Embracing AI: Empowering Associations and Enhancing Member Value

Full Transcript

Bill Sheehan (00:00):

Previously on Learning by Association.

(00:02):

AI is here, it’s going to affect the way we operate as an organization, and it’s going to affect the way our members operate.

Julian Moore (00:08):

It’s just a power tool. It is simply a new tool that we should embrace really quickly so that we make our staff’s lives easier, and more importantly, we make our members’ lives easier.

Bill Sheehan (00:23):

Welcome to Learning by Association, a podcast brought to you by D2L, where we delve into the ever-evolving world of associations and the challenges they face in navigating the currents of change. I’m Bill Sheehan and I’m thrilled to be your host. Join me and our guests as we explore the role learning plays in driving associations forward and how it can impact every part of your organization, from recruiting, to engagement and renewals, to staff development, business strategy and more. So, let’s dive in.

(00:53):

You are hitting on a very, very critical point for associations because I think today’s member wants that personalization/customization. Show me, you know me, right? And so right now associations, it’s very difficult to do that because there’s so many members with so much information. I don’t have time to learn about Julian or learn about Bill or learn about this or Frank and Joanne and this. But now by doing this, I think you talk about really being an assistant to the association is one of the biggest obstacles associations have is finding new members.

(01:36):

They kind of know the old members, they have that contact information and they can actually put information in there too and see why they didn’t renew. They might have some of that information or the like, and that’s a little easier. But trying to find that universe of membership is tough. And I think what happens is they say, I don’t have time to do that, I’ll do that next week, and before you know it, next week’s gone and it’s the end of the year and you don’t have a membership campaign. So I’m glad you touched on that and about how you can utilize some of that information and if you could, I just think it’d be helpful just to mention a few of those names again.

Julian Moore (02:15):

Yeah, by all means. So for the cloning and everything, every tool I mention is the regulated, the trusted version. We’re not talking about deep fakes when we come to cloning. We’re talking about copying, legally doing the right thing.

(02:31):

So HeyGen is just head and shoulders, H-E-Y-G-E-N, and that will clone voice, video, allow you to create your own news channel so that you can put out your newsletter as a video news channel. You can put videos behind, it looks spectacular, and you can have all your staff delivering new service. It’s just beautiful. It takes two and a half minutes to clone someone. It’s secure because you have to give authority, consent, and only the people who give authority and consent can actually adapt what’s being said. So, lovely. No one’s going to make you say something terrible.

(03:14):

From there, you then look at your data basing and the data basing is big data. If you are on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, if you’re on any, if you’ve ever done a presentation and put your contact details at the end, last slide, your information is somewhere. Now, that’s big data. That’s all been managed by Lusha, L-U-S-H-A, and now it’s searchable, so you can find everyone in Lusha.

(03:44):

From there, if I’m looking to then merge videos, I use a thing called BHuman and it’s letter B, word Human, Canadian Organization, Spectacular Customer Service. And what they do is they merge videos with databases. So you upload your database and they merge the video. So now that video of you is saying, “Hey, Haley, hey, Bill.” You get a personalized email.

(04:13):

The ability to search people’s websites in LinkedIn automatically, I just use GPT for it. It’s very, very flexible, GPT. GPT can make a video for you, GPT can be a data analyst for you. It has all these functionalities that very rarely get spoken about, and it’s super powerful.

(04:34):

And then realistically from there, it’s, what else do you want to do with it? So the websites, it’s always Durable. I still get a kick from clicking on Durable, to I want to be a landscaper. What’s the name of your company? All the Trees, the name, and hit enter. And then suddenly it makes my website in front of me. I just still get a massive kick out of such things. It’s beyond belief.

(05:06):

So when we are looking at those, they would be my core. Like on a training session for associations to learn how to make a website, how to clone their organization, how to search and find members and retain them and use GPT, takes three hours. And everyone goes away going, wow. Our team, instead of… We’ve got a team of three that now acts as a team of 30, that’s the productivity uplift. And then from there the creativity comes through because it can all be distilled down to, given the right amount of time and access, productivity is multiples of hundreds. But then you suddenly find this truly spectacular, wonderful thing happen. Everyone gets creative and going, all these I’ve ever wanted to do, I now can. It’s just so wonderful to see.

