AGM 2012: Webmaster Report
THE GOOD NEWS
As you can see above we have, in the past year, more than doubled the number of visitors and page views.
Des, Julia, Tom, Jeremy and Yiannis have posted on the website. Some more than others 😉
The total cost of this exercise was £5 for domain renewal.
THE BAD NEWS
Whilst most of our guest riders have mentioned the website as a factor in finding us this is not resulting in a significant uplift in club membership. Suggestions welcome!
BUGLE MAILING LIST
Has gone out weekly to (currently) 41 subscribers.
CLUB DATABASE
Based on the mailing list this needs to be both updated and its use agreed (data protection).
CLUB CARDS
These have been printed and circulated. Please let me know if you need more.
Stuart
Two comments.
1. Too late to add to the give away club cards, but perhaps something that can be added to to the web site. A way in which interested parties can request to be added to the Bugle e-mail list.
2. An old chestnut, but perhaps next spring we can advertise and start some short Saturday rides for newcomers, such as those being done by Monty.
Alternatively slow rides to the Sunday morning tea stops to introduce newcomers/slow or less fit cyclists to our club rides.
Picking up on the Web Masters comments, it is very encouraging that our web pages are getting lots of hits. However as he points out we do not appear to be getting many new members. Most that we have picked up (like our Web Master) live in or near Anerley, which I suppose is to be expected for a club named Anerley B.C!
What our web site needs is a direct reference to “Croydon”, which search engines will pick up on. Try Googling “Croydon cycling clubs”. You will have to look hard to find reference to the Anerley Bicycle Club.
I just Googled “Croydon cycling clubs” and the Anerley was off the screen appearing at item 10.
The only reason that it even appeared there was because in September an item was posted on our web site advertising a Sky Ride starting in Croydon.
The opertive word here, which Google hit on being “Croydon”
I then Googled “Cycling clubs near Croydon” and Anerley B.C had not even appeared when I scrolled down as far as page 3!
We appear to have an identity crisis!
Our web savy members should be able to devise ways to move our club up the Google listings.
A simple solution might be to amend our opening (home page) to read, instead of “Join us for a Sunday Ride!” make it:
“Join Croydon’s oldest bicycle club for a Sunday Ride, we’ve been cycling since 1881! ”
Des
Well yes we do have an identity crisis. Anerley is in Bromley’s oldest cycling club! and we start from Purley, not Croydon. I’ve had to work hard over the last year to get the club showing as page 1 for ‘Anerley’ which is the basic first step. Anerley is the brand. Indeed it adjoins the five S & SE London boroughs and needs to market to all. (Southwark, Lambeth, Lewisham, Bromley & Croydon).
As Catford CC & Sydenham Wheelers are the brands rather than Farnborough or Orpington.
The key to getting a good Google ranking is the number of quality links. Thanks to John D for getting his LBS to link to us. The other thing everybody can do is to include mentions of Anerley when posting in cycling and other related forums. That’s our unique but you see it seldom mentioned as against certain other clubs.
I do try in CycleChat. Maybe you would like to do YACF or BikeRadar? Members of LCC can also help by getting stuff into their magazine.
Anerley is not yet orientated to new riders but those who cycle regularly for leisure and commuting and are most likely to hear of us by word of mouth from existing cyclists albeit in the pub, canteen or online.
We are lucky that if we get listed then alphabetically we usually come first!
If you Google “Cycling clubs Purley”, the Anerley is top of the list. It shows “Starting in Purley we ride at conversational pace….”
However Purley is a minor suburb of Croydon and most people in this area looking for a cycling club would Google “Cycling clubs Croydon”, and find lots of other clubs first.
I referred to the web page on the Croydon Sky Ride because that was presumably the page where Google most associated the words Anerley – cycling – clubs and Croydon.
Yes I know that Anerley is not in the Borough of Croydon, but the club is!
Our main client base is therefore Croydon and needs to be promoted with that in mind.
The third item on Google for “Cycle clubs Purley” is a listing for cycle rides starting in Purley. These are rides which I have previously posted on a cycling web site. For example my route, posted under the name of the Anerley Bicycle Club, at:
http://www.cycle-route.com/routes/Purley_to_Edenbridge_Circular-Cycle-Route-4321.html
I have also put items on several other web sites, with links to the Anerley web site. However, as you suggest, if other club members are interested in promoting our club they could also help to move us up the rankings.