Category for Affiliated Societies

[epiphyte]

It would be great if there was a specific category where members of orchid societies could exchange information.

For example...

In order to publicize our upcoming presentations, we have recently started to encourage speakers to send us a list of orchids that they will be offering for sale at upcoming presentations. As soon as the list is received we will post it our OSSC flickr group...and within a week of the presentation we will post it on the Farm and Garden section of Craigslist. The list can only be posted to Craigslist within one week of the presentation because Craigslist automatically deletes all posts in 7 days.

Here's the list of orchids offered for sale that I just posted to our OSSC flickr group.

In addition to helping to publicize the society...posting the list of orchids for sale benefits society members by allowing them time to research the orchids that will be offered for sale and benefits the speaker by increasing demand for their orchids. So it's a win win win situation.

[bswanson]

Thanks for your suggestion. I am currently researching classified systems (along with other additions) to integrate into our new forum.

It was great to hear how your society is meeting this need. I might have questions on this as I work on this.

If other people have suggestion please reply to this thread.

Thanks again and keep the suggestion coming!

[epiphyte]

Hmm...a classified category would add some value. My recommendation would be for it to be completely free.

Regarding a category for society discussion...under Affiliated Societies...there is a category called AOS Society Discussion. Instead of having that category just link to the AOS Affiliated Societies Blog...it should be a regular category where members of orchid societies can post topics relevant to running a successful society....such as...providing value for members, promoting the society, educational goals and so on. Blogs are great... but forums are more conducive for actual discussion. The link to the blog can be posted in a sticky thread instead.

[epiphyte]

Another topic for the AOS Society Discussion category...

How many orchid societies regularly have a computer with internet access available at their monthly meetings? My society currently doesn't, but hopefully we will by our next meeting.

The large majority of the members of my society are quite unaware of many of the orchid resources on the internet. Due to the low level of computer literacy it's not sufficient just to tell our members about useful websites. Our plan is to set aside a few minutes every meeting to connect the computer to a projector and show our members how to utilize the various orchid resources on the internet.

[epiphyte]

On the off chance that there is another orchid hobbyist or orchid society webmaster who is somewhat proficient in vb.net...

At the request of my society I programmed a flickr API to display photos from our Flickr Group on our society's website. I just sent the page to our webmaster (who coincidently also programs in vb.net) so the page has not yet been integrated into our web site. However, here's the non-stylized version of the flickr API vb.net orchid photo gallery.

If there does happen to be somebody with a working knowledge of vb.net or at least an interest in learning a web programming language...feel free to PM me your e-mail address and I'll e-mail the file to you.

[epiphyte]

Have any societies tried offering free membership to students with a valid ID?

[epiphyte]

I just recently revamped my orchid society's visitor sign in sheet to help track where visitors are hearing about us. I'd be interested in seeing other society's sign in sheets or if you would like a copy of the one I revamped please PM me your e-mail address.

Speaking of where visitors can find out about us...I just created a twitter account for my orchid society. Any other orchid societies have a twitter account?

[epiphyte]

Today I did a google search for the Intercity Cactus & Succulent Show that will be held this weekend at the LA Arboretum. One of the search results was for the Cactus and Succulent Society of America facebook page. Woah! They have 291 fans since they created their page a little over a month ago.

So I decided it was time to create a facebook page for the Orchid Society of Southern California.

Here are the only other orchid societies with a page on facebook....

Tulsa Orchid Society

Spokane Orchid Society

Orchid Society of Minnesota

[raybark]

For what it's worth, I have opened up a free auction site for orchid folks, and if societies want to use it as a way to share divisions and the like, supplies, etc., they are welcomed to do so.

I really don't want it publicized too broadly, as that may lead to posting of less-than-desirable stuff.

Click Here

[epiphyte]

An excellent, free resource for orchid societies is Google Analytics which is extremely helpful for keeping track of information about visitors to the society website.

It can help answer questions such as...

Which websites send the most visitors to your website?
Traffic Sources -> Referring Sites

Which search engine keywords are helping visitors to find your website?
Traffic Sources -> Keywords

How long are visitors spending on your website?
Visitors: Time on Site

Where are your visitors coming from?
Visitors -> Map Overlay

Which of your pages are the most popular?
Content -> Top Content

Additionally, it's easy to generate PDF reports which can be shared with others. For example...

Here is a report which displays all the sites which have referred visitors to the OSSC website for the past year...sorted from most visitors to least visitors.

Referrers to OSSC website (PDF document)

Here are a few of the stats from that report...

1: Flickr: 414 visits
3: Craigslist: 131 visits
7: fascinationoforchids: 39 visits
9. forum.theorchidsource.com: 33 visits
16: aos: 23 visits

According to a recent e-mail sent out by the AOS...the AOS website receives 7,000 unique visitors per week. With 7,000 unique visitors per week, you'd figure that more than 23 people per year would visit my society's website from the AOS website. The low percentage of trickle over from the AOS website can probably be explained by how the affiliated societies link is not prominently displayed on the AOS website.