Sponsors?

I'm fine with having a little sponsors link on the site. As long as it's not overly intrusive (popups etc). Also a little money in the piggy bank would be well justified to cover some of the costs of maintaining this great MTB site/resource.

In Whistler BC they have a weekly Loony race (use to be $1 but these days $2 to enter). The races are organised by various stores with the money going towards a cup of soup and a beer at the end of the race. These are social events and an opportunity ride with a variety of skill levels. From moms dads and kids to pros, all in the same race in good spirit. These races are historically of a weekday evening (off course it doesn’t get dark till 10 -11pm in summer). Could this work here, perhaps fortnightly, what say the mob?

I for one don't think this sort of site should be getting into "sponsorship" arrangements. That implies a commerciality I don't think is appropriate. We're not a club and we don't have any costs so it's a bit of a can of worms for mine.

To me sponsorship implies some sort of contractual agreement with said supplier (whoever they are) which confers them some advertising and custom to them and importantly perhaps exclusivity and influence which wouldn't be good.

If the site gets paid for this then how is the cash used? Is there a company set up to run the site or does it go to Rob Pty Ltd... not that I have a problem with that if it goes towards your running costs, but over and above that this isn't a profiteering site and beginning to take us that way is a slippery slope.

We're already pretty good at letting each other know where's good to shop or take your bike for a tune up without introducing any undue bias.

I doubt we'd get anything much out of it anyway, look how the Phantom one went...

Anyhoo if they're giving away free bikes to all of us then fire away, otherwise I'd be for steering clear.

Ta,
Matt.

what if in return for the banner there was a 5% off link or something like that ????

Ah... come on, give us some credit!

What I'm thinking is that certain places, product and services get talked about in our forums a lot. This is basically free advertising for them so in a way we are already doing ads... but it's a bit hit and miss. If certain purveyors[1] of products and services want more people to notice them then what is proposed is a small ad. under the 'random image', in exchange for small favors. 'Small favors' in this instance range from nada, to building trails we love to ride, to a couple of beers, to a small kickback on referrals, to a few $$$ up front.

We're not talking your usual flashing banners here, and loads of em. Just a single small image that will change on page load.

And we're not talking all commercial either, I imagine we can use the space to point people towards clubs and other worthwhile stuff where appropriate.

And if the by-product of all this is that someone ends up with a small beer kitty at the end of the year that is spent at a social BBQ, are you really going to complain?

[1] Anything relating to Specialized will be banned of course!

OK, just to make things fair - no mention of Cannondale either!

Although - have you seen that picture on the splash page at the mo? How cool is that?

with Specialized?

As I have always said Specialized and Cannondale are the Holden and Ford of the mountain biking world.

It's a friendly rivalry between these two tribes that have'nt experienced the joys of a high end machine.

i personally think after all the hard work rob's put into this site that he's not gonna flatten us all with cheap looking pop ups and and crap cheesy ad's. have a little faith people, im sure it'll be all just fine and will probably benefit most of us.

personally mate i think you should do whatever you want if you think you can get a bit of back scratchin' for all your hard efforts, so be it, you sure deserve it!
fwiw also the sites that seem to be recomended here are due to everyone having good experiences with them and users helping others to find out about them. i cant tell u how many people ive recommended to places like t7 etc because they save people sooo much $ and trouble, and i only know about them through nob-mob really..
as for cannondale adds, the trouble is they wont be able to afford to advertise because of their new revolutionary cork finish, square wheel, 2009 line up sending them broke

Looks fine not obtrusive at all.

a links page would be handy too

LBS's
pop net stores
community sites
related homepages
(user submittable)

with the sponsored ones listed special separate at the top.

With 115 guests online (!!! - is this working?) then that's a lot of one persons bandwidth thats being chewed.

Having said the above Rob and I have knocked back all, of the many offers, for ads/sponsors we have received over the years. This is the only advertiser we believed to be appropriate - Rob and I have discussed this particular party for 3 months! Someone who offered a service a lot of folks here use / ask about anyway.

We're talking less then you would spend on a dinner out (not including grog) - any advertising will cover bandwidth and that's it. Should there be anything left then perhaps a case of beer at the NobMob xmas party - but these are the penny-ante sorts of $$$s involved.

Craig, everyone here has an input into the site - if there is any issue whatsoever with any ad, let us know.

Third entry in the "Navigation" box, left hand side of the page.

Having just seen tis all good, not too obtrusive and lots of clubs etc on there. I also agree on the links bit, maybe that mini-ad at the top left should link to the links page and have icons and categories on that.

And if this gives you a bit of beer money over and above running costs we can't say you don't deserve it, thanks Rob.

Ta,
Matt.
(20 minutes away from the coolest MTB park (Woodhill Auckland) and unable to ride cause I've done my back in... grrrrarrrgh... I'll just have to content myself with fitting my new set of Lyrics ;-})