SeaRayCorporate
Member
[There's a thread over the Cruising and Lifestyles forum that prompted me to write this]
As some of you may have noticed, Sea Ray recently completely revamped the Sea Ray Owners Club.
Just to quickly recap, we launched a sneak preview of a completely new Sea Ray Owners Club in November 2015. The previous model, which was in place for 20 years, primarily entailed earning "points" through various activities (usually dealer-related) that you could use toward the purchase of a future Sea Ray. (And the distribution of some hats at select boat shows.) Participation in that program/model was extremely low -- it really only benefited a small handful of Sea Ray owners each year who were in the market for a new boat. Even then, only 7% of new boat transactions in a year involved redemption of Owners Club points. So, the program didn't benefit any Sea Ray owner who wasn't in the market for a new boat, and even of those who were purchasing a new boat, 93% didn't use the program.
So, we decided there had to be a better way. We wanted to transition from what we believe had become a "Buyers Club" to an "Owners Club." We decided that the cornerstone of that program would be events. Sea Ray would contribute direct money to local events -- both dealer-led and owner-led events. We're in the process of rolling out that model in 2016. Our goal is 30 local events funded by Sea Ray in year 1, with a couple super-regional "keynote" events too. If the cornerstone of the program was going to be events, we needed to figure out how to organize, communicate and keep track of the events. That led us to create a Sea Ray Owners Club portal (SeaRay.com/OwnersClub).
Once we made the decision to host an online portal (primarily for event management) we started identifying all of the other things we could add there. Product previews, technical resources, latest news, opportunities for customers to answer each other's questions, etc. A particular pain point for customers (prior to the new portal) was a dodgy interface with Sea Ray technical information on SeaRay.com. There was A LOT of negative feedback about it when we launched the current SeaRay.com in Sept of 2014. So, we went back and organized, labeled and added metadata to 12GB of technical documentation (thousands of files), some stretching back 40+ years. We also set up the system so that once you logged in with your HIN, we'd automatically go harvest the documents most applicable to your boat and present them in your profile so you wouldn't have to search for them. The other 12GB of information are also available in a Technical Resources tab. The tech resources have robust search and filter capabilities too. Many models have owner manuals, parts manuals, prop charts and more. There's also an FAQ tab and an Answers by Owners for items Sea Ray doesn't have technical documents to address.
Finally, we wanted to make sure that the new Sea Ray Owners Club was inclusive of all Sea Ray owners -- regardless of the age of your boat and how you acquired it. "A HIN and you're in" was phrase during development; if you have a Hull Identification Number for your Sea Ray, you can get access to searay.com/ownersclub. There isn't a Sea Ray Owners Club "number" assigned to you anymore. Your boat is your key.
So, that’s the new Sea Ray Owners Club in a nutshell. Log in and check it out. Let us know what you think. If you’d like to see something different about the web portal, use the link in the lower right (Called “submit an idea”) and other community members will be able to vote on the best ideas for implementation.
[video=youtube;4__r-mLFl58]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4__r-mLFl58[/video]
PS - We've discussed this new approach directly with Jim here at CSR to ensure his comfort with it. We have an enormous respect for what he's built at ClubSeaRay and we recognize the unique value of a vibrant independent enthusiast forum (something pretty rare in the marine community!) We don't intend to upset that or replace it.
As some of you may have noticed, Sea Ray recently completely revamped the Sea Ray Owners Club.
Just to quickly recap, we launched a sneak preview of a completely new Sea Ray Owners Club in November 2015. The previous model, which was in place for 20 years, primarily entailed earning "points" through various activities (usually dealer-related) that you could use toward the purchase of a future Sea Ray. (And the distribution of some hats at select boat shows.) Participation in that program/model was extremely low -- it really only benefited a small handful of Sea Ray owners each year who were in the market for a new boat. Even then, only 7% of new boat transactions in a year involved redemption of Owners Club points. So, the program didn't benefit any Sea Ray owner who wasn't in the market for a new boat, and even of those who were purchasing a new boat, 93% didn't use the program.
So, we decided there had to be a better way. We wanted to transition from what we believe had become a "Buyers Club" to an "Owners Club." We decided that the cornerstone of that program would be events. Sea Ray would contribute direct money to local events -- both dealer-led and owner-led events. We're in the process of rolling out that model in 2016. Our goal is 30 local events funded by Sea Ray in year 1, with a couple super-regional "keynote" events too. If the cornerstone of the program was going to be events, we needed to figure out how to organize, communicate and keep track of the events. That led us to create a Sea Ray Owners Club portal (SeaRay.com/OwnersClub).
Once we made the decision to host an online portal (primarily for event management) we started identifying all of the other things we could add there. Product previews, technical resources, latest news, opportunities for customers to answer each other's questions, etc. A particular pain point for customers (prior to the new portal) was a dodgy interface with Sea Ray technical information on SeaRay.com. There was A LOT of negative feedback about it when we launched the current SeaRay.com in Sept of 2014. So, we went back and organized, labeled and added metadata to 12GB of technical documentation (thousands of files), some stretching back 40+ years. We also set up the system so that once you logged in with your HIN, we'd automatically go harvest the documents most applicable to your boat and present them in your profile so you wouldn't have to search for them. The other 12GB of information are also available in a Technical Resources tab. The tech resources have robust search and filter capabilities too. Many models have owner manuals, parts manuals, prop charts and more. There's also an FAQ tab and an Answers by Owners for items Sea Ray doesn't have technical documents to address.
Finally, we wanted to make sure that the new Sea Ray Owners Club was inclusive of all Sea Ray owners -- regardless of the age of your boat and how you acquired it. "A HIN and you're in" was phrase during development; if you have a Hull Identification Number for your Sea Ray, you can get access to searay.com/ownersclub. There isn't a Sea Ray Owners Club "number" assigned to you anymore. Your boat is your key.
So, that’s the new Sea Ray Owners Club in a nutshell. Log in and check it out. Let us know what you think. If you’d like to see something different about the web portal, use the link in the lower right (Called “submit an idea”) and other community members will be able to vote on the best ideas for implementation.
[video=youtube;4__r-mLFl58]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4__r-mLFl58[/video]
PS - We've discussed this new approach directly with Jim here at CSR to ensure his comfort with it. We have an enormous respect for what he's built at ClubSeaRay and we recognize the unique value of a vibrant independent enthusiast forum (something pretty rare in the marine community!) We don't intend to upset that or replace it.