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This article was originally published in the Photo Community News email newsletter.
I have looked at more camera club websites than I probably should admit to, and here is the plain truth: before a single person ever walks through your door, most of them have already walked through your website. What they find there decides whether they show up at all.
Think about what happens when someone hears about your club for the first time. Maybe a friend mentioned it. Maybe they searched “camera clubs near me.” Whatever the path, they end up on your website, and in about ten seconds they decide whether they are interested. That’s just how people size up anything online now, including camera clubs.
For a lot of clubs, that ten-second moment is exactly where new members get lost, long before anyone on the board ever knows they existed.
Two Ways to Blow the First Ten Seconds
Here is the honest diagnosis. Camera club websites tend to fail in one of two ways. Either they are outdated and abandoned, with events from three years ago still listed, photos that haven’t changed since the Obama administration, and a “contact us” link that goes nowhere. Or they are so cluttered with information that a first-time visitor has no idea where to look or what to do. Too much or too little. Both are membership killers.
Part of the problem is the platform. A lot of clubs are still running on ClubExpress, Wild Apricot, or similar club management systems that were genuinely useful when they launched, but they haven’t aged well. Other clubs went the opposite direction and built something free on Wix or Weebly: fine for a hobby blog, never designed for what a club actually needs. Either way, the layout feels stiff, and both approaches push clubs toward dumping everything onto one page instead of thinking about what a first-time visitor actually needs.
What Your Website Should Actually Do
What should your website actually be? I think there are two valid approaches, and which one you choose depends on your club’s size, budget, and whether you have someone who can build and maintain it.
The first is a clean, simple marketing site. Its only job is to answer five questions:
- What is this club about?
- How does it operate?
- Where is it located?
- What are the benefits of joining?
- How do I join?
That’s it. If a first-time visitor can answer all five in under two minutes and knows exactly what to do next, your website is doing its job.
The second is a full hub: everything the marketing site does, plus a password-protected area for members with resources, past presentations, competition results, and the kind of content that gives members a reason to come back regularly. This is a bigger lift to build and maintain, but it creates real ongoing value for the people who already joined.
One thing worth knowing: many clubs have moved their member hub function to a private Facebook group, and honestly, there is nothing wrong with that. It’s where many people already spend time, and it’s free, as long as someone is actively maintaining it and it’s actually building participation among members instead of just sitting there collecting dust.
Your Home Page Is a Landing Page, Not a Filing Cabinet
Whichever path you take, the home page has one job. It’s the entry point to everything your club has to offer, and it needs to feel like a welcome mat rather than a filing cabinet. It should reflect your club’s personality and feature real photography by real members, not stock images or clip art. Above all, it needs to make the path to “how do I get involved” as short and obvious as possible.
I made a version of this argument in Is Your Camera Club Making a Good First Impression? (link once published), which covered the whole first-visit experience, online and in the room. This piece goes deeper on the online half, because most clubs don’t realize how much actually rides on it.
Social Media Has the Same Job
Social media works the same way. If your club’s Facebook page or Instagram is mostly competition scores, ribbon counts, and board meeting announcements, you are not marketing your club; you’re talking to yourselves. Post the photography. Show people having fun doing something they love. That is what makes a stranger think, I want to be part of that.
Your online presence isn’t a formality. For most people who find you, it’s your first impression and your best recruiting tool. Treat it that way.
Now go pick up that camera and shoot something! Because – “Your BEST shot is your NEXT shot!” — Joe Edelman