Bill Sheehan (06:02):

I really think that AI is going to significantly help associations increase engagement of members because the service and information that the association has the ability to provide will be much more meaningful to each individual. It’s almost mass customization, in a way. And I think that’s what members are looking for. They can’t get that anywhere else right now. In fact, that’s why associations were formed. In the beginning I always said they were the original social network. I could go to these organizations and find someone who operates on faces just like I do, and I can’t find that in my neighborhood or in my apartment building or anywhere, but I can find it there, so they would travel there.

(06:47):

But I think now what AI has done is to, because of its capabilities, can really track and respond to every interaction that that member is having with the association and you can put that into a database like you’re saying, here’s members who are highly engaged and here’s members who are less highly engaged and, or not at all. And now it’s an ability for us to focus our efforts on those members who are not engaging, as opposed to try and engage, focus on everybody. So I just think there’s a pretty good future for associations with their involvement in AI.

Julian Moore (07:25):

I think associations are at the center of AO, I truly do. I think if you look at what AI has to offer, everything about it is useful for a membership organization. We have to communicate. By its very nature, an association is a mixture of companies, an events company, a research company, a lobbying company, and we push them all together and then we run it with six people and then suddenly think, oh, we’re… So now it’s like saying of those six people can act as a 60 person organization and that’s the enhancement. They get to do more, be more creative, and the members get better service. So, we stand to benefit more than almost any other industry in the world.

Bill Sheehan (08:16):

I agree, and I think also in that is one of the most important, and I call it invisible assets that an association has, and that’s education. They forget one of the reasons you’re joining is to advance your career, and that can either be through networking or learning or certification and becoming smarter. And I think right now they hide, they don’t know how to effectively deploy education. It’s not just reading the book, it’s talking to members like yourself or talking to the staff or talking to others within the industry, the suppliers, and becoming much more effective in the jobs that they do. But that may happen at a trade show, but what happens to those other 362 days out of the year? How do we continue that involvement that they have? And I think that’s where AI and these tools, some of these tools you’re talking about, can really help them, particularly through a learning management system, through an association management system, to really maximize that content to the benefit of the members. Again, in a customized fashion that would’ve taken months and a staff of 10. Now I can do it with one.

Julian Moore (09:31):

At its core, associations are training entities, and the only true reason for someone to join an association is to be more productive, be more beneficial. What’s in it for me? Why should I join? It’s the old question. Anyone who’s sold membership will know the, why should I join? What’s in it for me? So they’re looking actually to advance their career. So if it’s a business, they’re looking to advance their business, if they’re an individual, they’re looking to advance their career. That’s what associations at their heart really deliver and it has to be education at the core of it. That education brings along influence, the ability to educate your members in the way you want them educated, thinking the way you want is huge influence, and that’s the power of association.

Bill Sheehan (10:26):

Agree, and that’s so well put, that there’s a big movement here with ASAE, they call it the power of A or the power of associations. And that’s really what it is because that content that is being produced, either user-generated content or just discussions or actually in text and language, in books and courses, that information is trusted because it’s made up of so many different components within that industry that has been vetted. And you’re right, no other organization in that industry can do that, but an association. And it’s made up of that.

Julian Moore (11:02):

And it is absolutely the trusted source because right now we think of it as news industry, as, oh, do I trust this? Do I trust that? Is that fake? Is that? And that’s only going to get bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger, and as an association, you’ve always been the trusted source. As a member, I pay you X amount of money per month, per year, to receive your information and your services and that’s trusted source of information and services. That’s why I pay my money. You have to stay at that level so that when the world around us becomes untrustworthy, then your members know where to go.

