AAPG /HGS MEMBERSHIP EXPERIMENT AAPG ANNUAL CONVENTION 2006

AAPG /HGS MEMBERSHIP AAPG /HGS MEMBERSHIP EXPERIMENTEXPERIMENT

AAPG ANNUAL CONVENTION 2006AAPG ANNUAL CONVENTION 2006

Andrea Reynolds

Overview

Purpose of the Houston Membership Experiment

Input Data & Database Comparison Process

Company Results & Statistics

Observations & Learnings

Forward Plan

Questions?

Why carry out a membership experiment?

1) To compare how many Houston area geologists are membersof AAPG & HGS, AAPG only & HGS only

2) To facilitate AAPG age-targeted membership initiative

3) To understand why HGS members may NOT be AAPG members & why AAPG members are not HGS members

4) To allow us to track membership trends

5) Last, but not least – How to better attract new members to AAPG & HGS by leveraging each other’s membership base

Input DataThis work is based on a query of the AAPG & HGS databases from end-August 2005

The AAPG membership database in this experiment includes ONLY those who are recorded as living in the Greater Houston area

The HGS membership database includes ALL HGS members, including those that live outside the greater Houston area

This was necessary due to the immense size of the AAPG members database

Database Comparison Process (Simplified)

1) Get both databases in the same format(Last name, First name, company, phone #, etc)

2) Add columns to designate AAPG members and HGS members

3) Sort by Name

4) Make a Match - Manually compare 12,000+ lines in the master spreadsheet for same names, duplicate companies/emails/phone #, etc

5) Break out members by company

6) Interpret the data & break out trends in membership

Database Comparison

The merge created an Excel spreadsheet with 15,710 lines

…..not a quick, easy task!

Split out members by Company

AGIP-ENI ExxonMobil ShellAmerada Hess Hunt Petroleum TotalAnadarko Kerr-McGee UnocalApache Marathon Oil BakerBHP Newfield CGGbp Noble FugroBurlington ResourcesOxy HalliburtonChevron Paradigm IHS EnergyConocoPhillips Pioneer PGSDevon Pogo SchlumbergerDominion Repsol TGS-NOPECEl Paso Samson Veritas

27 Exploration/Production Companies 9 Service Companies/Vendors

Example of a company page (Both AAPG + HGS)

Key:BLUE text = AAPG memberBLACK text = HGS member

YELLOW shading = MATCH (AAPG + HGS)PINK shading = Probable match (AAPG + HGS)No shading = Records are not up-to-date

Example of a company (AAPG only + HGS only)

GeneralStatistics

E&PStatistics

All 36 Companies

Observations – E&P Company trend

Observation # 1: The E&P employees are split in thirds when it comes to membership

HGSonly

AAPGonly

AAPG + HGS

Observations – Vendor/Service trend

HGSonlyAAPG

only

AAPG + HGS

Observation # 2: Most Houston service employees are HGS members

Observations – All Company Data (E&P + Vendor)

Observation # 3: In the Houston area, more members belong to HGS only

HGSonly

AAPGonly

AAPG + HGS

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

Major Lg Ind SmInd

Lg Ven

AAPG OnlyHGS OnlyBoth

Company Statistics

Learnings

There are many records that are not up to date!Members do NOT update profile after changing:

Companies

Addresses – when moving to a new city/state

Phone numbers

Name (due to marriage, divorce)

Email addresses (after corporate merger, etc)

Therefore, it is sometimes quite difficult to match members – especially with common given names and surnames.

How can we use this to our benefit?

We have access to a VERY powerful source of information!

Opportunity for greater synergy between national & local organizations/societies

Large potential as a recruitment tool - who are we missing and why?

Trend data is very important – what does it mean?

Delinquent members – can we understand why they left? Did they stay national/local? Can we get them back?

(Inter)National & Local Synergy

AAPGBenefits

HGSBenefits

SharedMonthly Technical Lunch & Dinner Meetings

Special Interest Groups

Community Outreach

Social & Sporting Events

Annual Meetings & Int’lConventions

Divisions – EMD, DPA, DEG

Larger sphere for networking

Wide breadth of courses

+……. +…….

Collaborate & leverage strengths

HGS Bulletin & website Datapages, Bulletin, Explorer

Unrealized Potential

What can make this even more successful?

Members need encouragement to stay current & update their own records online

Companies can benefit – and can be used to recruit

Replication of this “experiment” in other regions

Age-targeted marketing – available for AAPG members, but not for HGS members (HGS does not collect demographics)

Forward Plan

How are we going to use all this information?

Recruiting “agents” have been identified within each company

The agent compares our list to active employees

AAPG & HGS provide recruiting materials

Agents distribute within the members – first to “AAPG/HGS only” members; then to non-members

GOAL: to attract new members (who have only been local/nat’l)and grow both organizations’ membership bases

In Conclusion

The AAPG/HGS Membership experiment has been eye-opening

We have seen interesting trends & statistics

“Agents” are currently at work in Houston

We recommend that AAPG replicate this in other areas

We will fully document the process – it would be ideal to automate the data-crunching to cut down on time

We see this as a success and look forward to final results

Thank you for your time & attention

Got Questions?????