On Fri, 1 Nov 2002, Colin Cobb wrote:
> Hey Blake,
Howdy All...
> That is a great newsletter you put out for your TR folks! 12 pages long! I
> put out about half that every month and it damned nearly kills me!
New England Triumphs does this too (abouy 14 - 20 pages each month). It is
very hard to keep this up, because you have to pester people to get the
submissions in. It is indeed a lot of work.
> Your text to photo ratio seems very well balanced to me.
I agree. Great job, Blake.
> I note that you have several member contributions. How do you motivate them
> to submit material? Do you have to edit the member contributions
> extensively?
I use the "schmooz method". You bump into people at events and if you see
them with a camera or you see them paying particular attention to the
event (like a seminar) and start chatting. Once you get your foot in the
door, it's easy to get them to commit to submitting. The hard part is
getting them to carry though the commitment.
That's where scheme two comes in. You call them on the phone to schmooz
and then subtly remind them of the publication deadline. If you have
enough of a pool of submissions, you can have a few articles in reserve
for the winter months when it is very hard indeed to come up with
interesting material (unless your club holds social non-driving events or
even tech sessions).
> My hard-copy newsletters are running about $1 each so I would expect your
> hard-copy edition to run about $1.50 per mailing address. How much do you
> figure you save your club annually by providing the electronic edition to
> your members who can receive it? We're over $300 annual savings now.
Our newsletter costs about that. $.60 for postage and then another $.60
for copy costs. It ain't cheap. We charge $18 for dues. That pretty much
covers everything with a bit left over for helping out with activities
during the year (like if someone holds a rally and spends $40 on trophies
but then only gets 4 participants...)
> Are you able to sell advertising space?
We don't bother. Too much of a hassle to collect money and double check
that the ads are printed correctly. If we get insistent vendors on the
matter, we ask them to send a box of flyers and we put 'em in grab bags at
the car shows that we participate in as a club.
> Anyway, congrats on a job well done! I hope your membership appreciates your
> efforts!
Ditto - three cheers and a Huzzah!
> Cheers!
>
> --Colin Cobb, Las Cruces, NM, USA
regards,
rml
p.s. latest NET - http://isis.mit.edu/~triumph/NET1102.pdf
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bob Lang Room N42-140Q | This space for rent
Consultant MIT unix-vms-help |
Voice:617-253-7438 FAX: 617-258-9535 |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
///
/// newsletters@autox.team.net mailing list
///
|