Affiliate Paradise

Web sites are an excellent way to let saddle club members remain in contact, to announce upcoming events, and to spotlight photos of members, their horses and past activities. It’s not very difficult to make a saddle club web page, even if you don’t have any web page development experience. With a little planning, you can create an attractive and useful page that members of the saddle club can use as a valuable information resource.

Instructions

1. Decide on the purpose of your saddle club web page. Do you want to give information to gain prospective members, or will it be mainly for existing members? Will you be announcing upcoming events or just showcasing information about the club? If you plan to announce your club’s activities, you will need to update the page frequently. If you are just providing information for prospective members, regular updates might not be necessary unless there is a major change to the club.
2. Based on the purpose of the saddle club web page, gather the needed information. You will need photographs in .jpg or .gif format. You can prepare text in a word processing program and then add it into the saddle club web pages when you are creating them. Make sure you have everything you need before you begin to create the pages.
3. Select a web host. Depending on your saddle club’s budget, you can go with a free web host or purchase hosting services. Free hosting might be appropriate for a small saddle club on a tight budget, but your pages will most likely have ads inserted by the host. If you pay for your web site, it will be ad-free, other than any ads you want to insert on your own.
4. Using templates provided by the web host, a word processing program that can save files as .html, or a web page creation program, put together your saddle club’s web page. Take your time designing the page until you have it just right. If you are trying to attract new members, the page should highlight the benefits of belonging to the saddle club in a prominent place. If you are promoting upcoming events, make sure they take the prominent spot.
5. Upload the page to the web host, and then view it in Internet Explorer (or another browser) to make sure that it looks good. If you have saddle club members using other browsers, such as Firefox, view it in those other browsers as well or ask one of those members to review it for you to make sure it appears correctly. If needed, make changes to the page and re-upload it.
6. Announce the new web page to all of the saddle club members. If you have a mailing list, send out the link. If not, announce it at your next saddle club meeting.

Tips & Warnings

• If your saddle club would like to earn some extra money from its web page, consider adding Google ads or joining a compatible affiliate program. For example, you might advertise horse-related books as an Amazon affiliate or partner with a pet supply company.
• There should always be more than one person who knows the password for the web host and how to upload the saddle club web page, especially if you are using it to track upcoming events and report on past ones, which will mean frequent updates. Get a volunteer from the saddle club, and provide her with the host and password information and a copy of the web page file so she can do updates if needed.