and if you have any feedback for me, please don’t hesitate to reach out by email at [email protected] or phone at 765-430-0222. I want to hear your thoughts, as this is your organization, and I want to make sure our decisions reflect that.
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Ag Journalism was my chosen profession (B.S. Agricultural Journalism, University of Missouri, 1957), and AAEA was my professional organization. I was an editor at Successful Farming, and later at Farm Journal, before accepting a position as Public Relations Manager for DuPont Agricultural Products, in Wilmington, DE. I served as AAEA president in 1980. I also was the writer/managing editor of the 1976 Yearbook of Agriculture, spending six months at USDA the last six months of 1975. As writers and editors we must remember the power of words … that the news we write must be correct — always. I was active in several professional organizations, but the good, lasting memories of AAEA will remain my favorites. I am, by the way, an octogenarian.