Comprehensive analysis of agricultural marketing and supply, farm credit and rural electric cooperatives' member-owner communications

A recent study determined communicating the cooperative value package to member-owners to be the most prominent critical issue American cooperatives face. This paper determines how effective agricultural marketing and supply, farm credit and rural electric cooperatives actually communicate with their members by identifying the current vehicles used to do so and the factors influencing managers' and board members' perceptions of effective member-owner communications. Data was collected from 125 cooperative managers and 211 board members of the agricultural marketing and supply, farm credit and rural electric sectors in Oklahoma, Kansas and North Dakota who participated in the study through an online or mailed survey. A regression analysis was used elicit the factors contributing to overall effective communications. The models confirmed the number of communication vehicles used does not fully explain the overall effectiveness of a firm's communication plan. Therefore, communication audits were conducted on six cooperatives, two in each of aforementioned sectors. Important findings from the qualitative portion of the research include cooperatives typically do not plan and budget to maintain and build relationships with current and potential members, in addition to making the efforts a priority to allocate enough time in carrying through any tactics. Additionally, the agricultural marketing and supply cooperative sector were late in adapting a diverse portfolio to include traditional, digital and online vehicles to communicate the cooperative value package to their member-owners.