How You can Help Yourself to Taste Success!

[Red Dragon]

We have a saying in my company and it is "Tasting your own Success". Now what does that mean I hear you asking yourselves?

What it means is that we should use within our own company the products and software that we design and sell, and that we believe in. This saves money, allows us to understand the product/service from a customer view and then enables us to relate to customer issues from a customer perspective.

Now that seems fairly reasonable and common sense, but what has that got to do with LostCousins?

Well it got me thinking. I'm only ever going to Match with another member IF I ADD SOME ANCESTORS! Its actually quite simple isn't it? If I want to Match someone in my tree then I need to add them to LostCousins. And if you want to match them with me then you have to add your ancestors.

The people we match to are going to be distant relatives at best, but they will be from a different branch and will therefore have that detailed information on their branch that you have on yours. To be able to share this information with a fellow researcher of your tree is mutually very rewarding. And just think of those potential brick walls in your own tree that they could solve for you.

Peter has mentioned that's there's over 90,000 members of LostCousins. So if each of us just added 100 people from the 1881 census (which is free to view), that would be 9,000,000 names. Because the population of the 1881 census was only 29,707,207 you will see that we would have entered a 1/3 of the number of people in the census, so how many matches would that give you?

I found entering a household was really easy, select the "Add a new Household" from the Search screen, select which Census, and add 7 bits of information. Adding the remaining people in the household is even easier! You only need to add 4 bits of information. I was finding that adding a new household of 5 people was taking about 2 minutes. So to get to that magic number of 100 ancestors added by each of us, would take less than an hour. Now how's that for a great return on your time?

So I'm appealing to all you LostCousins members out there, help me to help you! Lets go for that magic number of 100 entries for each of us for the 1881 census. Lets make this a success.

And then lets taste our own success.

The moral really is, the more we add the more likely we are to match.

Just in case you've mislaid the LostCousins site, it can be found here.

 

[Carla]

I am slowly adding more each weekend. I aim to add at least two households at a time....doesnt sound much but little and often is better than not at all. If i can add more i do but i just had no idea how many more i had to add! Phew

 

[OnlyMe]

Somewhere along the line I missed that you could enter households from the 1841 and 1911 census so I have a lot of catching up to do!
I agree with all Red Dragon had to say.
We may not get as many 'hits' as on other sites but at least the ones we do get are accurate and are a match! Hopefully you can exchange information and help each other with your brickwalls and they may have that elusive photograph that you would just love to have...

 

[Red Dragon]

Hi Everyone!

I've been recording some numbers and I'd like to share them with you.

Since I posted this, there have been

• 43 new members join the LostCousins site
• 1,802 new entries have been added and
• 132 relatives have been matched.

Now I know that none of these results are down to this post, but I'm trying to show that if we get the message across to members then these numbers would be massive!

Even as they are, they are quite impressive, an average of 6 new members a day, and a relative match in every 14 new entries.

So lets put those fingers forward, and start typing some more entries into the LostCousins site.

 

[Tim]

Well I've added some more today so lets hope everyone takes a few minutes to add any new finds to LostCousins.

 

[MarionK]

OK, I'll admit I've been one of the LC 'slackers', only having a few households entered from a few years ago. I've been trying to reach a certain stage with my research before adding those extra distant cousins, but now realise that may never happen. So, yesterday I added over 30 households from the 1881 census with, probably, another 150 to go. Then on to the 1841 & 1911 censuses. 3 new contacts resulting from yesterday's session!

 

[Tim]

3 new contacts resulting from yesterday's session!

WOW

That's good work Marion, and an excellent result! Who knows what extra bits of information they will provide?

 

[peter]

Wouldn't it be great if one of the new relatives Marion has found turns out to be another forum member? Unlikely, I know - but what better way of illustrating the power of the LostCousins!

Keep up the good work, Marion, and keep the tips coming Red Dragon.

 

[AnneC]

3 new contacts resulting from yesterday's session!

Wouldn't it be great if one of the new relatives Marion has found turns out to be another forum member? Unlikely, I know - but what better way of illustrating the power of the LostCousins!

I hoped that too, and immediately went to check, but no new contacts. While I was there I added a few more relatives, but still no new matches. I'll keep trying!

 

[MarionK]

Thanks, Tim & Peter. Added a bunch more yesterday, with 2 more contacts popping up! Still a lot more to go. Of course, now I'll have to take out a 'proper' LC subscription, so that I can contact them all.

 

[Tim]

Another 2? WOW again.

You should start posting your good fortune stories here, a place to share your success.

 

[Maid of Kent]

How can we get Red Dragon's succinct posting out to the rest of the 'genealogy' world? Certainly not Facebook, Twitter or similar but what about Wiki? Could that do anything to boost members?

 

[Red Dragon]

Hi Everyone!

Hi Maid of Kent. Thank you for your post and certainly any sort of media exposure would more than likely spur people to join up.
However, joining up doesn't necessarily mean that they will add any new entries.

