The iSMA Board Welcomes Two Newly-Elected Members

We welcome Carlos Oliveira Santos of Portugal, Member-at-Large who will be taking the place of Jay Kassirer as the Volunteer Chair Coordinator, and Leonidas (Leo) Skerletopoulos of Greece, also a Member-at-Large who has volunteered for the Membership Chair position. Thank you to both for their willingness to support iSMA and for the strong background in Social Marketing they bring to strengthen our organizational mission and related Board/Member activities.

Of the four Executive Officer positions; President- Patrick Cook, Vice President- Diogo Verissimo, Treasurer- Karis Schoellmann, and Secretary-Jennifer Wayman, each who currently hold those positions, has committed to remaining for another year. Julie Hentz will continue in the Communications Committee Chair Role.

iSMA Business

• It was suggested that a Nominating Committee be established for future elections, to fall as a responsibility of the Membership Committee. 
• Jennifer Wayman will lead the much-needed process of updating the iSMA Operations Manual, which when complete will be posted to the website for member access.
• Many concepts for revenue generation were discussed. Luca Uguzzoni presented a proposal where iSMA would gather pledges from various organizations for financial backing.
  Leo discussed the possibility that academic institutions could consider offering social marketing certificates with course work backed by iSMA and ESMA. Carlos proposed shaping social marketing courses to offer through foundations like the U.N. Foundation.
  Julie presented Braden Occomore’s idea of iSMA merchandise, available for purchase on the iSMA website containing clarification and catchy promotion of Social Marketing in fun and productive ways. 
• Patrick Cook and Ross Gordon will visit with FUSE about revenue sharing around the World Conference Events.
• The development of an improved byline/tagline to clarify and promote social marketing was discussed by Nancy Lee.
• Patrick reported on progress in creating a consolidated member database that includes all regional/local Social Marketing organizations, the financing of which would be divided among the member organizations.

New Website Update

The new iSMA website is nearing completion. Braden provided a demo of the developing site to date for those able to attend. A “Go Live” date was discussed and priority activities were determined. Win Morgan has offered his support with key tasks regarding the member database as well.

More News

• The First Encyclopedia of Social Marketing is underway as Timo Dietrich and Krzysztof Kubacki in Australia are editing one of five sections entitled Professional bodies and key resource centres. iSMA has been invited to contribute a chapter containing 2-3,000 words.

• Nancy Lee will be offering an online certificate course to launch in March 2020. A gauge for interest in the course has been included in the 2019 iSMA survey. The course fee will provide welcome revenue for iSMA.

• Patrick reported that if there is sufficient interest in sustaining the Global Alliance for Social and Behavior Change Support iSMA will recruit a volunteer to support the Alliance website. 

• Julie represented iSMA in a meeting with a representative of the Social Behavior Change Communication Summit (SBCC) to seek registration discounts for iSMA members and to shape a partnership where iSMA could serve as a supporter/sponsor. An iSMA panel discussion is being considered as one option for presence at SBCC in Morocco, April 2019

The Board will convene again in mid-November 2019