He lead the tour and genuinely seemed interested in being there. He's a great Carlton guy and the love he has of our club is there for all to see. You can't help but respect and admire his devotion.

The pie was good. My spelling/grammar on the above post... not so. My points were clear enough, but not proof read.

_________________
"In fairness it did seem in the early days of the draft teams would just pick a name totally at random out of a hat. I'm pretty sure we picked James Cook at #2 one year. The mediocre forward, not the explorer" - Me, 12/9/2011

Carlton 2012: Lets remind them why they once feared the Dark.

The night I went to last year was structured like that. Less people, and more discussion.

Tonight was essentially a tour of the club, filling in a feedback form - which did have some good questions - and then general chat to whoever you could catch.

I had written down some notes and ideas today but only got to mention one of them.

Hindsight the tour should have been shorter and a more focussed discussion afterwards. The idea was right, the execution not quite so, but they are planning on running another night soon enough.

However, the new GM Consumer Business and Digital Marketing Clinton Brown spoke to us for a while and is a super switched on bloke. Has worked with Hawthorn, Collingwood, an English soccer club who I cannot recall, and Channel 7. Very enthusiastic, very experienced.

Not sure how much I can say about what's planned, but there seem to be a lot of exciting things in the pipeline (one starting very soon, this Friday) and I think they are getting some good people there to help implement them.

I didn't get any of that at all. I was in the 6pm group, we had a brief introduction by Coutts and then the two guys running the new media side (with Clinton standing in the doorway) gave a very brief introduction to themselves and explained how they set up and monitor the Twitter and Facebook pages. Then we had a tour of the facilities and that was it (admittedly this was well taken by an enthusiastic De Bolfo). At least the night was a bit better for your group.

From where I sit it was a huge opportunity missed by the club, no two ways about it. They need to make these things worthwhile for us and them, the way tonight went it was beneficial for neither.

_________________
"In fairness it did seem in the early days of the draft teams would just pick a name totally at random out of a hat. I'm pretty sure we picked James Cook at #2 one year. The mediocre forward, not the explorer" - Me, 12/9/2011

Carlton 2012: Lets remind them why they once feared the Dark.

I was also in that group. After the tour some friends and I went into the main meeting room and started talking to Clinton, so it was only a small group of us talking to him.

Tony De Bolfo is fantastic! Without wanting to sound completely morbid it will be a very sad day for the club when he is gone.

In fairness to Coutts (and I'm by no means a fan of his or the marketing/membership departments) but I think you need to know the context of how the discussion came about.

Had he been in discussion for 5mins already or did he drag him aside as Coutts was looking for someone?

You have to keep in mind that in an event like this Coutts will have dozens of people trying to talk to him and while sean has some excellent ideas, everyone thinks they have a great idea and want time to make their point made.

Maybe he was being rude and dismissive, but maybe he was just busy.

_________________
"The ability to speak doesn't make you intelligent." Qui-Gon Jinn 15-05-2005

"there’s more chance of me becoming the full forward for the [Western Bulldogs] than there is of any change in the Labor Party." Julia Gillard 18-05-2010

Our report on the night with some pics as well,

http://spiritofcarlton.com/blog/2011/08 ... cial-2011/

For those on twitter you can see all sorts of comments and pictures from others who attended if you search for the #CarltonSocial2011 hashtag.

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

_________________
WADA medical director Dr Alan Vernec describes Essendon* FC drug case as biggest scandal in team sport the world of sport has seen. #WC2WB

#GUILTY

I completely understand that, but the way it felt to me was like he'd been in a conversation for 5 minutes, even though it was only 30 seconds.

He was standing completely on his own outside the function room, I approached him and initiated a conversation. I said nights like this are a good idea as a way to connect with the fans and that all we want is quality, not quantity. I totally agree lots of people would approach him and he'd have to humour a lot of them, but thats sort of his job on nights like tonight, isn't it?

I was chatting, telling him an idea, and he looked around to acknowledge someone walking by and then had a brief exchange them whilst I stood there. It wasn't very good at all. I'd have been better off talking to Luca or Clinton, but I think both had gone in to join the next group.

_________________
"In fairness it did seem in the early days of the draft teams would just pick a name totally at random out of a hat. I'm pretty sure we picked James Cook at #2 one year. The mediocre forward, not the explorer" - Me, 12/9/2011

Carlton 2012: Lets remind them why they once feared the Dark.

sean,

I read your comments and can understand your frustrations. I would like to give my perspective though.

