Perseverance

I’m hearing this refrain in my head … think of ‘I’ve been working on the railroad …”

We’ve been working on the website
All the live long day
We’ve been working on the website
Cuz we need to make our pay!
Can’t you hear the errors screaming
This is never gonna work!
Can’t we make it really easy?
Come on, Try Again

Come on Try Again
Come on Try Again
Come on Try Again, Again, Again

Well – you get the idea!

We are determined to re-develop our website using the new exciting web tools available for the Wordpress platform.  One main reason is that we want to have a really easy forum to use for our members.  We have a member forum now – but only a couple dozen of our 700 members use it because it’s difficult. We believe that interaction with our members is so important.  And, if the system is really easy, we’ll be able to add new videos and other content easily too – making it more valuable.  I learned long ago that a business cannot rest on its laurels.  I don’t care how good your product or service is, a business needs constant attention and innovation to stay alive and prospering.  And nowhere is this more true than on the Web!

In case anyone is interested in the details, we are building our new website using 4 primary pieces:

1. Wordpress platform
2. Wishlist Member plugin for Wordpress
3. Suffusion theme for Wordpress
4. Simple Press Forum plugin for Wordpress

These four pieces are all built to work together, but still – they are from 4 different developers and each is a complex system in it’s own right.  Imagine taking 4 big jigsaw puzzles and trying to make one picture out of them.  Just when we get 2 pieces to work together right, an error pops up from one of the other pieces.  And, most of the time we really don’t know which piece is causing an error – it can take a full day or even a week to troubleshoot any one error.  Then, we get everything working and one of the pieces comes out with a new version!  I feel like we’re playing ‘Whack-a-Mole’!

We’ve actually been working on this since last November – but we’re just now getting really serious.  We had wanted to announce the new site on July 1 – exactly 2 years from when our first membership site started.  That didn’t happen, but we’re hoping for August 1 now.  It will still be www.GeeksOnTour.com – that will just point to different places behind the scenes.

There have been more than a couple times this week that I’ve wanted to give up, say that our site is fine just the way it is!    But Jim wouldn’t let me!  He’s read enough about membership sites on the web and what the new tools offer that he’s getting more determined than me to make this happen.  As is often the case in our relationship … I get something started, but he makes sure it gets finished!  We’re a great team that way.  And, Jim has taken on the task of making the new forum work the way we want.  My job is to make the video delivery as smooth as possible.  And, the payment process needs to be smooth as well … if we could do this all for free, it would be a lot easier to put it together!  But, if we could do it all for free – then we wouldn’t need to do it at all!

Perseverence is the key!  And, I gotta say,when we struggled for two days with a particular problem … it felt soo good when we solved it! 

Our Picasa eBook is our first test of the capabilities on the new site. 

The eBook is an example of what Wordpress, and Wishlist Member allows us to do … we are able to put links in the eBook to the tutorial videos. Your $10 purchase, not only buys you the eBook, but also a special limited membership that allows access to those specific videos.  Really cool.  A video book if you will.  As long as you’re connected to the Internet, you can read the book and, at specified places, click a link to watch a video that shows you how to do what you just read in the book!

Ok, enough yakking … gotta get back to work.

I’ve been working on the website … all the live long day …

 

del.icio.us Tags: Geeks on Tour,Membership Site

Gabbing with the Geeks: Connecting to the Internet with Droid

Coming to you from Indiana, Jim and Chris talk about their summer tour of RV Rallies:

1. The Rally – July 21-25 in Louisville, KY
2. Family Motorcoach Ass’n (FMCA) Convention -  August 11 – 14 in Redmond, OR
3. Gypsy Gathering Rally – August 30 – Sept 3 in Elkhart, IN
4. Escapade – September 12 – 17 in Goshen, IN

Then they show you how they connect to the Internet by Tethering their Motorola/Verizon Droids.

del.icio.us Tags: Droid Tethering,Geeks on Tour

Thousand Trails - Indian Lakes

We stayed at this same park last year ... right about this same time.  It’s huge.  Plenty of walking trails thru the woods … Odie really likes that … and plenty of roadway to go for bicycle rides, Jim and I really like that. 

I took advantage of the beauty shop located at the park’s camp store building and got a haircut.  I got a haircut here last year too!  Once a year, whether I need it or not!  When you travel all the time it’s a treat to go to the same place.

We’ll be here for about 10 days.  We’re working on our website and preparing for our seminars at The Rally.  There’s no Wi-Fi here (except at the cafe) so we’re depending on Verizon and our Droids tethered to our computers.  Jim says his is working great – mine is pretty pokey but it does work.

Hey, if you already saw the post about Kentucky Horse Park, go look again (it’s just 2 posts back) I added a little movie with a great clip of a horse playing Tether Ball.  They call it his ‘Jolly Ball.’ :-)

Vote for Dee

IT would be so wonderful if Dee could win a new kitchen!  This is a promotional event for a South Florida kitchen and remodeling company.  They will remodel the kitchen of the winning entrant.  All she needs is your votes. Vote for Dee at the Panda Kitchen Contest.

I have known Dee since the early 80s – we used to go to aerobics classes together.  Then she came down with a rare nervous disorder and she’s been in a wheelchair ever since.  Uninsurable, Dee makes her living as a copywriter – a darn good one!  Some of the language on our website (you can probably spot the best-formed sentences) is by her. 

Another thing she’s good at is cooking.  If she wins this kitchen makeover – I look forward to a spectacular dinner when I’m back in Fort Lauderdale!  You can vote once every day.  Just click on Panda Kitchen Contest and search for Dee.  Click the button to View Story and Vote. 

Thanks!

Oh – and if you need a copywriter, leave a comment here and I’ll put you in touch.

Happy Fourth of July from Kentucky Horse Park

Since they are Kentucky natives, we asked our friends at RV-Dreams for suggestions of where to stay.  The Kentucky Horse Park was high on their list .. so, here we are!  The Wi-Fi is $15/day! But, luckily, the Verizon Data signal is strong here, so we are both online by tethering our Droids.
We rarely make reservations anywhere, but big holiday weekends bring out the hordes to all available campgrounds – so we like to make reservations and get parked well before the holiday.  Here’s our site.  I’ll take another picture on the Fourth to show you how there are no empty spaces then!

The campground is adjacent to the Horse Park.  It looks like a great place to go bike riding, so Jim spent most of our first day here working on the bicycles.  They’ve just been hanging on the  back of the car getting rusty for quite some time now.
Good Job!

 

 

We’re also spending a lot of time on our websites, trying to get the whole membership site converted to Wordpress and Wishlist member – see our latest “Gabbing with the Geeks”.  It feels kind of sacrilegious to be sitting inside our RV at our computers working so hard, when there are hundreds of people here on a pilgrimage to the outdoor, fun, campground lifestyle for the Holiday Weekend.  But, then again we get to enjoy that lifestyle when they go back to their offices – so we figure turnabout is fair play.
We will take some time off on the Fourth to watch the fireworks which commemorate our wedding day 12 years ago!  12 of the best years anyone could possibly wish!  And, I feel like we’ve only just begun.

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