So i started getting my "fastlane" business going about 9 months back. I quit my job to dedicate more time to the project, 3 months later I had a solid plan of action and knew what to do, and how to do it. Over the last 6 months I've been learning and building the website that will hopefully be the next big thing in the car enthusiast scene.
What it is
Basically it's an Interactive hub, showing all of the meets, events and clubs relative to you, your car and your location... so say you have a BMW 3 Series, it will show you all the clubs relating not only to that car, but also any local meets and events relating to BMW's also, with a social network aspect built in to keep people interested, coming back and interacting with one another, it's all about finding NEW things, new users, new meets, new clubs, new events and bringing everything to the forefront making advertising clubs, events and meets as easy as signing up and posting a "shout". All free of course.
Now building the website is only half of the battle (currently in alpha stage and just put it online to test how it holds up, so far all is looking well minus a few minor bugs and missing features, but all the core content is there and the site "works" so far, even if it is a little clunky (which i will be fixing!))
Advertising the website and making it a success ...
Obviously this site is going to FAIL big time if the existing clubs, events and meets have no interest in joining, so the current plan is to contact each of the major clubs and events and invite them to join, making them feel important, and them feeling like it is a privilege to be joining before launch, not to mention the advertisement perks when the userbase picks up!.
Then once there is a good amount of clubs and events on board, start advertising directly to the core "users" (the car enthusiasts) by attending events, posting on forums, posting videos on youtube, giving away free stickers for car windows to users who post/like us on facebook/twitter etc.
How does that sound? Obviously it's going to be a TON of work and I'm going to have no free time what so ever once I official launch and start advertising, but ... hopefully it will pay off
(in the form of advertisements down the side, car insurance, parts, tyres etc etc all "useful" advertisements for the userbase.)
So ..
Feedback please!
feedback would be extremely useful right now, as obviously I've been shut up for 9 months now thinking this is the best thing ever, so have probably overlooked a few things, be it about the websites functionality, execution or advertisement plan, I'm all ears!
the website itself can be viewed and tested in the alpha stages by going to Car Clubbed (feel free to use a fake email, the validation process is skipped) and if anyone knows sql injection or how to break it, please please do! and get back to me with how you broke it or any bugs you find, there are a few minor bugs and user interface issues i already know about, but so far i haven't found anything "major" other than a lot of the pages not working if viewed when logged out (which I will fix for beta once the logged in stuff all works 100%) as i am testing that the website basically "works" right now... i have a ton of other features to implement yet but want to make sure it doesn't fall over at this stage before moving on
car selection and location is limited for alpha testing, car nationality and style is yet to be implemented (for some niche clubs) but basically, feel free to log in, upload pictures, post shouts, host meets, host events, attend meets/events etc etc basically just try to use it and break it
also i have added fake user profiles, meets, events and clubs for "BMW" models, so select that car from the list if you wish to see how the site looks once populated, other car make/models will give empty results until people start populating them (which won't happen obviously during this testing phase)
heads up that error messages are being handled very poorly right now.. again to be fixed in beta, but if you see any errors that you don't expect please again let me know!
quick photo of what to expect on logging in with a BMW selected as your car, excuse my friends ever so appropriate image ^^
What it is
Basically it's an Interactive hub, showing all of the meets, events and clubs relative to you, your car and your location... so say you have a BMW 3 Series, it will show you all the clubs relating not only to that car, but also any local meets and events relating to BMW's also, with a social network aspect built in to keep people interested, coming back and interacting with one another, it's all about finding NEW things, new users, new meets, new clubs, new events and bringing everything to the forefront making advertising clubs, events and meets as easy as signing up and posting a "shout". All free of course.
Now building the website is only half of the battle (currently in alpha stage and just put it online to test how it holds up, so far all is looking well minus a few minor bugs and missing features, but all the core content is there and the site "works" so far, even if it is a little clunky (which i will be fixing!))
Advertising the website and making it a success ...
Obviously this site is going to FAIL big time if the existing clubs, events and meets have no interest in joining, so the current plan is to contact each of the major clubs and events and invite them to join, making them feel important, and them feeling like it is a privilege to be joining before launch, not to mention the advertisement perks when the userbase picks up!.
Then once there is a good amount of clubs and events on board, start advertising directly to the core "users" (the car enthusiasts) by attending events, posting on forums, posting videos on youtube, giving away free stickers for car windows to users who post/like us on facebook/twitter etc.
How does that sound? Obviously it's going to be a TON of work and I'm going to have no free time what so ever once I official launch and start advertising, but ... hopefully it will pay off
(in the form of advertisements down the side, car insurance, parts, tyres etc etc all "useful" advertisements for the userbase.)So ..
Feedback please!
feedback would be extremely useful right now, as obviously I've been shut up for 9 months now thinking this is the best thing ever, so have probably overlooked a few things, be it about the websites functionality, execution or advertisement plan, I'm all ears!
the website itself can be viewed and tested in the alpha stages by going to Car Clubbed (feel free to use a fake email, the validation process is skipped) and if anyone knows sql injection or how to break it, please please do! and get back to me with how you broke it or any bugs you find, there are a few minor bugs and user interface issues i already know about, but so far i haven't found anything "major" other than a lot of the pages not working if viewed when logged out (which I will fix for beta once the logged in stuff all works 100%) as i am testing that the website basically "works" right now... i have a ton of other features to implement yet but want to make sure it doesn't fall over at this stage before moving on
car selection and location is limited for alpha testing, car nationality and style is yet to be implemented (for some niche clubs) but basically, feel free to log in, upload pictures, post shouts, host meets, host events, attend meets/events etc etc basically just try to use it and break it
also i have added fake user profiles, meets, events and clubs for "BMW" models, so select that car from the list if you wish to see how the site looks once populated, other car make/models will give empty results until people start populating them (which won't happen obviously during this testing phase)
heads up that error messages are being handled very poorly right now.. again to be fixed in beta, but if you see any errors that you don't expect please again let me know!
quick photo of what to expect on logging in with a BMW selected as your car, excuse my friends ever so appropriate image ^^
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