Bill Sheehan (11:45):

Yeah, and I think too, that where I think AI can play a pivotal role and you might know more than I is, a lot of times when a member does not renew, they typically will say, “I didn’t see the return on investment or a return on value.” And now I really think that with AI, you can plug in certain things and say, “This is what it would’ve cost you to get these services if you had not joined the organization.” So, I’m sure there’s some tools out there where you can plug in to try and get a calculator, right? An ROI calculator.

Julian Moore (12:19):

One of my favorite ones was a member saying that very thing, “Look, why should I join you?” And a association who lobbied on behalf of, against government and won, sent dummy checks through the post saying, “This is as good as in your back pocket after winning against X.” So it was sometimes AI is just out the window because, how do you get across a message that this is what we did on behalf of an industry and this is how you’ll benefit?

(12:58):

I think what we will see is personalization get pushed to the forefront, and that’s brilliant for members because personalization means that you’ll be able to as a member go on and say, I want my training to be around X, and then there’ll be a calendar of training created for you. And that training is all delivered from the association. All the education’s delivered, all the events. So I’m interested, it’s the Gemstone Association or gemologist, and suddenly I’m only interested in sandstone, nothing else. And I’ve gone gemology and sandstone, it’s not really the most attractive, but you get the idea where now what we are doing is personalizing their experience of the association. That would’ve been millions of dollars in the past, whereas now it’s $25 a month. And it’s that sort of experience that means your member retention will go through the roof and your member acquisition will go through the roof.

Bill Sheehan (14:04):

And I think your member engagement will go through the roof because that’s a big concern now for associations is that my members just aren’t engaging. Either they’re not even opening the newsletter anymore, they’re not coming to the show, the events, they’re not coming to training. And I think it’s because you don’t know them, you don’t know what they want, and you’re sending a piece of information that’s going to them that is not personalized, that is not custom. So I think that with AI, spending time on learning how to use these tools to the benefit of not only your organization but to the benefit of your members, I think is critical.

(14:45):

And so I do think as we move on, there are going to be some specific challenges I think associations are going to have about AI. It could come from the board of directors saying, we don’t want you doing this, it could come from the CEO saying, I don’t want us touching AI because we’re in the pharmaceutical industry. We might get information that’s wrong. We’re in the endocrine society. We might get [inaudible 00:15:06], so.

Julian Moore (15:06):

I would say first off, any board member that says we don’t want you touching AI, should be sacked. And I appreciate it’s controversial, but if someone’s working against your association’s future, they don’t sit on the board. If a CEO is saying we should not use AI at all, remember when I said about my old boss saying email, it’s not? That’s the same thing because pharmaceuticals for instance, Eli Lilly currently use AI to discover new novel properties. And they’ve even said in a statement that the hallucinations that AI has are beneficial because it’s discovering drugs they never even conceived of.

(15:56):

So, if you look within the medical industry like radiologists, AI can read an X-ray 400% more accurate than the human. So now suddenly we’re getting better medical outcomes and we still need the radiologists. Radiologists still have to verify this is doing what it’s meant to be doing, it’s not made stuff up. So it’s a tool for the world in every industry. There’s not an industry that won’t get touched.

(16:25):

Massage therapists can now take photos of the back and say, which muscle is in spasm and the best way for me to treat? And now they’ll start treating it and they’ll get an up to the second moment going, all right, now have a look at this, now do this. Hairdressers will have mirrors in front of them where it’ll scan the person’s face and then their skin tone and length of hair and go, these are your haircut options and you can swipe through and see which ones and how it’ll look before you have it done. There is absolutely no industry that’s not going to get touched.

Bill Sheehan (17:02):

Yeah, and I think something else that’s coming on there is augmented reality, right? And I think that has a huge impact for associations, particularly on the trade show side of things, where you almost don’t need the big booths anymore. You can almost create a scenario from your computer where you could have an engaging conversation and see the product in action. And I think that’s a huge concern for associations because obviously, that’s where a lot of the revenue is driven for organizations just through trade shows and the others. Are you seeing some of that? I mean, is augmented reality considered AI? Is a part of AI, or [inaudible 00:17:38]?

