Club admins guide Pt 1: Starting a club.
Hello! I am a currently 600 chess player. What i lack in chess, i make up for in club experience. March 5th was the day I started. My ambition was to help others get better while learning myself. I had a successful club with currently 200+ with being in the top 100 in VC (more on that in a different blog).
Every blog, I interview a different person on a different topic, and on this blog, it's @tanvistiger.
Hello!
So what is your club's name?
Super Chess Masters
How many members does it have?
It has 410 members
Are you super admin (SA) or admin (A) in any other clubs?
Yes, I am an admin of Shadow Wolf, Gunners, Chess Gutzers and I am a Super Admin in my own club Variant Chess. It just started a few days ago so it doesn't have many members.
And I'm guessing the first 3 are successful.
Yup they have over 100 members in them.
Ok. So how did you decide to start your own club?
It's a long story, let me explain…
I saw a lot of my friends making chess clubs with a lot of members in them. They were making tournaments, daily matches, vote chess, and many more. I thought it was really interesting so I decided to make my own club and here I am with my own club "Variant Chess"
How do you make a club?
You can make a club by going to the heading "Social" on the left corner and clicking on the subheading "Clubs". It will show all your clubs and on the right-hand side you will see more subheadings which include "Create a Club". Click on that, give your club a unique name, profile pic, and description, and publish it. After making a club, you need to start inviting people and making your club the #1 best club to join.
How does my club "take off"?
Your club can "take off" by making interesting activities and forums. You have to invite a lot of members to your club and maybe keep something like the first 10 people to join my club will be admin. People will be interested and will join your club. You can keep a jobs forum for everyone who joins. They can go to that forum and try to be a coordinator or an admin of the club. Your club also has to be very active and keep on making daily tournaments/vote chess for like every week. Your club can "take off" within a few months if you follow this.
I don't like the idea of "first 10 get admin". If we don't do that, how do we get a club to be active?
To make a club active, you have to invite and entertain. Start a conversation in the notes or forums, get to know the members of your club! You could also make daily tournaments and post daily puzzles/riddles for people to enjoy and look through in their free time.
How can I get a big club like me or you fast?
Invite friends by sharing invite links or begging to your most active friends on chess.com. When your club has 30 members you can start inviting more people, make more activities, and promote a person for them to invite and manage the club when you are not active. When the community gets bigger your club will get bigger.
In your last response, you said "and promote a person for them to invite and manage the club when you are not active."
How can I Manage a club with jobs?
You can manage a club with jobs by keeping a few people to make vote chess, tournaments, fun forums (daily puzzles, riddles, etc.), and maybe a daily tournament checker to see if anyone is stalling. With these jobs, your club will get really active and could grow.
Sometimes this doesn't work. I'll dive into it in a later blog.
Should I go into a big club and learn more?
Yes you should go into a big club and learn more and see what they do to get more members or make the club active. You will get an idea on how to start your own club.
Sometimes the struggle is getting members to do vote chess or matches.
How can I get people from a club to join a vote chess or match?
To get people to do vote chess or matches maybe you should put up an announcement or a forum with the match link/vote chess link. If they disabled notifications for the club then maybe send them a message saying you need help for this match/vote chess. In big clubs, this is not a problem. Naturally, people would join. In small, growing clubs you might have to encourage and make people join.
Last question, If you stop working on the club, will the club go inactive?
Yes, if you stop working on the club, the club will be inactive. When the club is inactive, people start to leave the club because they think the club is no longer useful to them. That's why we should always put in some time for the club so people don't leave and so the club does not get inactive.
Ok, real last question, did you like the interview?
Yes, I enjoyed the interview.
Well that's good. Alright, bye.
MY THOUGHTS
My thoughts are you should make a club, nurture it, and make useful people admin. First time small clubs are hard, so before you get into it, join a bigger club. Create a list of club names, and make your club. Public clubs mean you can join without permission from an admin, and Private means you do. Ban means they can't join no matter what. You can invite within the club, or on someone's profile. If you have any other questions, or want to compliment me, type it in the comments.
FYI, this takes a few days of my time to interview, so i wish it was out sooner.
If you want to be interviewed in the next one, register here: https://www.chess.com/forum/view/clubs-and-teams/club-admins-guide-sign-up-forum-72171381
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS
Q. Is a club a community too?
A. Yes, it is. It’s important to maintain a healthy, kind, and friendly community too. If it was a toxic, unkind community, no one would stay as they would dislike the club.