Peter has mentioned that 42% of LostCousins members have not added ANY ancestors! That must be nearly 40,000 people who haven't added an ancestor. If we can get these people first to start adding their ancestors and they each added 100 entries, then that would be another 4 million records added. And look at the successes that people are making from only adding a few new ancestors?

So an update on the figures from last week.

• 19 new members joined the LostCousins site
• 2,181 new entries have been added and
• 104 relatives have been matched.

In the previous 2 weeks, 3,983 new entries and 236 relatives matched. Giving us a great ratio of 17. So for every 17 new entries, a relative was found!

It IS that easy to taste success, so everyone, please keeping adding your ancestors and their families, that Lost Cousin is just waiting for you to do those few simple keystrokes that I mentioned in my first post.

 

[AndyMick]

So, some folks need incentives, eh? How about it, Peter? The next round of forum invites go to those who add [think of a number] new ancestors in [think of a time frame]?

I have to say that participating in this forum, and Alexander's FTA programme (and my cheap imitation Excel macros) have prompted me to add more ancestors. And in so doing, they're rejuvenated my interest in my own tree (as opposed to the One Name Study). I suppose you can only be obsessive about one thing at a time

 

[peter]

How can we get Red Dragon's succinct posting out to the rest of the 'genealogy' world? Certainly not Facebook, Twitter or similar but what about Wiki? Could that do anything to boost members?

If even a third of the readers of my newsletter followed your example and used their My Referrals page to invite friends and relatives to join LostCousins it would make an enormous difference to the numbers. Whilst you've invited lots of people to join the average member hasn't invited ANY, and there are even some members of this forum who haven't made full use of this feature (which has been there since we opened 9 years ago).

 

[peter]

In the previous 2 weeks, 3,983 new entries and 236 relatives matched. Giving us a great ratio of 17. So for every 17 new entries, a relative was found!

Please note that the number of relatives matched is usually going to be significantly higher than the number of new cousins, partly because some of those matches will be with existing cousins, and partly because there may be more than one match with a new cousin. On the other hand, every single match demonstrates that the system is working well!

 

[Jennie]

So, some folks need incentives, eh?

My understanding is that any new development area of Lost Cousins is based upon increasing the growth of the number of Ancestors added by members. Joining the forum and being part of a team certainly worked for me but extending the forum membership to include the missing 40,000 is definitely out of the question! Perhaps one area that could be addressed is that we need a short string of words such as "Add deceased Ancestors, link with your live Lost Cousins"? An improved sentence could then be prominently posted throughout the web on websites and all of our emails etc? I know from experience that justifying not adding ancestors was easier when I was greeted by a long informative set of words (...I'm far too busy, etc...) rather than just a "Get on and do it" type of message.

......And in so doing, they're rejuvenated my interest in my own tree (as opposed to the One Name Study). I suppose you can only be obsessive about one thing at a time.

I can relate to these words. During the course of a day I often repeat to myself "Family first, then ONS".

 

[Alexander Bisset]

How can we get Red Dragon's succinct posting out to the rest of the 'genealogy' world? Certainly not Facebook, Twitter or similar but what about Wiki? Could that do anything to boost members?

Sorry why not Facebook, Twitter etc. These are far and away the most popular forms of exchanging information about interests and hobbies. I just don't get why for those that already have an account you wouldn't use it to do this sort of publicity. Of course for those that aren't keen on either medium there is no need to use it and no need to sign up to use it, but for those that already have an account, why not?

Once the forum is launched if forum members who have a Facebook or Twitter account use the tools provided on the forum to "recommend" pages it will publicise it to their friends and spread the word. If they wanted to also make a post on any family history Facebook pages they follow then that would exceptionally quickly spread the word to all that organisations members who are linked on Facebook etc.

When there is a free tool specifically designed to do the job you want to do it is surely an unusual strategy to ignore that tool?

 

[Maid of Kent]

Sorry why not Facebook, Twitter etc. These are far and away the most popular forms of exchanging information about interests and hobbies. I just don't get why for those that already have an account you wouldn't use it to do this sort of publicity. Of course for those that aren't keen on either medium there is no need to use it and no need to sign up to use it, but for those that already have an account, why not?

Once the forum is launched if forum members who have a Facebook or Twitter account use the tools provided on the forum to "recommend" pages it will publicise it to their friends and spread the word. If they wanted to also make a post on any family history Facebook pages they follow then that would exceptionally quickly spread the word to all that organisations members who are linked on Facebook etc.

When there is a free tool specifically designed to do the job you want to do it is surely an unusual strategy to ignore that tool?

You're right, of course, Alexander. It's just a personal prejudice against social networking that prompted the comment. But as you say, if a person already has the account then why not use it to its full potential

 

[Maid of Kent]

If even a third of the readers of my newsletter followed your example and used their My Referrals page to invite friends and relatives to join LostCousins it would make an enormous difference to the numbers. