Issues with Cloverleaf Club

[alfaowner]

Hi all,

I've seen a lot of negative things said around the forum about the Cloverleaf Club. Can anyone who is already a member or potential member or have thought about joining In the past offer any feedback on this?

What are the issues? If you thought about joining and decided against it, what changed your mind? Anything constructive welcome, don't be shy :-) Give me examples if you can.

I'd like to see if we can get some of these problems addressed.

Many thanks

AO

(No personal information will be passed on)

[EVEL]

I cant really say anything negative about them as i only ever really enter the comps on there .


And i won the Bose comp last November , Portable ipod docking station

So from me

[Squadrone Rosso]

You know my (partially) resolved issues Ian

[alfaowner]

Well this is fairly positive as there are not many complaints, I assume they have got their act together then

[Hunter]

Sycophantic site run by over-zealous protectionist marketing people.




My experience was that my racing day out last year was cancelled and never re-scheduled.


Enjoy the meeting Ian

[zulu ferret]

Received it for a while but then that ceased. I haven't thought about it much at all since.:

[GCDBONES123]

Hmm hunters opinion may be tad strong but he has a point. It just feels soulless and im afraid to say pointless. It does feel like its done by marketing people not Alfitsi im afraid and that would be tgotally OK if there was an open forum, they listened and acted on the issues (2.2 hesitatation - GRRR ) or had some decent offers to make it worth your visit.
To be fair I cant remember the last visit I made but that probably sums up the issue for me. Went 15 or 20 times and didnt find anything to keep me coming back so simply gave up. Compare and contrast to this site though and im here nearly every day despite my best efforts to stop

[GCDBONES123]

oh yeah - the Mto £500 offer was worth having but by the time i got to my dealers they told me I couldnt have it. Shelled out £16K on a supermini having just shelled out best part of £20K on a 159 and driven nothing but Alfas for 10 year and I couldnt get the £500 0ffer. May seem trivial but its the little things like that where people start getting aggrivated and they build resentment instead of brand loyalty. Im damn sure any other marque with an active customer on the hook would have strecthed the offer for an existing owners club wwhere they know my prior car buying history? (RANT over )

[GTA_Nigel]

The web site is very clunky and it's pretty dead over there as far as the forum is concerned. It's obvious they don't want negative publicity on there (re issues with Simon) so it's hard to create a thriving community if you are only allowed to say nice things. It would be best if they dropped the forum, made it a site focused on offers and news for Alfisti and then pointed people here if they wanted to join a proper open forum. If the offers were worthwhile I think people would pay membership (I would pay to do two of the track days a year).

It should be an opportunity for ARUK to communicate with Alfisti in the UK. Why not a blog from the head of ARUK marketing? But they aren't really using it that way. Where is anyone from ARUK commenting on what's happening in the UK for the centenary? You'd think they would be trying to drum up support and interest in what's going on over here.

It's a big lost opportunity. I work for an IT research company that analyses these things and we generally find company run "communities" like this don't work well. The previous post on this thread shows the lack of "real" interest in individual Alfisti.

Cheers,

Nigel

[GTA_Nigel]

Just checked on the Cloverleaf Forum, no-one from ARUK has commented on the thread about Milan 2010. I just get the impression they aren't interested - if there is one trip I WOULD want Cloverleaf to organize, it would be a trip to Milan next year!!! No news or anything about the centenary events in the UK.

BTW John Griffiths of AROC is single-handedly keeping that place alive. Tell them he deserves a medal!

One positive point - the Mithril offer is a good one and I will take that up at some point.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Hunter]

Originally Posted by GTA_Nigel

The web site is very clunky and it's pretty dead over there as far as the forum is concerned. It's obvious they don't want negative publicity on there (re issues with Simon) so it's hard to create a thriving community if you are only allowed to say nice things. It would be best if they dropped the forum, made it a site focused on offers and news for Alfisti and then pointed people here if they wanted to join a proper open forum. If the offers were worthwhile I think people would pay membership (I would pay to do two of the track days a year).

