Date: 4/29/2009
Name: Christian Lamp
email: cklamp@hotmail.com
subject:at least a few people get it...
I've got enough little emails in my inbox to know i'm not the only one who feels this way.A few of you are completely missing the point. I never once said there is nothing of value here nor have I ever said that joining the class isn't a good idea.
What I said was that for 25$ you have to provide something that the people you want to join your assn actually want or need. At the very least it has to be an extra perk to that membership.
This board, the class manual, ability to race in nationals and a jib sheet obviously doesn't seem to be cutting it based on the comments and guilt trips that are frequently posted here trying to get people to join the national assn.
So, what do you do about it? you need to step back and figure out what's missing from what you're trying to sell that the buyer wants.
Well, I have a few suggestions obviously:)
Since this site is supposed to be an extension of the clas, and Jim is always mentioning how hard this site is to run. Make it easier on Jim and take that out of his hands and move to an easier to manage system such as a Forum. Jim doesn't have to read emails, doesn't have to create special pages, or upload any of that, nor does he have to deal with GPS threads that go on for 8 days:)
It's also real time and you don't have to wait for your thread to show up if you want. You could assign all assn members moderator priviledges to help clean up any spam. You could still leave the forums so that posts only get posted when a moderator actually authorizes it as well if you prefer.
I'm not in any ways saying that Jim's work isn't appreciated, I really do appreciate it, but the class assn, and the members can probably make it a lot easier on him by making that move and give him more time to work on his boat, or sail it:)
Fleet 1 already has forums up and running, www.sj21fleet1forums.org and they work very very well. Anyone who wants to post there is welcome.
With the addition of forums you could also add special members only areas as well. I'm sure the cruisers don't really care about a lot of race planning, I don't know, maybe they do.
You could probably give each fleet their own forums section as well, which could help tie all the classes in together as well rather than having them all over the place and having interested parties come here saying "hey is there a fleet in my area" all they'd have to do is look at the forums.
A lot of forums also allow user "profile" pages as well where the user can post more pics, their own diaries, etc, It just depends on what kind of setup you go with. www.reefcentral.com does something like this with their forums.
The Jibsheet could be printed online as Cal has already suggested. But in addition to that to build value into membership, you could offer a low quality version free, with useful but small pictures as needed, but then offer a nice high quality PDF or similar document with higher quality and bigger pictures for printing, and or hell even mailing. www.arstechnica.com does this with some of their articles if you want a reference.
Again, Cal's a printer, and i can't speak for him. but what about taking the class manual and updating the version available to the public. But again, you go with a useful but lower quality version that anyone can view, but you offer a nicer printed copy for your membership dues. Again, maybe with better pictures/diagrams.
In the vein of trying to promote the class more, maybe the class finds out about printing up a large quantity of SJ21 stickers of some sort, and hands out one with your membership dues. Maybe a bumper sticker, or a window decal, whatever.
Maybe you get some bergies printed up, or some patches for those that are really proud that they can sew onto their jackets.
The assn could al
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