Membership FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)

WHAT THE HECK IS THIS ALL ABOUT?

We, the Locally Grown Triumvirate, want you to support Locally Grown Northfield (LG or LoGroNo) financially by becoming a member. We’re proud of what we’ve done in our first three years. We want to keep doing it and more. Financial support will help sustain that effort.

PROUD? OF WHAT?

Since our launch in Sept. 2006, LG has:

• published 2,500 blog posts and 170 podcast episodes
• received 30,000 comments by 900 different people
• published 160+ photo albums of community events, totaling many thousand photos
• grown to over 8,000 unique visitors per month

SO YOU’RE BUSY. BIG DEAL. WHAT’S THE POINT OF ALL THAT?

Our broad mission is similar to Northfield.org’s, i.e., using the internet/online tools to strengthen the civic fabric of the Northfield area since we’re part of Northfield’s civic blogosphere. But we focus our efforts on:

• curating local news and issues with the help of our fellow citizens
• convening civil but opinionated conversations with citizens and community leaders
• publishing photos of local citizens in public to ‘show the community to itself’
• delivering it all in a way that’s responsible, ethical, fun, and sometime irreverent. We even toss in some faux news occasionally, just to keep you on your toes. This approach keeps it interesting for us and hopefully for you.

IF I BECOME A MEMBER, WHAT CONTENT WILL I GET THAT NON-MEMBERS WON’T GET?

None.

HUH? YOU WANT ME TO PAY YOU FOR SOMETHING THAT EVERYONE GETS FOR FREE ANYWAY?

Yeah. We like to think of LG as a civic asset, with all content and conversations accessible to everyone.

WHY NOT BECOME A NON-PROFIT? YOU COULD GET GRANTS AND MY MEMBERSHIP WOULD BE TAX DEDUCTIBLE, RIGHT?

We’ve not ruled it out. But NCO/Northfield.org currently occupies that space in town and so it makes sense to us to try a different model.

WHY NOT SUPPORT THE SITE WITH ADVERTISING?

We took a brief stab at selling banner ads in early 2009 but discovered that it really takes someone devoted to advertising sales to make that revenue stream work, as KYMN Radio, the Northfield Entertainment Guide, and the Northfield News know only too well. So while we don’t rule out traditional banner ads in the future, we’re opting for an alternative approach.

SO I GET NO EXTRAS BY BECOMING A MEMBER, NOT EVEN A USELESS MUG OR CHINTZY MOUSEPAD?

No membership trinkets right now (we’ve not ruled them out), but there are some benefits to becoming a member:

• You are spared from having to see annoying banner ads nagging you to become a member during our membership weeks.
• You are spared from having annoying Google AdSense ads cluttering up the site the rest of the time.
• Basic members get to publish blog posts to the members’ sidebar blog. We’ll select some of those blog posts for publishing on our main blog.
• Premium and Premium Plus members also get to publish 2-4 blog posts/month advertising products/services or promoting a cause or event. So we’re allowing for advertising but in the form of members’ sidebar blog posts and attached conversations. A business owner or a non-profit organization staffer or a local citizen can all advertise/promote in the same way.
• You get invited to monthly LG parties at local pubs. These social gatherings will be open to anyone as we think it’ll be another way to encourage people to become members. But you’ll get an e-engraved invitation.

Update 12/30/09: We’ve created a 7-minute screencast video in which we explain how our Membership Sideblog can be used to promote a product, service, cause, or event for $2.50.

WHAT NEW STUFF ARE YOU CONSIDERING FOR THE SITE?

We’d like to host web forums and live-chats with local community leaders and other special guests. We’d like to do more video. We’d like to be able to report on/summarize all that’s happening in the local blogosphere each week. We’d like to have more reporting, more journalism, like the RepJ project we hosted last year. These extras could be provided by other people besides the LG Triumvirate.

SO IF YOU GET A LOT OF MEMBERS, YOU’LL OFFER THAT STUFF?

No. Our thinking is that membership revenue will sustain our current offerings (blogging, podcasting, moderating, photos, technical tasks), which takes about 10-20 hours/week. Once we get to a sustainable level on that, then we’ll likely ask people to financially support the extras on a per project basis. How?

For example, a local freelance journalist might propose doing a series of investigative reports for $X; or one of the Triumvirate might propose to moderate a series of four live-chats with local elected officials for $X; or a local student might propose producing a series of video interviews with local artists, musicians, athletes, etc. for $X.

We’d help do fundraising for each project proposed. Once a project’s dollar amount was raised, then the person making the ‘pitch’ would perform the service.

IF I BECOME A MEMBER, WHERE DOES MY MONEY GO?

Into Griff’s bank account, since he’s currently doing most of the work on the site. He’ll throw Ross and Tracy a bone occasionally.

WHAT ARE THE MEMBERSHIP PLAN OPTIONS?

• Basic: $3/month OR $36/year, recurring. (No banner ads; sideblog posting privileges)
• Premium: $5/month OR $60/year, recurring. (Same as Basic, plus the ability to submit two ads/PR-type posts to the sideblog/month)
• Premium Plus: $10/month OR $120/year, recurring. (Same as Basic, plus the ability to submit four ads/PR-type posts to the sideblog/month)

HOW DO I PAY?

We prefer that you pay via debit/credit card or PayPal. It saves us time.

What about paying with cash or a check?

Both are accepted. Use our Contact Us page to make arrangements.

WHAT IF I WANT TO CANCEL?

You can easily cancel a recurring account any time. We provide a link for you to click.

I DON’T LIKE RECURRING CHARGES. WHAT IF I JUST WANT TO GIVE YOU A LUMP SUM?

We provide an option for you to ‘donate’ any amount. We’ll then figure out how to fit that into a membership plan for you.

WHAT HAPPENS AFTER I PAY?

You’re sent to a web page with a form to fill out that asks for your first and last name, your email address, a username and a password.

WHY DO I NEED A USERNAME AND PASSWORD?

You have to be logged in if you want to avoid the annoying ads or author blog posts.

WHAT IF I DON’T KNOW HOW TO AUTHOR BLOG POSTS?

We’ll teach and help you.

Who’s had good results from using the sideblog posts to promote something?

See this blog post: Membership testimonial: PEHS gets a third of its web traffic from Locally Grown

WHAT IF I HAVE MORE QUESTIONS?

Contact us.

THIS FAQ HAS GONE ON WAY TOO LONG. WHAT SHOULD I DO NOW?

Click here to consider which membership payment options are best for you.

And thanks for considering it.