Julian Moore (17:37):

It is. An augmented reality, virtual reality. So virtual is a complete world creation, augmented is an overlay on the real world. So if you look through glasses and you’re walking a street, you might get an arrow going, turn right here and it will take you to your desk. It’s a GPS in your glasses, that’s augmented. If you put your glasses on and you suddenly see you are in Jurassic Park, that’s virtual.

(18:03):

So, while I would say I think personally we are going to see a huge push to events becoming bigger, because if I’m in my office on my daily life and I’m using all these tools and how productive I am, I’ve actually got more time to go and engage with my community. And the events we’re seeing, now delegate numbers are going up again. The COVID thing threw everything off, but we are seeing numbers go up and I personally believe we’re going to start seeing much more in there because we’re communal by our very nature and we’re social, like we’re associations. We are literally an association, a community of like-minded individuals, we like to get together. So while the tools will be exponential growth, huge boost and to the economy for associations, I think the events are going to become more, live events are going to become more critical. Yes, we’ll have webinars. Yes, we’ll do CPD training online. Yes, we’ll have all those things, but the live face-to-face engagement’s not going anywhere.

(19:18):

If we look at music, we can generate music in any voice. We just saw, was it Travis? I forget his name, the chap, country star who lost his voice to a stroke, just released a new song. So, we’re seeing the creativity go through the roof, we’re seeing productivity go through the roof. The thing it can’t do, and that I don’t think it ever will, is social. And that’s where the live events will flourish.

Bill Sheehan (19:52):

Yeah, and I think too, what’s critical for association’s survival, at least in the foreseeable future, and I think the business models of associations may change, but at least for the foreseeable future where associations are really struggling is, how do we get that younger demographic to join an association, right? The ones coming out of a trade school or coming out of a university or what have you, or entering in their early career and they’re thinking, well boy, I, don’t want to join an association. I don’t know what an association does, for goodness sakes. Why would I join? And I think now with these models of data where we can track what is of interest now for younger generations, what are some of their biggest concerns and how can we craft a message to them even at the college level somehow and working in conjunction with universities? Do you see in some of your travels and journeys, are you seeing where this could be applied to really attract a younger demographic to get involved and pay so that the associations can continue to thrive?

Julian Moore (21:02):

I actually think this is one of the most exciting parts. So typically in the history, when we look at membership, we will get the students, because typically student memberships were free, then they would qualify in their profession and they disappear and they come back about 30 to 35 years old. We had no idea where they went, and then they would be association members going forwards. However, that bit in between really is quite easy to explain, it’s just we didn’t know how to overcome it. It was, I’m in my early career, I’ve qualified and I’m working six days a week and I’m busy. Leave me alone.

(21:47):

So what we did is we developed these associations when we were 40, 50 years old, and they were created years ago, developed by 40, 50-year-olds, and they were right for 40, 50 and they still are. No one’s ever gone, hang on, I’m going to create an association for 21 year-olds. So they speak a different language, they connect differently, they have different requirements. If I put CPD training for engagement on, and I try to get 60-year-olds come along, they’re like, well, I’ve done that. I really don’t need that anymore. Whereas, so what we now have is the ability to speak any language. And so we can take our newsletter and say to AI, rewrite this for a 21-year-old and focus on the points that a 21-year-old new professional in this industry would find interesting. Search the web for the hot topics and integrate those topics within this newsletter. Now you’ve got one written dedicated to that 21-year-old. So you’ve just become relevant for any audience, anywhere in the world.

Bill Sheehan (23:00):

Right, and then I think now even, and this is kind of data technology, but now once that newsletter is sent out, you can actually track which articles are being read from which audience and then further refine your message to that member as well, to do that. But I think to me, I think that’s a huge concern for associations because years ago when you look back, before you had access to the internet, you had an industry that was coming out of school that would backfill the attrition of the ones who were retiring.

