Next step in area website development
As some will know, I have been responsible for building and maintaining the area website (www.yhjudo.org.uk) for a while now. A site that is heavily under utilised, there are features to allow clubs to manage their own mailing lists for example. Online entries to events are doable but organisers of events are reluctant to use online entry systems despite it taking a load of work away from them. Maybe that's why they're not keen?
If anyone can suggest ways of encouraging clubs/event organisers to make use of features like these feel free to suggest some!
I've created a Facebook group and page and a twitter (yhjudo) account that are generating some interest, but trying to keep Facebook page/group events up to date with an ever changing calendar can prove tricky at the best of times! I created a FB application that can display the calendar on a user's FB page using the calendar database behind the area website, but a few glitches to work out yet.
I've added components to the website to allow people to comment on news items, for example, using their FB logins.
I have RSS feeds of area news and the calendar that can be subscribed to (I really should start gathering stats on RSS use, suspect it's very low!).
Some folks volunteered to help, they soon (a month) stopped doing updates for FB. Meanwhile I continue to try and expand the yhjudo 'brand' in the modern world.
The latest edition to the online collection of tools is a Google calendar which should allow people to view our events in their own calendar and club webmasters the chance to embed the calendar dynamically into their sites, I wonder if that will be met with the same indifference as the other tools I've spent time creating.
Admittedly the Google calendar isn't fully populated as yet as events get added only when the area website saves them to it's database but it's a step in the right direction.
The question is, is all this effort and work done in vain as the number of folks using these features are very much in the minority?
If anyone can suggest ways of encouraging clubs/event organisers to make use of features like these feel free to suggest some!
I've created a Facebook group and page and a twitter (yhjudo) account that are generating some interest, but trying to keep Facebook page/group events up to date with an ever changing calendar can prove tricky at the best of times! I created a FB application that can display the calendar on a user's FB page using the calendar database behind the area website, but a few glitches to work out yet.
I've added components to the website to allow people to comment on news items, for example, using their FB logins.
I have RSS feeds of area news and the calendar that can be subscribed to (I really should start gathering stats on RSS use, suspect it's very low!).
Some folks volunteered to help, they soon (a month) stopped doing updates for FB. Meanwhile I continue to try and expand the yhjudo 'brand' in the modern world.
The latest edition to the online collection of tools is a Google calendar which should allow people to view our events in their own calendar and club webmasters the chance to embed the calendar dynamically into their sites, I wonder if that will be met with the same indifference as the other tools I've spent time creating.
Admittedly the Google calendar isn't fully populated as yet as events get added only when the area website saves them to it's database but it's a step in the right direction.
The question is, is all this effort and work done in vain as the number of folks using these features are very much in the minority?
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