How Can We Better Help New Members?

[Adina P]

As we get ready to implement a new series of welcoming and informative emails to new members to help guide them once they join, I'd like your input on a few things:

-- What do new members need to know?

-- What do they need to know first...what's most important?

-- What do they need to know next...and after that?

Mainly I want to get your feedback on what is most critical for new members to learn and what is important for them to learn over a period of time as they settle into DK membership.  We want to ensure they feel welcome, now how to navigate, can find answers to common questions, etc.

When we're done, anyone who wants to get what new members get will be able to sign up for the emails.

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

Hailey, there are already several groups for people living in the Northwest. There's the Pacific Northwest group http://www.doodlekisses.com/group/PNWDoodles, and then there are groups for cities like

Portland  http://www.doodlekisses.com/group/portlandareadoodles and Seattle  http://www.doodlekisses.com/group/seattleareadoodlegroup

You don't "upload" a group, you just start one. When you go to the Groups section, there's a little box in the upper right corner that says + Add

You click that little box and follow the directions. All groups have to be approved by Adina, and quite honestly, there are a lot of groups with very few members and very little activity, so unless there's a big need for something that doesn't already exist , it might not get approved. 

[F, Calla & Luca]

I agree. And here's another:
http://www.doodlekisses.com/group/tricities
There may be more.

[F, Calla & Luca]

I only see 9 members from Idaho.

[Hailey and Oliver]

  thank you!!  i now understand.  Sory about the whole upload thing.  i guess my mind works faster than my fingers.  To be honest,  i didn't see the add the add thing in the corner.  :o.

[Sherri, Sophie, Winston, & Kitty]

It took me months to realize there was a community guideline and FAQ and by then I had stumbled around enough to find everything I needed. I'm admittedly not good about reading emails that come in from things I've joined. Maybe I'm not alone?

Just today I went to a website that was quite busy, like the DK main page. I took one look at it and groaned because I didn't know where to go first, but then I saw the first tab said "Start Here" and I clicked and presto, easy peasy. I know now the guidelines and help info is under the "Main Tab" here but I didn't even realize I could run my cursor over them and find menues with additional links until many months in. I would make it obvious where to go to get the introductory info. "Start Here" worked perfectly for me.

Also, I know people have mentioned that it would be great to have a better search function but also it would be great if there were instructions on how to search in different places, (i.e. searching a specific group vs. the main forum, vs. the whole site...)

[Christine & Camus]

Lots of good ideas.  I think an emphasis on the new members page to - "Be curious, investigate."  When I first joined I spent hours days weeks looking at the groups, reading posts, and found so much information.  It was very informative and fun.   

[Theresa & Duncan]

I noticed pretty early on that seasoned members get frustrated when folks post topics that have been posted before. It can be intimidating for a new member making their first few posts to be told "that's old news, look here", or at least it was for me :). I think a "tweaked" search bar might help with that since it would centralize information and help newbies (and oldbies!) find what they are looking for more easily and cut down on multiple posts (of which I am guilty! I would do a search, not find what I was looking for and happily post a new thread, only to find that I should have looked in the Forum :).

But I having said that, I really don't think it is such a bad thing when people repost similar topics. For one, no two situations/doodles are exactly alike, and refreshing old topics brings new perspectives and experiences. If I see a discussion topic that I already contributed to in a earlier post, I either reply to the new thread to be helpful or just move on to the next thing :).

These are just some thoughts from my own experience though, so I am really interested in some of the other replies here :).

[Shelley & Beans]

I agree, I have read some of those that said it had been posted before and although I haven't done it, have been intimidated to start something that I think may have been posted before. I can't see the harm in re-posts... Often if you are just starting out... as I see we have new members daily, you don't really know what you are looking for something just kind of catches your interest and you read on... So I say let the RE-posting continue. Thanks Theresa... good comments. 

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

The thing is, when a new member asks a question, who's going to answer it? Not usually other new members, lol. It falls to the older members with experience to answer, and I'm sure you can understand that it gets very tiring to keep answering the same questions over and over again, especially when the answers are complicated or require a lot of explanation, and you have typed out the same long explanations and details dozens of times before for years, and the information is all still right here for anyone to find fairly easily.

Personally, when I have a question about anything, I always try to find the answer myself before asking other people for help. That seems natural to me. I understand that it may be different for others, I am speaking from my own perspective. Sometimes I see discussions started for information that is so basic, widespread, and easily found, that I can't help thinking that the person who posted it is just too lazy to look for it or can't read.

There is also only so much space on the main page in the discussion forum, and as new discussions are added, the older ones sink and then disappear. Please forgive me, I don't mean to be intimidating or mean or harsh or hurt anyone's feelings, but I don't know any other way to say this;  it's simply really boring for many of us when we go to the main page and don't see anything interesting or new to talk about or read, but just the same old things that have been asked and answered for years.

It's also kind of frustrating when you have spent hours and hours and sometimes days of your time over several years researching and compiling information and providing it here for the beneift of other people, and rather than even attempt to find it or read it, people ask you to summarize it or repost it ever other day. That's why we say "There have been many discussions here about that, look here" and post a link. Why is that intimidating? The only alternative would be for me or someone else to type it all out again for an hour or two. I don't type. I hunt and peck, and I have arthritis in my hands. I guess another alternative would be to just ignore the "re-posts", and hope that someone else has the information or knowledge that is neede to give an accurate or helpful answer. But ignoring someone seems ruderto me than saying, "look here", lol.

So that's the problem with "re-posting" from another perspective. :-) 

 

[F, Calla & Luca]

I agree with every point you have made. And I do ignore many of the repetitive posts nowadays because of all those reasons too. Life is simply too short at my age to type the same thing over and over and over....Maybe it's difficult for new people to realize just how many discussions there have been about coats and poop and many other topics. I personally think we are very generous and kind when we respond to well meaning people.

[Theresa & Duncan]

I can see your points to be sure, I just don't think all re-posts are a result of "laziness". For me personally, I look up what and were I think it will be, and if it isn't readily available or specific enough then I will post my question. It's a blog after all, living and breathing. Posting a discussion takes time, so if I found precisely what I was looking for I wouldn't bother taking the time to post. I think all of this falls under tweaking the search bar if possible, since intuitively that's just where many people would go to find what they were looking for.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with posting links to previous discussions as a way to responding to new ones. What's intimidating is the way it's posed (and not necessarily by you, this is a broad reply). It's one thing to say "here, you may find this useful" and another to say "this has been discussed countless times before, check here". The person on the receiving end of that second comment will probably feel a little stupid, even if he/she did do a search before hand. Also, there have been times when I was directed to a post that I had actually already read but didn't feel like it answered my particular question, even if the person who directed me thought it did. The only other thing I would add is not all new DK members are new Doodle parents, they are just new to the site but bring their experience with them. t really is a matter of perspective though, so I can't say one is more right or wrong than the other.
And even having said all that, I am usually very excited to see that you (Karen) have replied to one if my posts since you always have very insightful comments. I

[Amy, Cubbie & Ollie]

It is one thing if someone makes a comment about having tried to search but couldn't find the answer but it is another when you see that someone just joined and then that same day they are posting questions in the main forum that have been asked countless times.  That is when they clearly did not make any effort to find the answer themselves and it is frustrating (not to mention boring to see the same post again and again).