Happy Birthday Parfumo!
11 years ago
Today, Parfumo International is one year old.
I just want to say a big Thank you! to everybody who supported us, especially by contributing so many excellent perfume reviews and forum posts.
So, it is time to give you a feedback about Parfumo's progress.
When we started this project, it was not clear at all that this site would attract people. Whereas the German Parfumo was more or less the only perfume community in the German part of the web for a long time, Parfumo International has to compete with at least two other big and successful sites that have been around for many years.
A clean design and lots of cool features is what Parfumo had to offer initially, but from the first day after go-live it dawned on me that only excellent service would make people feel at home here, and so we tried to do just this.
Success came very soon. The news was spread among the Facebook groups and by word of mouth. We soon found out that quite a few people were discontent with some shortcomings they had experienced elsewhere and so decided to try Parfumo. Many of those who joined in were serious perfume lovers who asked for a site where their own ideas and quality standards were met.
By now, Parfumo International has gained its own unique profile. We are focussing on perfume reviews – sharing one's own experience of fragrances with others. Besides that, the forum offers lots of opportunities for perfume discussion as well as to socialise, and so, the Parfumo International community sprouted. We invite users to take some effort, and to take their hobby seriously. Both newbies and experts are welcome here, and all can learn from each other.
What I am really proud of is that the atmosphere on this site is extremely friendly and supportive. We reap what we saw, and I think it was a good decision to try and be as friendly and supportive as possible instead of setting strict rules or being bossy. The moderators team formed lately was asked to follow the same policy.
I consider Parfumo International still an insider's tip. We currently cannot compete with the traffic on the older community sites – but shouldn't we see it as a matter of quality before quantity? I am happy and thankful that the Parfumo International community is so active – and considered its small size, more active than the German Parfumo. I feel we are still in the phase of forming a high quality community site which will eventually be well-known to a more general audience.
Parfumo International is growing, and even strongly. We have days with more than 1000 people visiting Parfumo International, and the last month brought one new visitor's record after another. I think we are on a good way.
So, what are our plans for the future?
Don is currently working hard on the database. As already announced the process of adding new perfumes and corrections of perfume data is being worked over. The general idea is to let the whole community take part in this process more actively simply because the number of suggestions has grown in a way that we can hardly handle them on our own. Suggesting new perfumes, checking the suggestions and finally approving or rejecting them will generally be a matter of the whole community in the future. There are so many ideas for new features and improvements but it is essential that the webmaster will be relieved from the work of approving perfume suggestions in the long run. We have to get it going.
I wish everybody a happy new year, and I am really curious about what 2013 has in store for Parfumo!
I just want to say a big Thank you! to everybody who supported us, especially by contributing so many excellent perfume reviews and forum posts.
So, it is time to give you a feedback about Parfumo's progress.
When we started this project, it was not clear at all that this site would attract people. Whereas the German Parfumo was more or less the only perfume community in the German part of the web for a long time, Parfumo International has to compete with at least two other big and successful sites that have been around for many years.
A clean design and lots of cool features is what Parfumo had to offer initially, but from the first day after go-live it dawned on me that only excellent service would make people feel at home here, and so we tried to do just this.
Success came very soon. The news was spread among the Facebook groups and by word of mouth. We soon found out that quite a few people were discontent with some shortcomings they had experienced elsewhere and so decided to try Parfumo. Many of those who joined in were serious perfume lovers who asked for a site where their own ideas and quality standards were met.
By now, Parfumo International has gained its own unique profile. We are focussing on perfume reviews – sharing one's own experience of fragrances with others. Besides that, the forum offers lots of opportunities for perfume discussion as well as to socialise, and so, the Parfumo International community sprouted. We invite users to take some effort, and to take their hobby seriously. Both newbies and experts are welcome here, and all can learn from each other.
What I am really proud of is that the atmosphere on this site is extremely friendly and supportive. We reap what we saw, and I think it was a good decision to try and be as friendly and supportive as possible instead of setting strict rules or being bossy. The moderators team formed lately was asked to follow the same policy.
I consider Parfumo International still an insider's tip. We currently cannot compete with the traffic on the older community sites – but shouldn't we see it as a matter of quality before quantity? I am happy and thankful that the Parfumo International community is so active – and considered its small size, more active than the German Parfumo. I feel we are still in the phase of forming a high quality community site which will eventually be well-known to a more general audience.
Parfumo International is growing, and even strongly. We have days with more than 1000 people visiting Parfumo International, and the last month brought one new visitor's record after another. I think we are on a good way.
So, what are our plans for the future?
Don is currently working hard on the database. As already announced the process of adding new perfumes and corrections of perfume data is being worked over. The general idea is to let the whole community take part in this process more actively simply because the number of suggestions has grown in a way that we can hardly handle them on our own. Suggesting new perfumes, checking the suggestions and finally approving or rejecting them will generally be a matter of the whole community in the future. There are so many ideas for new features and improvements but it is essential that the webmaster will be relieved from the work of approving perfume suggestions in the long run. We have to get it going.
I wish everybody a happy new year, and I am really curious about what 2013 has in store for Parfumo!