(23:35):

But in today’s world, there’s just not that sense of wanting to join because they’re kind of connected technologically, not necessarily socially, but I mean, in person. But they have this access and they feel that, I can get all this information, I’m making friends, why would I need an association? And I think it stems back to the fact of, but the association information is the single source of truth and you can learn how it can help advance your career, not just in the next six, eight months, but for the rest of your life and to advance that. And I really think that’s where AI can kind of go along with you because AI doesn’t age, it doesn’t lose its memory like some humans can, and it can really begin to develop those relationships. But again, it’s just helping you develop those relationships. It’s not replacing you and doing that because no one wants to have a relationship with a machine.

Julian Moore (24:35):

Well, it really can’t replace them, that’s the thing. At the moment, all the knowledge sits in the association and its stuff, and all these are, are new tools for the association and its staff to use. It’s not going to acquire knowledge, it’s not going to take anything and repurpose it. It can’t do anything without a human. So it’s absolutely going to be just a huge boost for every association. And the most basic way is saying, well, how many of your members aren’t native English speakers? Maybe English is their second language. And if the English is their second language, how many of them are you still sending an English newsletter to? And simultaneous translation used to take way too much money and too much time, and now it takes four seconds to go turn this into German, turn this into French, turn this into Spanish. It’s literally giving you just the most incredible opportunity to acquire new members, be more relevant to members, offer members more value for their membership, and engage with them more, and to actually maintain that central point as the association.

Bill Sheehan (25:58):

Yeah, and Julian, I got to tell you, this has been one of the fastest hours of my life. It has been wonderful hearing all this and I know we touched on a lot of subjects.

(26:11):

Let me ask, you mentioned so many tools and resources. Is there a website or something that folks might want to come to just if they ever want to look at that? I think the associations are so overwhelmed by what’s out there, but I think, is there something you might recommend?

Julian Moore (26:29):

So there’s two websites, however, I should put a caveat at the beginning. They list all the AIs. So we’ve tested about 12,000-ish different AI tools, and of the 12,000, realist and truthfully and honestly, about 1,000-ish are fantastic. The rest you can take or leave, and the vast majority leave. So keep that in mind when you’re looking, but there’s one website called, There’s an AI For That, and that’s very, very cool. And then the other one I believe is called, I Tools. AI tools.

Bill Sheehan (27:09):

AI Tools.

Julian Moore (27:10):

And it’s Aitools.ai, and those two lists all of the different ones and they’re curated by AI. Unfortunately, it’s sponsored, so it means whoever’s paid the most is at the top of the list, but it’s absolutely worth having a look through.

Bill Sheehan (27:27):

That’s great, that’s very helpful. And let me ask too, as we bring this to a close, I think the association community worldwide is anxious about AI. I think they’re extremely concerned. I think they’re looking over their shoulder saying, am I going to be replaced? And you’ve touched on this a few times, but I think if there was one thing that if we could kind of put a little bow on this and just to let the association community know that everything’s going to be okay. What would you say?

Julian Moore (28:02):

It’s not only going to be okay, my expectation is that after half a day training on the tools that are relevant to you, you will work less, be more productive, have a better time doing your job, service your members better. I actually think we are moving into not a utopian time, but we are moving into an absolute boom time for associations and their members.

Bill Sheehan (28:33):

So Julian, we’ve talked a lot about that AI’s here and it’s not going away and I know there’s some fear and anxieties with the association community worldwide about AI. Let me ask a question. What would you think if an association doesn’t use AI or doesn’t embrace AI as part of their day-to-day operations, what’s their future look like?

Julian Moore (29:06):

I don’t think you can under or overestimate this enough. The biggest risk is irrelevance, lack of member retention, and basically, closure. That’s the biggest risk. If you’re an association, your role is to service the members in the most productive way possible for the least amount of money, in the way that members want to receive that information and get their benefits for. If you have a competitor and your competitor is using AI, they are now 100 times more productive than you are and if you think that you’re safe because you have the best training, you are not. Training is now something that anyone can use at tool to create. If you think you’re safe because you have the best lists, you’re not, and lists are available everywhere. No one is safe. What’s going to lead the charge is education and engagement, and then that’s all wrapped up in a neat bow called personalization.

