Overall I feel it has been a good season for engagement with online platforms producing the best results in terms of "reach". Our various social media accounts have grown accordingly (see below).
Traditional media definitely took a hit through COVID and several regular contacts in the region have been made redundant or have moved on to other publications or regions. I have been able to find their successors and generally the Johnston Press network has been grateful for previews and have published them digitally (and sometimes in print) on the appropriate regional platforms.
In a similar way, the change of staff at PTPRC has meant that for much of the season I have been sending previews to Weatherbys and they haven't been appearing on the national site in a timely fashion but I think I now have the correct people to target for this, though our photos now rarely get used, sadly.
I would like to express my concern that I am still not being informed of fixture changes and dates. I was surprised to be told at the second last meeting of the year that all the 2022-23 dates had been largely agreed and I had no knowledge of it. It was quite embarrassing when asked by a member of the public whether I thought it was wise that a meeting moved to a particular date and I had to admit that I was the last to know.
Likewise I am having to publicise the fixture pages on the MP website without sponsor details or, worse still, sponsor details which are out of date. Please send through the information as soon as you have it.
In the build up to events we have a policy that we don't push meetings until the meeting before has taken place. When there are significant gaps this does not cause a problem but when we get to congested parts of the season please understand that I will not be posting about your fixture in the run up to another Midlands meeting.
When I am looking to push your meeting I need your info to do it. I can, and often have to, write generic posts about the weather being nice for pointing etc. but it would be nice if you could tell me what your going is so I don't have to source it myself from the National website. The trade stands or other non-racing interests you have organised, special events, gate opening times and so on is also useful info for my preview, especially as I am increasingly challenged to write about the racing because I know from trainers that their horses aren't running. At the moment I get more info from trainers than from Secretaries.
I want to publish fixture pages and Facebook Events for our 2022-23 season as soon as possible please. As soon as meetings have been confirmed (I'm sure I won't be told) please send me your planner page details so I can convert that into a web page and get it up on our site for people to plan ahead. Likewise any details of national series qualifiers, or any other race you are awarded which has a National Sponsor, please let me know.
I'm not sure this really fits into the PRO remit but I have ended up looking after the equipment most of the time (with thanks to James for starting the season so well for me) and it has been a great success. Judges have embraced it and now find it easy to use and review. We have had several results where the iPad helped produce the correct result and one dead heat that nobody viewing the video could split even with the technology.
I have created a sub-site for the main Midlands Pointing website at https://howto.midlandspointing.com to allow for MAPPA colleagues to be able to learn how things are done in case of emergency, or simply as a place where you can find forms and documents quickly and easily. I will be adding to it regularly (this report is on there for example) and welcome any ideas as to what info would be usefully included.
It is not currently secured in any way because there is no info on there which would compromise anything but in due course I will be making it a membership site and sending you usernames and passwords accordingly.
I put quite a bit of effort into the SEO of our website so it is pleasing to see that search is by far the biggest source of traffic.
| Organic search | 17,515 |
| Referral from other sites | 9,788 |
| Direct Typing of URL | 9,448 |
| Social Media | 8,418 |
| JPI Media (Johnston Press) | 118 |
| Unique Users | 40,157 |
| Pageviews | 139,191 |
| 18-24 age group | 10.2% |
| 25-34 age group | 19.3% |
| 35-44 age group | 19.3% |
| 45-54 age group | 19.1% |
| 55-64 age group | 17.1% |
| 65+ age group | 15% |
| Home page | 21,400 page views |
| Shop | 17,566 |
| South Notts Fixture Page | 4,485 |
| Revesby Races Fixture Page | 4,425 |
| Pytchley (Guilsborough) Fixture Page | 4,043 |
| Revesby Preview | 2,186 |
| Brocklesby Fixture Page | 2,079 |
| Quorn Fixture Page | 1,724 |
| Cottesmore Fixture Page | 1,719 |
| Resources > Glossary | 1,370 |
For info. We don't pay to promote our social accounts in any way so this is completely organic growth (usually about 5-10% growth per month during the season)
| Facebook (Midlands Pointing) | 2556 |
| Instagram (@midlandsptp) | 945 |
| Twitter (@midlandsptp) | 1153 |
E-Tickets have remained a significant time and stress overhead this season.
There have been problems at the Future Ticketing end caused by the fact that the central national account management now allows people from outside our area to advertise their events and products on our sales pages. People from other areas were also duplicating tickets which we had set up to reduce work for themselves, resulting in their event tickets being shown on our ticketing pages because they hadn't updated the details on the system.
There have also been scanner issues in the latter half of the season. Due to the poor reception at most of our courses we have to operate our scanners in offline mode, meaning the data has to be downloaded from the national system on the morning of the meeting and uploaded onto the individual scanners which are then supposed to work offline. However, they have been trying to reach the national system every time a scan was made which caused major delays in verifying tickets. I have now been through a laborious process with the techies at FT and reset/reinstalled both scanners. I have posted the process on the How-To pages in case we need them again!
Having said all that the sales of e-tickets continues to add value to fixtures. It is difficult for me to filter the event ticket reports to remove the officials and owners and report back to you all how each event did for sales. If you would like the raw data so that you can remove the people you know didn't pay for their tickets and work out how many did then please send me an email.
A major positive of the season has been the uptake of mobile card machines on courses and these have worked well. HSBC, iZettle, Sumup, Square and others have all been shown to be usable, with one course/meeting reporting twice the income on the card machine compared to e-tickets. This has to be an important way forward.
