I know I’ve been showing up frequently in the Ideas and Bugs forums, and hopefully you guys aren’t sick of me yet.
I wanted to take an opportunity to say THANK YOU for the fantastic tool that TroopTrack is now, and that you have been improving for us. I get a “warm fuzzy” feeling knowing that I can post in almost any community forum and get a response within hours.
Just in case anyone is interested, here is the website I’ve been building for our pack using TroopTrack. I’m no graphic designer, but TroopTrack makes it easy to concentrate on my content without having to be one. Admittedly, I probably need help!
Great job Mike!!! I am truly impressed with your site. I’ve shown it to my membership chair and Scoutmaster… Yep, I’ll be looking at your site as a guide to improve ours! :):)
If I have a question how to do something, I know where to go!
One thing that I noticed, is your non TT URL points to your TT site. We need to set this up with our current website host.
Can you share any tips that you learned? Inquiry minds want to know!
Thank you for that feedback, @sgaines. The best thing I have to offer right now is to not be afraid to ask - I am still extremely impressed with the feedback loop here at Trooptrack, and at how responsive the TT team has been.
The second best thing I have to offer is that all the content I’ve put up on the website answers questions I’ve had as a new leader. There’s more content I obviously can’t show you without being a member of our pack, but I’ve also created page to give us a 12-month plan. For example, we just had a business meeting today, and thanks to this page we knew that we had to start planning for events occurring within the next several months, and so it’s easier to go through a task-list and get things nailed down. Also created another sheet for “Succession Planning” - so it’s easy for us to see, at least 6 months in advance, which leaders will be leaving the pack as their kids age out. With those 2 pages we hope to avoid dropping the ball after the Blue & Gold dinner…
Thirdly… Analytics. I can now see direct impact of “marketing” in the papers and our Facebook page, on the number of people visiting our Trooptrack site. I can see what works, what doesn’t… I don’t have those answers yet, but I love data and will be reviewing it … some day soon…
I suppose those would be my tips
annual view calendar (no dates, just months)
succession planning
setup analytics, either using a site like StatCounter or Google Analytics.
Thanks for looking and the feedback - I’d love to see your site as well.
You’ve given me a few things to think about. I was impressed not only with the content you posted, but with the formatting of your site. So many troop/pack websites offer the same information (including ours) that it was refreshing to see something different.
I’m sure I’ll be posting questions as they come up.
When building your pages do you have a specific way of getting the information into TT? Meaning, do you build the page in MS Word first, then import it, or do you start with a blank page and go from there?
Oh I see – well, yes, at the moment I’m throwing things together directly in the WYSIWYG editor in TroopTrack, saving often (not because of any instability of my browser, computer or Trooptrack itself… just because it’s good practice JUST IN CASE).
Our Pack is in some disarray, picking up from an exodus of leadership and so as I find us asking/answering questions at our meetings I take notes and throw together these sheets.
Other examples - Activity ideas, to aid den and pack leaders in brain-storming the kinds of events the pack should be doing, adding details when possible to coordinate these events with scouting award requirements. Planning Sheets - so the Annual Plan list now links out to details for each event. So far I’ve put up a page for detailed planning of the pinewood derby, September recruitment… and there will be one for the Blue & Gold dinner, etc. etc. You get the drift.
Now, something you just reminded me of is a request I’m going to put in the Ideas forum shortly - as I put together more and more pages, I wish I could have a consistent look and feel - right now it’s completely on me to do that, so I do have to do a fair bit of side-by-side review between pages - thankful that I have 2 monitors. I’m going to ask for the ability to create templates to include the following:
So that the next time I create a page, I can select the “Event Planning Detail Template” and it will create the page using the header and footer I already defined. AND I’ll be able to include a “Last Updated” datestamp – don’t you hate when you look at a page and you can’t easily tell if it’s 1 day old or 1 year old?
Wow @JamynShanley…, that’s great! Is there a BSA page that links to it?
How did you find the fillable form? I did for a time have a link to a fillable form, but found out too late that it was an old version.
Did you also have a link for the fillable Adult Application?
Of course, my preference is that Trooptrack setup a form so people can self-register, and then Trooptrack just pumps out the form and emails it to the Committee Chair for signing and processing with Council…
