TOPIC:

Please give us your honest assessment and feedback on what we can do to improve our website. Some things we want to accomplish are:

- Improve our public relations and recruitment efforts via the site
- Enhance our site appearance through use of pictures and speech videos
- Entice prospective members to click on the member bios and other sections to learn more about us
- Provide more value to existing members by way of important documents or articles

Thank you,
Don Steichen

P.S. We are a neighborhood / community based club that is 1 year old and has a solid core of 12 members. Currently 17 dues paying members but looking to grow this to 25+

Moving this to our new forum section for this.

Don,

The following is my evaluation--others may have differing opinions. I invite other people to chime in, also, for a complete assessment.

Lets start with what I like about your website.

1. Your Meet Our Members page shows some good bios of your members. This is great, because it increases the odds that a prospective new member looking at your website will see that they have something in common with your members and want to attend your meeting. The bios also mention what your members are getting out of Toastmasters and Sandy's mentions that she is the Division 1 Governor, which sounds impressive, even if a prospect does not know what that is.

2. You do have some photos on your home page. As noted below, the next step would be to look at the subject of your photos.

3. You have a Google Map for your meeting venue.

4. You have a Facebook link.

Here are some possible improvements that I think could help:

5. Use of color. People have different opinions about using color. I think a little bit more color, used strategically could benefit your website, as it looks a bit bland (plain white), right now. However, use color sparingly, and avoid bright colors. (Like our support lead, Brian says, less is more.)

6. Think of your home page like a great introduction to a great speech. You want it to grab people's attention in a positive way and make them want to find out more about your club by exploring your website, and coming to your meeting. It is the only page of your website that you can be confident that website visitors will actually see. Some things to consider in that regard:

• There are no club members shown in photos on your home page. (I know they are on the Meet Our Members page, but a prospect may not look at that page.) Do you want prospects to think you have no members? A photo slide show *might* help, because it also would add motion to your home page, which also attracts attention.
• The photo of the kids and the turtle on your home page could get misconstrued. When I first saw it, I thought it looked like the boy was urinating on the turtle, not holding a rope. (My apologies to anyone offended by this.)
• Your home page could use an "elevator pitch" or "value proposition" that grabs attention. This could be your club's mission statement, but those are typically dry and boring when used alone. (Could be combined with something else, though.) What will make a prospect want to get up on a Tuesday morning and come to your club? What is special or unique about your club that demands a prospect's attention and time?
• You should brag that your club is the home club of the Division 1 Governor. If you are a Distinguished club or better, put that on your home page. If you have someone going to an area/division speech contest, brag about that on your home page. If someone just got their CC, brag about that. (Brag about your people and your club accomplishments. Accomplishments get positive attention.)
• If you want people to notice your Meet Our Members page, put a link to that page on your home page.

7. Your Meeting Info/Directions page could benefit from an exterior photo of your meeting venue and a short synopsis of directions to your venue from a nearby major road. (e.g., from Route 1) This helps people find your meeting venue, and helps those who are not comfortable using Google Maps to get directions.

8. You could use some supporting web pages (Custom pages) that you strategically link to from your home page. Examples, "Our Club Founder" (A bio page of your club founder and why they started the club), "A Typical Meeting" (what to expect in a meeting), "FAQs", links to your District website, links to good content on the Toastmasters website, etc. If you want to do speech videos, I would suggest putting them on a supporting page (not home page).

9. Enable the hit counter, so you can see what kind of traffic your website is getting.

Overall, I think it is a good start for a website. There are some areas where it could be improved, but these are things that can be done over time. I invite others to also chime in here with their input.

In order to continue to have this forum section be useful into the future, we need to request that everyone contribute to it.

Therefore, we are implementing "Get an evaluation, give an evaluation." . Basically, we are requesting those who have received a website evaluation give a Toastmasters style website evaluation for at least one other club that has requested an evaluation in this forum section. (You get to choose which club website to do the website evaluation for.) Just post your impressions: things you like about the website, and areas for improvement. Everyone has something to offer... just trust your instincts.

Hey Don!

As a new club, you may be even newer to Free Toast Host than I, and I'm pretty new! Just remember, Rome wasn't built in a day, do a little bit as you go.

All solid ides from Steve! Just a few things I noticed;

Yes, the lack of more color first struck me. You CAN color the background, and the "page" that holds the text will still be white. I went with a cream color for our background, just to have something there. Soft, warm colors.

You couple of really nice pictures on t your homepage, but no people! I noticed you have a very nice looking facebook page (good job, by the way), so just get some of THOSE photos on your website. Visitors want to get to know a little more about YOU, not just the organization.

Great job on getting most of your membership to go "public" with their profiles! Of course, you might have just made that decision for them. An idea I've been considering myself.

Like I say, a little at a time. Keep it up.

Blaine Little, ACB
V.P. of PR, TM 1757

I like that you have your own domain. To me that is a professional touch.

Floater message I am mixed about. I think it's clever, but I am not certain it's a selling point. My experience is most people don't know what Toastmasters is. Those who do, probably aren't put off by it being old and stodgy like my father's club was.

I don't know where Bedford is until I click the Meeting Information/Directions page.

Generally speaking, paragraphs are not indented on the web. "Here" does not look correct to my eyes indented.

The text on the homepage does not reflect the Toastmasters mission statement for clubs.

I agree with the above comment of the boy on the turtle.

Meeting Information/Directions
I like it!

Meet Our Members
A good number of members with profiles. Good stuff!

Facebook
Current content. Nice!

I totally agree with Steve's recommendation of an elevator pitch to attract members.

You are on your way!