In an effort to evaluate our marketing plan and see if we were meeting our Felt and Fiber Forum Members needs, we conducted a member and guest survey May 20 though 27.

Overall, the results were good in terms of the satisfaction of our members.  There are a few things we will be working on to make some improvements to enhance the site and information available to members.

Our first question  was “What Brought you to the Felt and Fiber Studio forum/Blog?”  Since we are an online community, it was important to know how people find us.

I added invitation to the list on the graph because several comments we had included that as an option we hadn’t offered on the questionnaire.

For those members who found us on an online search, half of the respondents chose “wet felting” as their search criteria, 25% “fiber,” and 25% used “needle felting.” Other comments included — felting, fibre, fleece,  and wool roving.

93% of the respondents said they were satisfied with the interaction on the forum. Sometimes was the response for 7%.  The comments for “Why not” were,  “I don’t feel I have much to contribute to the conversations, but find them interesting” and “I check in occasionally, but not regularly.”

Members (79%) feel valued.  65% feel their interests are well represented. Friendly and helpful members rated 93%.  Comments requested more information on spinning, weaving, crochet, etc.

 

 

One of the most interesting answers for me was the activities members are looking for on the forum.

Comments included “Mixed media is more interesting to me,” and “online classes.”

Participation would be higher if we were able to give our members more time.  100% of the respondents checked this off.  What this tells me is that those regular members somehow make time to visit, while others pop in occasionally when they have a few minutes available.  Giveaways and classes were also considerations at 8% each.  “A larger membership with increased posts would naturally prompt me to respond more frequently” was a surprising comment for this question.  We’d love to have more members participate, if only we could find a way to give them more time!

 

92% of Forum members also subscribe to the Blog.  Again time was mentioned in the comments as to why members did not belong to both.

One of the reasons I wanted to do the survey was to see how we could get our members to help us increase our membership and participation.  Here were the results:

Again there is that power of “word of mouth.”

I was also curious how people felt about the lack of advertising since we make an effort to keep the site uncluttered and supportive of the purpose of the forum without compromising the integrity of the site.  71% liked not having advertising.  29% had no opinion.  However, the comments were revealing — quality fiber related vendors would be welcome. Others commented that the sponsorship banner was a good idea.

What does all this mean?

Generally, it means for those members who responded,  The Felt & Fiber Studio Forum/Blog is doing a good job as a friendly place to share most things fiber enthusiasts care about.  The information gives us a few directions to improve or make changes that would benefit our members and, hopefully, engage our current members to help attract new members and other ways such as Search Engine Optimization clues to drive more online traffic our way.

Can we improve?  Of course!  There are things we will be doing in the future to offer more of what our members want to see and do.  In addition, we will provide some material to promote the forum for anyone who wants to help.

In the mean time, keep telling your friends about us and come by often to share what you’ve been working on with us, offer some tips or let us know how we’re doing.

Our thanks to everyone who took the time to complete the survey!

We hope to see you all on the Forum soon! http://feltandfiberstudio.proboards.com