Goals

Expanding membership required flexible technologies 

The American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) is a membership organization dedicated to inspiring excellence and nurturing lifelong involvement in the choral arts. ACDA provides a wealth of benefits to its members, including professional development and networking opportunities, choral repertoire, publications, awards and competitions, a career center, and more. 

ACDA had migrated to a Salesforce-based Association Management System (AMS) (Fonteva) and sought a marketing automation solution that would offer additional features and ease of use while integrating well with their core system.

ACDA can quickly set up and automate membership renewal emails, easily inject personalized data, and even send temporary membership cards with member information from Fonteva

Challenges

Aging systems no longer met growing needs

  • As it grew, legacy email management solutions no longer suited the organization’s needs.
  • The organization had recently implemented a Salesforce-based Association Management System (AMS) and wanted a solution that integrated well.
  • ACDA wanted to easily segment lists, capture additional information about user preferences, and automate certain processes, including member onboarding journeys and reminders about membership renewals.
Membership organizations rely on dues and renewals; ACDA can segment lists based on membership payment dates and automate a member renewal journey using Engagement Studio

Solutions and Results

Collaboration and training simplify the move

  • Fíonta performed a thorough yet tailored discovery phase with key ACDA staff and stakeholders, reviewing existing systems, data, and business processes to ensure the new Marketing Cloud Account Engagement (MCAE, formerly known as Pardot) implementation was easy to use for key stakeholders. 
  • Integration with Fonteva and list migration from Constant Contact set the stage for ACDA’s success.
  • Previously manual processes have been automated, and ACDA has a stable of branded email templates and marketing assets that meet its needs for standard and one-off email communications.
  • Fíonta’s training on MCAE allowed ACDA to see a quick return on its investment in the solution.
ACDA treats member onboarding very seriously, and with MCAE Engagement Studio, can automate and deliver targeted content over a period of weeks and report on engagement in real time