Looking for volunteers to run one (or two?) clubs, for welcoming ppl and helping ^_^

[sothis]

agreed - nothing would change in the forum, this would just be the easy place to point people to. what im thinking is the bio for that account could contain links to all of the common questions/issues that people ask, such as the links to the anime/manga help threads, a blog post somewhere that shows how to register for the forum, info on setting up anime lists (drahken did a great post about this), etc

[Habhome]

Sounds like a really good plan, I vote "aye" for that.

[randomredneck]

Originally Posted by Habhome

Sounds like a really good plan, I vote "aye" for that.

I second the idea.

[sothis]

just as more ammo for why this is a good idea (the 'help' club), out of all of the comment form submissions i receive, probably 95% of the ones that arent spam are things easily answered in the forum. either an anime/manga that's out of date, asking how to change a username, asking why they cant log in to the forum (they dont know about the two accounts), etc. i get so many of these that it keeps me from working on other features, plus given everything i'm doing i often forget to respond at all.

i think the combination of welcoming (shows we're friendly here :)) and simultaneously pointing people to the 'help' user means that questions will be answered before they'd get to me, and everyone would be happier with the site in the process!

[Habhome]

Originally Posted by sothis

just as more ammo for why this is a good idea (the 'help' club), out of all of the comment form submissions i receive, probably 95% of the ones that arent spam are things easily answered in the forum. either an anime/manga that's out of date, asking how to change a username, asking why they cant log in to the forum (they dont know about the two accounts), etc. i get so many of these that it keeps me from working on other features, plus given everything i'm doing i often forget to respond at all.

i think the combination of welcoming (shows we're friendly here :)) and simultaneously pointing people to the 'help' user means that questions will be answered before they'd get to me, and everyone would be happier with the site in the process!

Yeah, the welcomers should say something like:

"Hi! Welcome to the site! *personal comment if there's something interesting in the bio* If you need any help then feel free to drop a comment at *link to help account*"

[HihioZabimaru]

I would love to help welcoming people. I already try to do it as often as I can, so this would be great.

[greg975]

Originally Posted by sothis

greg - i mean on the site, not the forum. lots of folks don't know about the forum, don't realize you have to have two accounts, etc. this would be a group that would welcome people on the site (User Community - Anime-Planet <---the new users). yes, some people might introduce themselves, but a lot won't/wouldn't. this is us coming to them.

i can tell you from experience over the last 10 years that when people are welcomed to a site personally, and see that it's a friendly community, it greatly impacts their desire to stay. i say this having left messages like that myself (especially when i had more time), and watched when others did so, as well. the response was 99% of the time extremely positive, people often were surprised that someone was actually reading their profile, they immediately felt welcomed, etc. trust me, it works :)

Alright, I get your point, I always see AP's site and forum as both being indiscriminately part of the same great thing with is Anime-Planet, thus I didn't understand the meaning of the "welcoming club".

I agree with what you're saying when it comes to being welcomed personally. It's really different. There's a great community in AP, that's actually why I stayed in the forum, it'd be too bad if people didn't know that because it wouldn't be "transparent" enough.

Originally Posted by sothis

i think the combination of welcoming (shows we're friendly here :)) and simultaneously pointing people to the 'help' user means that questions will be answered before they'd get to me, and everyone would be happier with the site in the process!

*Agrees* You get my vote! ^^

Count me in the "Welcoming club" if this idea comes to life. By the way, how do you plan on starting this club? Did you think of a way to train mobs/members?

[sothis]

what i'd ideally like to find is a few people who would be interested in running both (others would be members, but i'd like to find a few people who actually want to run it - meaning in the future they'd be the ones to be proactive and start conversations with the members about ideas/projects, assign badges, recruit new members (or have a plan for that and delegate to others), etc).

i could create the subforums for the clubs and also help brainstorm and together all of the members/mods/me could come up with how we'd want people to get started, what sorts of things should be said, any of that. i can help out at first, but yeah, the goal is to have people who are willing to run it :) this way you can run the club without me (i can pop in from time to time and help too ofc, or help with decisions if people cant decide, coding help for features we might need, etc), which means you can do more autonomously and i can work on site features instead :D

[randomredneck]

Originally Posted by sothis

what i'd ideally like to find is a few people who would be interested in running both (others would be members, but i'd like to find a few people who actually want to run it - meaning in the future they'd be the ones to be proactive and start conversations with the members about ideas/projects, assign badges, recruit new members (or have a plan for that and delegate to others), etc).

i could create the subforums for the clubs and also help brainstorm and together all of the members/mods/me could come up with how we'd want people to get started, what sorts of things should be said, any of that. i can help out at first, but yeah, the goal is to have people who are willing to run it :) this way you can run the club without me (i can pop in from time to time and help too ofc, or help with decisions if people cant decide, coding help for features we might need, etc), which means you can do more autonomously and i can work on site features instead :D

Count me out of the running the thing option. I'm not exactly cut out for that sort of thing. Be happy to be a member though.

[Habhome]

I wouldn't be too reluctant about being one of maybe two or so in charge, I've been running the Claiming club before for some time, and I was active in the Stalking club which was aimed at making people feel welcome and otherwise entertain members =P

You know who I am I guess, and if you think I'd be fit for it I'd be willing to give it a shot ^^