Members area?

AlanRatcliffe · 2009-10-04T18:48:14+00:00

I've been wondering if y'all would like a "members only" board? Somewhere which is not publicly accessible to non-members. I'd still like to keep most of the forum public, as the info found there is what drives people to sign up as members anyway, but just somewhere where you can relax a bit more and speak to friends. Just a thought... Any opinions? Thoughts? (old forum) Poll Results: Would you like a member's only board? Yes: 5 No: 12

Bob-Dubery

Alan Ratcliffe wrote Gimme some credit. ?

Here's a photo of some credit

Don't squander it all on wine, women and guitars.

Sean

A lot of "don't see the point" posts. Would the point not be to encourage regular guests to become members? Okay , so even if it's just to view the "Off-topic" board (and I suppose some would point out that that is not much incentive) it's not about exclusivity because how difficult is it to become a member? Guests won't lose out on any guitar related stuff since it's the off-topic board anyway, and the worst that can happen is prickling a few guests interests to join only to have a couple more members with zero posts.

RobK

I think there are better ways of encouraging guests to join. A few things that come to mind:

- have an article section - only accesible to members
- a members only newsletter
- special offers/discounts, etc to members from advertisers
- the lessons section accessible to members only

etc.

Squonk

RobK has a point

Maybe make the lesson section only available to members, I would even suggest the Classifieds as well.
8)

chris77

The biggest con is that it might have evolved into an exclusive old boys type club. Playing the guitar (and especially on this forum) brings together people from all sorts of backgrounds and with tastes as diverse as the musical spectrum is broad. The last thing we should do is alienate somebody with a perception of us vs. them. The idea I think was rather to get more posters. The more the merrier, and the stronger the forum will be for it. So if there are any readers who might want to post but who havent done so for some reason, please register and PM Alan or one of the admins with any suggestions on how to make you feel comfortable with actively participating in the discussions.

Keira-WitherKay

well in reply to a few of above posts.is i see no reason why a guitarist would not join a free guitar site........ especially a South African........ once she/he is aware of it... so maybe to attract new members one needs to advertise the site..........elsewhere ......

cos yeah this is a good site...... lots of valid info......... and many experienced memmbers post valid and most importantly honest replies on topics......

the only segment of the site i would look at improving would be the chat room....... i pop in every now and then........ and to be honest ... on a guitar site one seeks conversation that is music/guitar/gear related........ and i ofte find people who know each other chatting totally off topic......... surely one can use msn for that ....... cos if it's a guitar site make the chat room a guitar chatroom which would attract others to log on ........ not just a few connections using it as a social non guitar forum........ again just my opinion ...and not the end of the world this site has plenty of benefit to musicians......

and one last thing is it possible to have a proper review section ...... where the reviews are done by specialists in the field...... since often one would like to get a full review on the new gear in the country.... but not a bias'd opinion from a user .... so maybe have a review by an expert and then users can comment on that ...........

and maybe we in reviews of gear/guitars ect should build up a data base......... cos often i'd loveto see the reviews on gear .... and especially the gear just arrivedin this country ......... Alan maybe the importers would contribute to your site financially if you started a list of locally available gear with reviews but set up in categories.... say ...Guitar amps.... / or acoustic guitar amps/ as at moment we have random reviews and i'm sure i've missed some i would love to read .... but not gonna search 30 pages for it .......... so nice to have an index for reviews in categories...

anyway some thoughts

but love the site .........

peace and light
keira

Bob-Dubery

RobK wrote I think there are better ways of encouraging guests to join. A few things that come to mind:

- have an article section - only accesible to members
- a members only newsletter
- special offers/discounts, etc to members from advertisers
- the lessons section accessible to members only

etc.

Those are good ideas. And we need to be mindful that Alan and Norio need to make this site pay for itself. However other problems then arise. If you're going to have a lessons section then you need to have GOOD lessons, and probably lessons targeted at a certain style and at a certain level of expertise. To get good you usually have to pay for it - which means paying somebody to devise a lesson once a month.

Articles or a news letter may be better bets - if there's a perception of quality and value. But again there has to be a reason for people contributing these articles to do so on a regular basis - and that generally means payment.

aubs1

Manfred Klose wrote strange a friend warned me that forums start to become like this after a while, i didn't ever believe that GFSA would ever want to go private.
the chat room and PM is private isn't it? so what more do we need ?
Besides what would you wanna post that is so private that only registered users can read?
lets stick to guitars.
my 2 cents.

Manny, I agree with you 100%, I seldom go back as a "Guest" to sites that are private, in fact, you feel like an intruder......

racman

A members area would only make sense if membership was more exclusive which then starts a far different debate, so my vote is No.