The exact idea you presented to Ian Coutts has been presented to him before (on more than one occassion) and the relevant staff are aware of it. The club is aware of the need to present as a 'news' organisation, it is also aware of its obligations to the football department and the AFL.

It can be a fine line between getting information out to the public quickly and too quickly. The club is aware of it and they are working towards getting the balance right between informing the public about new information as quickly as possible and obligations to interested parties such as the football department, the AFL and even sponsors.

I spoke to those who organised the event tonight and I can tell you they were very enthusiastic in terms of processing both the verbal and written feedback from the night.

Tonight was probably more about giving than taking from the club's point of view tonight, there were too many people to make it an effective focus group type arrangement, however this is the first of many hopefully and do not be surprised if things are tweaked for future events and other more feedback focussed events are also organised.

Having had a bit to do with the club for 6 or 7 years now I can say from my experience that the club has really advanced at an enormous rate in the last 12 months alone. The club now has a lot of savvy people in there working hard, I'm pretty excited about what they might produce in the next few years and I was pretty cynical just a few years ago.

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

Supper time at seanpb's house

_________________
"I had to eat"

... what? I penetrated the apple pie?

What a glorious misfire that was, NBH. Honestly, that is probably the worst attempt at humour I've seen on a forum in a very, very long time.

SoC, I've very little faith in the people running the show at the moment. All these 'industry' types or 'qualified' professionals exist to co-exist. They need each other to backslap and protect one another. Deloitte Digital come in and tell companies what their consumers want... brilliant. Thats the sort of business I want to be in: not creating answers or solving problems, but getting others to give them to you. How about you just ask them yourselves using the services you've been given for free by Mark Zuckerberg and whoever it was that created Twitter? Here's a draft: "@Carlton_FC we want to improve our service. Please help by suggesting various ways we could do this #BeNavy"

There is no downside whatsoever to the idea I floated. Unoriginal or not, it doesn't make it a bad idea. If people have been suggesting it for ages why hasn't it been done? Did they need to pay an advisor to sign off on something heaps of people have suggested, thus acknowledging the want for it by the market they directly serve? Every person who uses this site or follows the Facebook/Twitter pages wouldn't go 'you know, Carlton gave me that news I've been craving all week too quickly. I'd prefer to find out by listening to the radio or watching the channel 10 news later on'.

The beauty of new media is you get the info you want quickly. Why not get it first from the source?

I digress, Coutts was rude and left a bad impression.

_________________
"In fairness it did seem in the early days of the draft teams would just pick a name totally at random out of a hat. I'm pretty sure we picked James Cook at #2 one year. The mediocre forward, not the explorer" - Me, 12/9/2011

Carlton 2012: Lets remind them why they once feared the Dark.

Thought I made the point pretty clearly, it is a difficult job for a football club to act as a news organisation. You know, competing interests and all.

Anyway, what did you think of the muffins?

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

How is it difficult? They have a camera. They would have a computer. Mock up a simple graphic template of the team sheet, amend as necessary each week, have someone speak clearly into a microphone, sync this to the film of them, upload to the universal services you pay nothing for.

I don't want them to cover the Gaddafi stuff or uncover drug rings in Malaysia following months of undercover investigative journalism... I don't want them to be 60 Minutes. I want them to take advantage of an easy opening to appease their fans, of which I am one.

Its not like theres an embargo on the info, they post it first on Twitter/Facebook. It'd be a very good way to explain the ins and outs and provide updates on players who are injured or returning from injury. Its not like they have to justify their selections to the fans, but its a really good way of reaching us.

The muffins were fine.

_________________
"In fairness it did seem in the early days of the draft teams would just pick a name totally at random out of a hat. I'm pretty sure we picked James Cook at #2 one year. The mediocre forward, not the explorer" - Me, 12/9/2011

Carlton 2012: Lets remind them why they once feared the Dark.

I liked the mini chocolate muffins.

They are usually $1.50 in the Carlton Cafe. Good price tonight.

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

How much tonight?

_________________

1,000,000 Zimbabwean dollars. Or for the pedantic, free.

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

Do you get wafers with it?

_________________
#DonTheStash

Yes, and they were wafer thin.

The food was great, my compliments to the mandy cook.

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

Also, thanks to D & K Office Supplies, proud supporter of the Carlton Football Club for the free pen.

_________________
The Spirit of Carlton compels you!

_________________
#DonTheStash