Message Boards (Pt 2)

I mentioned earlier this month that one of the more popular message boards had been revamped, with negative response. Rivals is a Sky owned organsiation and it does seem that they have shot themselves in the foot. Its not just Charlton contributors that have revolted, but across the board other fans have expressed dissatisfaction. Its strange, Sky have a justifiable reputation of good solid marketing, so to cheese off their customer base to the extent that they walk away is incredible. As a marketer, albeit unemployed at the moment, I am trying to fathom what they are doing. The site can only be successful if there is a reason for customers to go there and for the Rivals sites the uniqueness is the easy to use, fan driven message boards. Sky do not seem to realise that the loyalty is to the board not the host. So to turn the fans away from the message boards does seem to be gross negligence on behalf of Sky.

Sky's loss is the gain for others, I have been frequenting Netaddicks, Charlton Life , BBC 606 and also the Rivals site. The nice thing about the BBC site and the Rivals site is that you can go onto other Clubs sites and find out about our loan players, for instance I was asking about Kelly Youga earlier this week on BBC 606 (Scunthorpe), with more parochially hosted sites this is not always possible. The good thing about Charlton Life is that it is parochially Charlton and is totally Charlton orientated.

Paul May, also known as ReamsOfVerse put a lot of work into the old Coveredendchoir, hosted on Rivals, which was ditched by them in the change. The result being that not only has Paul upped sticks but he has taken his ball with him and set up Covered End Choir on fansonline, with promises of more to come the site is looking good and beginning to get old and new users back on board.

its nice to see Sky shoot themselves in the foot for a change and their mistake has benefited their competitors. Its good that there are a variety of venues to have Charlton chat, its like Saturdays The Rose of Denmark, The Oak, The Bugle etc,. each of us makes our choice where we meet our friends and the same is happening on line - just stay out of the seedy Rivals place!