AlanRatcliffe

RobK wrote - have an article section - only accesible to members
- the lessons section accessible to members only

A resounding "NO!" to those I'm afraid. All content must be free - along with the discussion (also a form of content). The content is what brings people in to the site and convinces them that it's a place they would like to spend more time on and possibly even join. There is nothing special about our content - most of it can be found elsewhere for free and not require any membership to access. So by making content private you only push people away to other sites where it is free.

Even those visitors who follow a link or search result in, read a page and depart never to be seen again, add traffic to the site, and traffic makes the site more viable as a place to advertise. Advertising is our source of revenue, not selling lessons or articles. Ads pays the bills to keep the site going and finance our luxury yachts (yeah, right... LOL!).

I'm not really looking at this as an incentive for people to become members. Classified ads are already an incentive - because only members can post ads and send PM responses.

- a members only newsletter

We already have that. Part of the package. I just haven't had the time to utilise it properly and send out newsletters lately as it's quite a time intensive thing to do. It's something that's on my shortlist to rectify soon.

- special offers/discounts, etc to members from advertisers

Good idea - we considered it before, but we felt at that point we were too small a group of people to really negotiate anything worthwhile (I kind of have a membership figure of 2,000 members as the magical point - we're at 1700 now). Definitely something to be looked into again when the time is right.

Interestingly enough, if we do arrange specials for members, they will have to be displayed in a members-only area to prevent non-members from getting details and taking advantage of them. ?

PeteM

I only came across this forum by chance, through Googling. Since then I've made it my business to tell everyone who is connected with guitars to visit it.
If it's a numbers game that determines the on-going success, I suggest that the site needs exposure outside of the Internet to encourage guitarists to visit and become members. Yeah, I know this could cost money, but perhaps we can all play our part by mentioning it our gigs announcing it at open mic sessions etc.
It's a great site and deserves SA support - after all, don't we all get something out of it? I do!

RobK

Alan Ratcliffe wrote
RobK wrote - have an article section - only accesible to members
- the lessons section accessible to members only
A resounding "NO!" to those I'm afraid. All content must be free - along with the discussion (also a form of content). The content is what brings people in to the site and convinces them that it's a place they would like to spend more time on and possibly even join. There is nothing special about our content - most of it can be found elsewhere for free and not require any membership to access. So by making content private you only push people away to other sites where it is free.

Sorry if there was some misunderstanding. I didn't mean to imply the content should be paid for. Content would still be free, the only "payment" being that guests would need to sign up as members to view it. Just thought that if you wanted to have a members only thing, it should be something more than just an off topic discussion board, and if it proves to be an incentive for guests to sign up, great.

The classifieds are an incentive, but it's not a really good way of keeping members active. Some might just be once off registrations to post an ad and then they're never seen again. Something like an articles or lesson section that are regularly updated might keep more members active and that would go (IMHO) a long way in convincing advertisers to contribute to something like the members only specials.

As for payment for content (to authors), considering the willingness of people on this forum to share their knowledge and experience, I don't think you'd battle to find members willing to regularly contribute to these sections for free.

NorioDS

I must say, I'm keen on doing a paid section of the site but I won't take anything away from what's already given away for free. Maybe the paid version would have no ads, top-notch video lessons (ala GuitarMasterClass.net - so you dudes can earn bucks from your videos, IF they are accepted) and things like that.

Most of GFSA, like Alan said, should be free. Because SA guitarists, rich and poor, need a place to hang out, share ideas, collaborate and so on but there's definitely room for a paid-section. Not anytime soon but I just wanted to let everyone know that I'd like to head in that direction some time.

Manfred-Klose

I suggest that the site needs exposure outside of the Internet to encourage guitarists to visit and become members. Yeah, I know this could cost money, but perhaps we can all play our part by mentioning it our gigs announcing it at open mic sessions etc.

PeteM, i have a solution to that problem, some thread i created a while back for invite cards to GFSA kind of like cards you hand out.
It is invite cards i designed a long time ago(check the date, very old thread), basically i have it printed out on a thicker paper so it will be strong, and sometimes i spray it with something that adds a protective layer.
Last time i printed out it, it cost me about R50 for 50 cards in colour.

I dropped some at my local music store, and they were more than happy to let it stand next to the counter so clients can take one, within 2 weeks there were no cards left ? ........so maby that is why there is so many members from cape town......hint hint........ :-\

I also take some with if i go to a gig and give it out to other guitar players i chat with at the gig.

here is the thread:
http://www.guitarforum.co.za/site-feedback/invite-cards-for-guitar-forum/

So if you have a printer at home, what is stopping you?

PeteM

Manfred Klose wrote So if you have a printer at home, what is stopping you?

Nothing - good idea - cheap at the price.

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