It should be an opportunity for ARUK to communicate with Alfisti in the UK. Why not a blog from the head of ARUK marketing? But they aren't really using it that way. Where is anyone from ARUK commenting on what's happening in the UK for the centenary? You'd think they would be trying to drum up support and interest in what's going on over here.

It's a big lost opportunity. I work for an IT research company that analyses these things and we generally find company run "communities" like this don't work well. The previous post on this thread shows the lack of "real" interest in individual Alfisti.

Cheers,

Nigel

Originally Posted by GTA_Nigel

Just checked on the Cloverleaf Forum, no-one from ARUK has commented on the thread about Milan 2010. I just get the impression they aren't interested - if there is one trip I WOULD want Cloverleaf to organize, it would be a trip to Milan next year!!! No news or anything about the centenary events in the UK.

BTW John Griffiths of AROC is single-handedly keeping that place alive. Tell them he deserves a medal!

One positive point - the Mithril offer is a good one and I will take that up at some point.

Cheers,

Nigel

Yep, agree with you Nigel.

Good posts.

[alfaowner]

Firstly, thanks for those replies, really appreciated.

My thoughts are that they will want to address issues brought up, because surely they didn't intentially come up with a marketing plan to annoy you. Also someone mentioned the centenary, just so that you know, the entire event business waits for the F1 calendar to be firmed up and then plan events around it. (including Goodwood dates) But of course discussions can still take place. On the 10/100 Centenary social group at AO, we said that if Alfa don't plan anything (and I am sure they will/are) then the Alfisti will. We are currently talking about the plan to drive a minimum of 100 cars to Milan, should be GREAT fun!

Thanks again for the feedback.

AO

[GTA_Nigel]

Thanks Ian, it's a pity they didn't tell us why they weren't telling us anything! We understand if there are issues firming up dates due to other things, why don't they let us know - we will understand! Just saying nothing seems to indicate they don't care.

Despite all the issues with firming up Milan events, you would think at least they would come to an arrangement with a number of hotels so that we can book up now. They do know what the dates are and we all need help identifying where we should stay. I'm still amazed that Cloverleaf is totally silent on the Centenary.

Anyway, let us know how you get on.

Cheers,

Nigel

[k3lvc]

Don't know whether this is too late.

My view from being an early member is that this is a half-hearted outsourced Customer Loyalty Programme and bugger all to do with ARUK. I went to one of the track days last year which was great but again nothing to do with ARUK. I'd feel genuinely sorry for anyone who shelled out their own 'hard-earned' to join.

I'm well aware of the ways these things work and their effort is fairly poor. They have no control over whether ARUK respond to issues raised/queries etc.

Would be interested whether your meeting is with ARUK or their 'service provider'.

[alfaowner]

Originally Posted by GTA_Nigel

Thanks Ian, it's a pity they didn't tell us why they weren't telling us anything! We understand if there are issues firming up dates due to other things, why don't they let us know - we will understand! Just saying nothing seems to indicate they don't care.

I would have to agree with you on face value but honestly, they do care, they really do! You only have to speak to them about the Centenary face to face to see this. I gave some examples of what was discussed on this thread and others and some of my thoughts too and I am confident that issues will be addressed.

Originally Posted by k3lvc

My view from being an early member is that this is a half-hearted outsourced Customer Loyalty Programme and bugger all to do with ARUK. I went to one of the track days last year which was great but again nothing to do with ARUK. I'd feel genuinely sorry for anyone who shelled out their own 'hard-earned' to join.

I'm well aware of the ways these things work and their effort is fairly poor. They have no control over whether ARUK respond to issues raised/queries etc.

Would be interested whether your meeting is with ARUK or their 'service provider'.

We was talking with the brand department so no worries there

When an update is ready, you will be the first to know.

AO