How FMA Simplified Its Audience Data Strategy—And Saved Hundreds of Hours Every Month

Overview

The Fabricators & Manufacturers Association (FMA), a nonprofit that supports the metal forming and fabricating industries, faced a common but deeply entrenched problem: complex, manual data workflows that sapped team time and created inconsistencies across departments. Despite having multiple tools in place, the team was bogged down by inefficient processes and siloed systems.

One striking example: preparing an issue close for a publication used to take the FMA team two full weeks of manual effort. After implementing Omeda, that same process now takes less than 30 minutes. This transformation helped unlock hundreds of hours in monthly time savings across departments.

Instead of layering on more technology, FMA chose a different path: simplifying. With a renewed focus on clarity, alignment, and adopting an integrated audience data platform, FMA radically streamlined its operations. Now it saves hundreds of hours per month across its media, membership, and events teams.

The Challenge

FMA’s audience team was managing multiple brands, a large membership database, and several internal pillars, including media, membership, foundation, and events. But their tools weren’t integrated, their workflows were highly manual, and their data processes were both inconsistent and time-consuming.

Key pain points:

Manual coding of industry classification data (e.g., NAICS codes)
Siloed and outdated audience workflows
Redundant data entry across platforms
Lack of trust in audience reports and analytics
Workflow delays tied to clunky, non-scalable systems
Two-week issue-close prep cycles due to disjointed, manual processes

“We were doing a ton of manual work—coding data line-by-line, pulling mismatched reports, uploading files between platforms. We would get a bunch of errors because the AMS didn’t know how to read the data… It wouldn’t tell us where we were erroring out. So it would take us 20 efforts just to upload the same files of 20 to 50,000 records. It wasn’t just inefficient—it was exhausting,”

April Hanrahan, Director of Audience Development, FMA

The Turning Point

Rather than continuing to struggle with disconnected systems, FMA stepped back and asked: If we were starting from scratch, how would we build this better?

That shift in mindset led to eight core areas of change, from internal alignment and data clarity to adopting a centralized platform for segmentation, reporting, and fulfillment. Omeda, a unified audience data platform, became the cornerstone of this new strategy.

The Solution

By implementing Omeda and revisiting their internal processes, FMA reimagined how data moved across teams, tools, and workflows.

Key highlights:

Modernized audience segmentation by moving from manual NAICS coding to structured, mappable business classifications, thereby reducing errors and effort
Redefined internal workflows using standardized templates, stakeholder walkthroughs, and simplified execution
Integrated Omeda with existing tools like Jira, their AMS, ESP, and CDP—decoupling where needed and reconnecting where it made strategic sense
Replaced error-prone imports and uploads with automated file processing
Adopted a collaboration-first mindset by involving publishing, membership, sales, and executive teams at every step

The Results

FMA’s effort to simplify and streamline its audience operations produced measurable, high-impact outcomes.

Outcomes	How They Got There
Hundreds of hours saved per month across audience operations	Centralized audience data in Omeda to unify segmentation, fulfillment, and reporting across all brands
Issue close prep time reduced from two weeks to under 30 minutes, saving more than 100 hours per cycle across four publications	Automated key workflows that previously required manual list-building and coding
Faster list imports and audience uploads, including seamless telemarketing file processing via Jira	Integrated critical platforms to eliminate rework and reduce upload errors
Streamlined reporting, eliminating the need for Excel cross-referencing and manual validation	Rebuilt reporting frameworks to deliver real-time visibility without relying on disconnected spreadsheets
Increased team productivity and reduced stress, allowing staff to focus on strategy, engagement, and innovation	Enabled cross-functional collaboration that ensured sustainable, scalable adoption
Improved trust in audience data and better cross-functional visibility	Focused on continuous improvement by starting small and expanding over time

“We’re not so stressed. We’re not so, like, ‘Oh my gosh, in two weeks we have this issue close. We’ve got to get this done.’ Now, we have so much time where we can focus on cooler things to try to accomplish rather than doing an issue close.”

Organizational Benefits

Greater cross-departmental visibility into data and workflows
Stronger team confidence in reporting and segmentation
More time for higher-value work like strategy, content, and innovation

“This wasn’t about chasing shiny objects. We didn’t need new platforms. We needed smarter processes and a better foundation.”

Key Takeaways

Simplicity is a strategy, not a compromise. FMA’s results came not from more tech, but better orchestration. Eliminating redundant steps unlocked hundreds of hours in value.
Clarity beats volume when it comes to data. FMA stopped collecting data for data’s sake and started acting on what mattered.
Collaboration drives real transformation. Cross-functional input made every change more impactful and long-lasting.