Hi all,
What are your views on squadron websites?
do you think they are something still worth doing? or would you say there isn’t a need with the use of social media?
Thoughts?
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We binned ours off several years ago as we were getting more traffic and enquiries through the book of faces
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I manage a wing website and still get a fair few cadet “wanting to join” contacts through it.
Websites perhaps appeal more to parents and donors than Cadets but still worth doing.
I’d not want all my Sqn online presence owned by the Zuck. (Other global tech brands are available)
I recently made one using https://spark.adobe.com/ it’s not a website more a virtual leaflet. Came across one from Merseyside wing (forgot which one) which looked good and to be honest once it’s put together you slide the link on pages of interest on Facebook etc or email out and we’ve had quite a few messages asking for more info…and it’s free
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Yeh, a minimal Single Page Application is more than enough these days (I like the concept of a “Virtual Leaflet”). If you keep Social Media up to date it’s pretty easy to add in the feed to the website, so there’s low effort in keeping the website up to date (either by using widgets provided, or using APIs, if you have some technically-minded staff or cdts). The days of every Sqn totally reinventing the wheel and showcasing everything that cdts could do has definitely passed - not that I ever thought that was a good idea.
(As an aside, I’d agree with @mprentice1 - Wing websites do still have a place, if only to act as a signposting service with local units etc; done well, these can be better than the Sqn finder that’s on the HQAC website. Region websites, are, and always have been, utterly pointless)
I’m not sure - I thought a lot of teenagers now don’t use Facebook precisely because their parents do.
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Do you actually find much engagement via Facebook - I find kids these days don’t use it - and half the announcements are missed via Facebook. Tends to be the parents that see things on Facebook.
I started using the announcements tool on SMS to mirror and guide cadets to the Facebook page for details of activities or SMS as applicable
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I think a static website has a bit more permanence than FB, or a page on a blog site etc. Though even a basic site needs SSL and responsive design to be credible.
Yeh, in general that’s what I meant, although there’s definitely a growing proportion of “parents of teenagers”-aged people who probably use Social Media a lot more than we might expect
Absolutely.
On the flip side, in the non ATC world I’ve been in to apply for grants (council, local charities etc) and being able to show the great & good a web site with grinning teens is a huge help.
I doubt a social media page would have the same weight, but it’s worth using all available channels.
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That’s why I said a Single Page Application with appropriate feeds, that way you get the best of both worlds: an actual website (www.xxxsqn.com), with minimal updating required because all the content is driven there from SM. With careful use of APIs it wouldn’t even need to look like you were pulling it straight off Twitter / facebook / instagram / tiktok. The static content would be limited to contact / map / a very (imho) short about section
I might go into competition with http://raf.ac 
On a serious note, I did suggest about 10 years ago that HQAC run a totally minimal domain hosting service, so that every Sqn could have http://<sqn#>.aircadets.org, to align with the general email account
Thank you for all of your thoughts and ideas. I have been thinking about creating a game that I can embed into the website using HTML for classification training alongside the training powerpoints on Ultilearn and ACP’s. The idea of which my cadets liked the idea of instead of PowerPoint learning.
We’ve had some emails from new parents from the website.
One said they had seen others in the area, but liked ours and what we could offer.
Although the page hasn’t been updated in years.
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There’s still a place for a squadron website.
We use Wix for design and hosting.
It’s good to plug Instagram and we have a monthly blog too, but essential to keep it up to date… having an out of date website is worse than having no website at all…
I wish that existed. I think your ideas are great, sadly APIs are beyond my skills. I might have to ask a teenager!
^ This!
If you do please share!