(30:13):

So as a member, if I can go to an organization and only get information that’s relevant to me and none of the other fluff that I’m not interested in, then why would I go anywhere else? This is the key here. It is about embracing it, understanding it, and really leaning in.

Bill Sheehan (30:36):

Yeah, and you’ve touched on this earlier too, and I think I want to kind of re-emphasize this. That I do think associations are sitting there, particularly in the C-suite, the chief operating officer, the chief information officer, the chief learning officer, the chief executive officer, even the chief financial officer saying, we got to use AI, we got to use AI. How would you tell an association, here’s how you begin to get involved in AI?

Julian Moore (31:07):

Yeah, step one is, always your strategic plan. What is your purpose? What’s your mission? What’s your strategic plan? Pick one thing and then you say, well, this is where we’re going to use it for the first time and work on a sync, don’t try doing everything at once. On any implementation, doing everything everywhere at once takes them a lot of effort. So I would pick one thing. I would then immediately put every staff member, it doesn’t matter what they’re doing, every staff member through a one and a half hour, three hour training. It can be online, they haven’t got to leave, because once you understand how to make your chosen AI talk like you, write like you, sound like you, and have all the knowledge of your organization and make it really easy for them to use, why wouldn’t they? You’ll just find they adopt it, embrace it.

(32:11):

So step one, choose one AI and train the AI to sound like you. This is simply uploading a couple of emails you’ve done before and say, this is how I write. And now it sounds and talks and looks and walks like me. And then once I’m using that and I go, well, this is my newsletter, drop it in and say, make me a new one, they really get into this quickly. So get the staff trained, training of the staff is probably critical, mission-critical.

(32:42):

And then from there as the CEO, make sure you lead the charge. One of my favorite things I ask CEOs to do is, on their phone, there is an app for every single AI. So you can, GPT is one of the best. It has a headphones button. You hit the headphones and you go, right, have a look at my outlook, tell me what I’ve gone on today. It tells you what you’ve got on today. Okay, ask me 20 questions about today, one at a time, and I’ll answer them and after this, write me an outline of everything for today. And then as you’re doing this, drive to work, walk the dogs. When you arrive at work, you now have a Word document because it can save it in any format, of your entire day and it’s gone into depth on only your thoughts and the best way to attack today.

Bill Sheehan (33:41):

That’s brilliant, it’s brilliant. And I think something you touched on that really needs to be driven home is that association staff want to be trained. There was a survey done, I believe it was by Forbes, that said 83%, and this was across organizations, so it included companies and associations. 83% would leave their current job if they had another similar job that does training. And that training can be onboarding, it can be about AI, but you’re showing an investment in your organization, which I think the board would find very appealing, to make them operate more efficiently and more effectively, and I think that nothing can do that better than AI.

(34:24):

So you have been a wealth of knowledge, and I know that people are going to be spending a lot of time on those websites. The, There’s an AI For That, and I think theresanAIforthat.com, I think it even breaks out into kind of verticals, like these are the best ones and verticals. But you have been so generous with your time, and I think it’s reassuring to know that the human being is still the subject matter expert, not AI.

Julian Moore (34:57):

That’s for sure, and will be for some time, yeah.

Bill Sheehan (35:01):

I agree. Well, Julian, thank you so much for your time. This has been wonderful. I wish you all the best.

Julian Moore (35:06):

Thank you so much. Take care.

Bill Sheehan (35:08):

Bye.

Julian Moore (35:08):

Bye.

Bill Sheehan (35:10):

You’ve been listening to Learning by Association, a podcast where we delve into the ever evolving world of associations and the challenges they face in navigating the currents of change. This episode was produced by D2L, a global learning innovation company, helping organizations reshape the future of education and work. To learn more about our solutions, please visit Www.d2l.com and don’t forget to subscribe so you can stay up to date with new episodes. Thanks for joining us, and we’ll see you next time.

Resources Discussed in the Episode

• Unlocking Potential: How Associations Can Thrive in the Age of AI
• How AI Will Impact Education and Beyond