SCTA website

[dwarner]

Kent,

You're right. Poor choice of words. I want to see where we stand before making any statements as to what will happen. Please let us know what you want to see in the meantime. I do know there is a list of fixes but, I have not seen it yet. As I stated before this will not be an overnight deal, small steps.

DW

[1212FBGS]

DW its cool, your still my hero! next to my wife your one of the nicest people i know.... as for the site, man these things can get really really deep, been there done that and is best left to someone who likes that sort of thing, you know the kind of guy who likes root canals!
As Deb said, please start with easy navigation... if people are comfortable with the site they will come back...
Kent

[dwarner]

Tom, Deb & Kent,

Thanks for the suggestions. I just passed them on to the web people. I like to see where this goes.

DW

[DahMurf]

Again thanks for taking this on Dan! If you need any uninvolved testers on any new look/feel stuff let me know! I like to poke around on websites when I need a little mental break at work. 

Debbie

[Stainless1]

Again thanks for taking this on Dan! If you need any uninvolved testers on any new look/feel stuff let me know! I like to poke around on websites when I need a little mental break at work. 

Debbie

OK kids, I think it is time we cleaned up a few more 4 letter words around here.... SSS can't we get the W word changed to something like "finance fluffing"   

OK it's a slow day on the site...

[Seldom Seen Slim]

Stainless, since I sold my busines last spring I've been pleasantly unemployed - and my memory seems t be going.  What's that word you mention --- unh, I think it's "wurk" or something -- what's that mean?

[Stainless1]

I don't know, I retired over 2 years ago... but when Linda leaves in the morning, she is pissed off about something so I know the W word is a bad thing... OK sorry for the short hijack Dan, but it keeps your thread on the top... 

[mkilger]

Dan thats great news, but dont you have  so much to do already?  next year maybe pres?  hope to see you in inpound at speedweek.   

[McRat]

It needs a whole section devoted to diesels...   

KIDDING!!! 

In my opinion, the #1 thing about a race info site is to have timely updates when things change.  This is something I think the SCTA has done a good job at.  Not sure how it is currently set up, but all officials of the SCTA (perhaps selected others) should be able to quickly and easily update content without requiring outside assistance.  Anything that works against that will work against getting timely updates.  When I hired a "web designer" for my business, they didn't know what I did for a living, and made it nearly impossible for me to alter the contents without "asking".  That is a lousy way to do things, from personal experience.

Personally, I love good content and pictures, but I'm not a fan of Blingus Maximus:  Overdone flash content that reduces the amount of info on a page is getting more and more common.   NHRA's site is a good example of overdone design, IMO, for a "racer-based" site. 

[dwarner]

Stainless,

No problem on the hijack.

My retirement plan for 2009 is to keep on par with the cat, nap for nap.

DW

[Glen]

I think we should wait to see what the changes are when they post the up graded site. We can nit pick it then and suggest the changes or additional needs. Give it a chance.

[donpearsall]

Dan, good luck, and thanks for the work you will put in on this. I have developed many websites for different purposes and it is a huge amount of work.

My suggestion would be to add fillable Adobe Acrobat forms for membership, vehicle entry, medical forms, etc. That way the entrants can easily fill out the forms on the computer and eliminate illegible entries. The forms would be emailed to the office eliminating postage and mail delays. Adobe has good tools for doing this and a developer could create the existing forms in a few hours.

Don

[Dean Los Angeles]

Don is sooooo right. Making the Adobe forms so that you can fill them out makes life so much easier. The data fields can be formatted so that you get the data in a form that is usable to you, like phone numbers for example.

It's amazing how many people still hard code their web pages. It's so much less work to make them data driven so that the users have control over the content without bothering the poor web guy.

[1212FBGS]

Dean
the only real problem with data is search bots...if you are only posting data and do your own promotions to drive visitors to your content then its OK other wise old school is the best....form fillers and data capture are must have's...
Kent

[Stainless1]

I've suggested BNI membership sales on line several times, always got the "yes that would be good be we are not set up to do anything like that" answer.  If we could submit medical forms, pay BNI memberships and racing entry forms online I think it would be great.