Calgon Take Me Away

Richard Charpentier Notes from Rich, RV Park Web Design, Trials on the Road, Web Design Leave a Comment

Here we are closing up shop for the evening.  Let’s see, 5.5 hours today spent on finishing an article for Living In Tin that I started weeks ago.  And while finishing it up I realized that several more articles will be forthcoming.  That’s good.  More information always helps.

After working from 7 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. I took a quick lunch break.  Then I launched back into “RV park contact mode.”  We’ve been in this mode for weeks now.  Reaching out to parks from Arizona to Montana.  In order to reach out to them we’re checking their websites.  One by one, town by town, state by state.  And you know what?

There are a lot of horrible, dated, unattractive websites out there.  There are sites that don’t include their addresses or phone numbers.  Then there are the sites with animated .gifs.  Oh I loved those back in the 90’s (not).  Finally, there are sites that are just down hard, even though the park is still open.  We’ve sent out several letters in the past two weeks to parks and let them know, “Your website is down.”

Those are the most fun.  Finding addresses on places that don’t have a functioning website is trying.  Often their address is listed on their website, and other referring sites just link to their site…..which is down. 

Uh your site is down

Well, this site has been down for the last two weeks….

My favorite site so far?  It has to be a park in Colorado.  The park is under new ownership, and they actually have a very pretty site.  A little busy for my taste, but it’s still a compelling site.  And when I checked to see if it was a mobile friendly site?  Nope.  Clearly the site has just been rebuilt, there’s no way the park owners want to re-pay for the services they’ve already gotten from someone else…..so I checked the link to their web designers.  “Responsive mobile friendly website specialists….”

Really?

Well, we dropped them a letter too.  I’m sure their designers will get a phone call…….

So yes, I’m having a “Calgon take me away moment.”  I need a bubble bath.  Unfortunately I put a new work space into the Airstream instead of a tub.  I knew I should have thought harder about the remodel the other week.

And tomorrow…..reading through website after website again.  🙂  It actually makes me happy when I see a good one…unfortunately a lot of them aren’t making me smile.

 

 

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