Monday 30 March 2009

Introduction to flyfishmap...

Well here we are at last. ...and as you can see http://www.flyfishmap.com is now live and ready to be populated by you, my fellow flyfisherfolks. As an avid fly fisherman who's been at it for nearly 30 years (here's me with my first fly-caught trout), I've often thought it would be great to have a resource like this.... to explore new areas and find new places to fish. So the idea of this site really is to create a one stop shop for researching your fly fishing adventures around the world.

This site is totally collaborative, and its success and usefulness largely depend on you. There's only a limited amount of pictures and videos I can personally put on the map, but together we can add thousands worldwide and the more there are, the more useful the map becomes to everyone else. So I'd really encourage you guys to pass the word on to your friends, family and colleagues and get them them to add their pictures, videos, blogs and business markers too.

For fly fishing-related businesses, you should look at this site as a way of developing traffic and enquiries to your site. You can do this for FREE with a basic maker or by enhancing your marker with video, slideshows or audio. With engaging multimedia content in your marker, users will know more about your offering and it's therefore more likely that they'll either go to your website, call you or share your marker with their friends.


Ok, I'm just gonna move on to some usage points now.

Using the map

The easiest way to use the map is by clicking a continent button, then clicking on a marker grouping in a country and then finding individual markers. Then click on the marker to open it. Use the key at the bottom of the map to see what each marker represents.

You can refine your search results by using the filter on the right hand side . Tick/untick the boxes and click 'Apply'. However, you will probably only need to do this in areas heavily populated with markers.

You can also use the Search box to look for a particular marker. Our search system finds results by matching your query to the text in the title of each marker and its description box. That information is added by the marker 'owner'.


Creating Markers

To create a marker for the first time, you can either :

a. Click on Register at the top of the homepage
b. Click on Add Marker on the right hand panel of the homepage.

Either way you will need to create an account when creating a marker for the first time.

On entering the Create Marker page, you will be asked to choose or confirm your marker type. You then need to select a title for your marker (for all types of marker), and write a description (all markers except Photo and You Tube). Your description should include an overview of your business, prices, contact details etc. For blog owners you can either include an overview of your blog and screen shot, or create blog markers to promote individual posts for a particular location. If your text exceeds the available text area, then any extra text will appear in a scroll bar.

Then enter your web address from which your Visit Website button will be made.

You then need to upload a photo. Please try and resize the photo to the exact dimensions specified. If you don't, our system will resize the image you upload in proportion to what you have supplied and the image may appear smaller than the optimum display window.

The share button is automatically added into your marker. Each marker has a unique URL enabling anybody seeing your marker to share it via email, social networks (Twitter, Facebook etc) or social bookmarking sites (Digg, Stumbleupon etc).

When the recipient clicks on the link, flyfishmap launches,
zooms into your marker and opens it.

So its worth spending the time to make it look good!

After you have created the marker, the next step is to position it on the map. You do this by zooming in to the position you want to place the marker, click and grab the crosshairs, and drop them on the location. Try to be as accurate as possible by zooming in as far as you can. When you have positioned the marker correctly, 'click save and continue'.

You will then have the opportunity to enhance your basic marker by adding a photo slideshow, video or audio file for which there is an annual fee as indicated. Just upload the files from your PC or Mac....again please try and supply your multimedia to the specifications we have provided on this page.

Photo or YouTube markers cannot be enhanced in this way.

If you don't want to enhance your marker just leave everything blank and click Save and Continue. The final steps are to create an account name and if you have enhanced your marker, you will need to pay via paypal account which accepts paypal payments or any major credit card.

Once we have received your marker application, we will review it and then approve it to go live on the map. We aim to do this within 48hrs, hopefully much quicker but in some circumstances this could be longer. If you do not see your marker within 72 hrs, please send a message via the contact form and we will get back to you.

After you have an account, you can then login to flyfishmap.


My Markers

Once you have an account and are logged in, you can manage your markers in 'My Markers' which you can see at the top of the page. Here you can manage your existing markers, edit/enhance, update them, delete them and create new markers.

Next to your marker, you will see its URL, you can use
or share this link anywhere on your website (on the contact page for example) or the web.

In My Banners, you will also find a number of banners and buttons which you can use to link back to your marker or our homepage. We'd really appreciate any exposure you can give for these materials, and as we are giving you a free link on our site, we hope that you will return the favour.

Fly fishing related businesses may also be interested to join our network on Linked In set up recently as a forum to discuss issues affecting the fly fishing industry worldwide. Please note, this is only available if you work in the industry.

Personal users can also connect with us via Twitter or join our page on Facebook

One last thing I'd like to point out is that, at the moment, the site is in beta, which means there may well be the odd bug or problem we haven't yet discovered in our testing. I'd be extremely grateful if you find anything that you think is wrong or in error, or think could just be plain better, by reporting it to us via the 'contact us' form. We have a number of plans to develop the site further but would really welcome any of your feedback and ideas too. The more feedback we get, the better we can make this site. And in this regard I'd ask that you have some patience in your usage of this site, which shouldn't be too hard for you as you're a flyfisher!

Lastly, we have created a quick survey for your feedback and first thoughts on using the site.
Click here to take survey

Well that about wraps up our first post. We sincerely hope you enjoy using flyfishmap and we look forward to seeing your markers.

In the meantime happy mapping and tight lines!


Ed Burgass
Founder
flyfishmap.com

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