I'm trying to make Love Clapham better because I really believe this area needs a community site that's independent and run by the community itself. I can't promise it will be 100% perfect because I run it in my spare time out of my own pocket. But if you can help me a bit I will do my best to make it better.

This community section is brand new and it has lots of features I've yet to add to it. What I really want is some people to just help add some profiles, pictures and things, and simply tell me what you think or if you spot anything wrong, anything that needs improving.

Thanks :)

Jack

Nice site Jack - think the map on the Ben and Jerrys listing shows the Clapham in West Sussex rather than the SW London heartlands....

Other than that good work.

Haha, oooops. Will change that :)

I'm going to add a couple of new things over the weekend like a proper events calendar that anyone can add to and a directory for companies. I just want to make sure the community and forum bits work for now. Thanks very much for trying it out.

Jack

Have joined up and promise to have a look around over the weekend and will come back with some suggestions. Archie (the dog) and I have to head off for a walk and a pint now... maybe there are 2 threads for you - drinking and dog walking! M

Thanks very much - you made it this far which is a good sign in itself! :)

Definitely have to do a Love Clapham drinks soon. Perhaps dog walking can be involved at some point too.

I love a forum :-) (I help with one at my work) so if I spot any anomalies, I will let you know. In the mean time good luck with it.

Hi Jack,

I was just browsing around for stuff to do in Clapham and have often thought of setting a similar site up myself.

The basics of your site are good although it is a little bit difficult to navigate.

The main thing I think it needs it promotion, promotion, promotion.

Great that you get lots of hits but you need people to care and be involved and to look forward to regular updates E.G once a week

If you develop it as more of a brand and organise meetings or the odd fun social yourself then it will give it some life. At the moment, there is no real reason to 'become a member' people come on looking for stuff to do but then realise what's on time out is better.

Obviously, it's about developing a community but i run around Clapham Common every week and have never heard of Love Clapham before this!

What kinds of things would you like help with as I'm a willing volunteer?!

Hiya! Thanks for your comments.

I agree, promotion is key but the big problem is that I run the site in my spare time, so I don't have much time to update it or promote it really (nor money). I definitely want to do some meet ups though (I have one planned for in the coming month, date tbc). I've also been toying with the idea of adding advertising to make some money to put back into the site.

In terms of help - anything people want to help with really! It could be content, promotion, or more advice to tidy the site up. Which leads me to, what about the navigation to you find difficult? Would be great to make it as easy to use as possible.

Thanks!
Jack

Hey everyone,

Personally I think the site is fine in terms of usability so don't have much to contribute on that one. I've only just started using it so will note if I come across anything though.

I think the site is great but am wondering what it's aspirations are? Are there any long established community sites out there you could aim at developing along the same lines as? Either in London or internationally?

Maybe I'll go have a look around and see if I can find any examples?

Laters,

Max

Hi Max,

Welcome to the new community! Thanks for your comments.

In my head I have plans, but my full time job and cost of site development are my restrictions. Still, my next big add on will be a proper directory that local businesses and organisations can use.

The biggest aspiration is to involve the local community more so that people start sharing information with each other, e.g. helping each other out, pointing out special local offers etc. There are other local sites with huge communities of local residents and they work really well. I guess it's as 'South Side Resident' says, the site needs more promotion to tell people about it.

Jack

Hi Jack, I'm an online marketer so if there is anything I can help with I'd be happy to be involved. I think the site is easy to navigate.

Your ideas regarding the user generated Events Calendar is great, I'm imagining something along the lines of DontStayIn.com. I also think, though it's nice not to have advertising, it is expected to see ads on sites like this. Google Contextual ads would be unobtrusive and potentially relevant to the content.

Further ideas for content, could be to encourage the various sports and non-sports groups and clubs of Clapham to set up a profile on the Community page, enabling a Facebook Page style feel but on a more local level. Similarly local trades people could do the same, but there should probably be a distinction between profit and not for profit listings, with the former paying for space to discourage spam. [edit: written before I saw the above post]. Another idea would be to somehow link with the Lambeth Freecycle Network.

In terms of promotion, you're already doing most of the free forms of promotion. If advertising makes some profit, perhaps paid promotion could happen. I would recommend search, but perhaps event sponsorship and/or a (re)launch event would get the name out locally.

One last thing, "secret london" has been a massive success story on FB, with the website showing a vision for the future with its secretcities.com URL. Not easily copied, but the "love" prefix could be franchised out to others (perhaps delete that bit to stop people stealing the idea).

The forums editor has a formatting bar so you think it's an RTF editor but then it goes ahead and puts those annoying mark-up codes which is fine for us tech-geek-heads but rather off putting to your avg. punter.

Hi,

I think the Love Clapham idea has loads of extension possibilities and you should definately utilise advertising if it means you will be able to build the site further.

EcoBees.co.uk is another really good local free trading site a bit like free cycle which you should all have a look on. There is some surprisingly good stuff going around.

Developing something on here similar to Secret London or TimeOut for Clapham would transofrm this site as most people are looking for things to do in their spare time when they stumble across it.

Has the tweet up happened yet?

Hi Jack

been following you on Facebook for a while, so I thought I'd check the website. Maybe you could add some "Pink Clapham" type of tab. Gay community is quite big in the area, so may not be a bad idea!

Cheers
C

Willing to help, Jack. I've lived in the area since 1977 and have seen many changes (as you can imagine!). Martin