2026 Association Benchmarking Report: AI Adoption Surges as Revenue Strategy Gets More Complicated
Every year, our Association Benchmarking Report offers association leaders a clear view of what’s happening across the sector. The 2026 Association Benchmarking Report, now in its 15th year, is officially available for download, and this year’s data tells a noticeably different story than last year’s.
We heard from 665 association professionals this year—our largest response rate yet. Here’s what you told us.
AI Adoption Accelerated
Heavy AI use—meaning associations using AI-powered communication tools frequently or daily—nearly tripled, from 12.5% in 2025 to 33.5% in 2026. Just as telling, the share of associations reporting no AI use at all was cut roughly in half, from 42.3% to 21.0%. In just a year, AI has shifted from a pilot program to a tool showing up in daily workflows.
The Top Challenges Reshuffled
Likely no surprise, generating non-dues revenue is still the No. 1 challenge, cited by 51.9% of respondents, and communicating member benefits held at No. 2 (49.5%). But leveraging data for strategic decisions climbed into the top three (47.7%), edging past engaging young professionals for the first time. As data becomes easier to collect (perhaps with the assistance of AI), associations leaders are shifting their focus to strategic deployment.
Revenue Mix Kept Shifting
Job posting sales nearly tripled, from 3.6% to 10.0% of non-dues revenue, while sponsorship’s share slipped from 29.7% to 25.3%. Associations are clearly diversifying where their non-dues dollars come from. That said, more than a quarter of respondents also pointed to fragmented sponsorship and advertising opportunities, or a lack of data to prove sponsor ROI, as real barriers, so the strategy behind the mix still has room to grow.
Staffing Pressure Eased, Mostly
Reported understaffing dropped sharply, from 51.3% to 35.1%, and just over half of associations now call their staffing levels “just right.” The one holdout is data and strategy, still the most understaffed function at 38.5%. More capacity overall hasn’t closed that particular gap, which lines up with the challenge around leveraging data mentioned above.
Engagement Tools Held Steady, and Video Broke Out
Email remains the most valued engagement tool (83.4%), followed by association websites (80.6%), enewsletters (80.2%), and webinars (79.1%). But the real mover was video: high-frequency use jumped nearly eightfold, from 3.2% to 24.5% of associations communicating 11 or more times a month. Video is also starting to pay for itself. More than one in five associations now agree it generates revenue through sponsorship, advertising, or paywall access.
A Few Tools Are Climbing Fast
Online buyers’ guides (+24 points), SMS messaging (+22.5), AI tools (+17.5), and association apps (+17.1) posted the biggest year-over-year gains in perceived value as member engagement tools. None of these cracked the top 10 overall, but the growth curve is worth watching if you haven’t invested in any of them yet.
Outsourcing Expanded Across the Board
Associations are leaning on outside partners more than they used to, and association management led the way, more than doubling from 9.9% to 22.7%. Email marketing and education and training weren’t far behind. These trends suggest more deliberate resourcing for specialized or ongoing work, not just filling gaps.
Hybrid Still Wins, But In-Person Is Back
Hybrid work remained the dominant model at 52.0%, but fully in-person work more than doubled, from 10.4% to 25.5%, while fully remote arrangements declined. The association sector is moving from short-term workplace decisions into more intentional work environment design.
The Sector Snapshot
Naylor’s composite Best Practices Score, which tracks how effectively associations adopt high-performing engagement, measurement, and revenue strategies, rose from 42.8 to 48 this year. Taken together, these numbers point to a sector that’s more data-informed and operationally mature than it was 12 months ago, even if the path to get there looks different from association to association.
This is a fraction of what’s in the full report, which also covers event format preferences, social platform performance, how to get a personalized Best Practices Score Card for your own association, and more.
If you’re setting strategy for 2027 or just want to see how your association stacks up against the sector, I think you’ll find it’s worth your time.
Download the full 2026 Association Benchmarking Report here.
Photo courtesy of 3rdtimeluckystudio/Shutterstock.com.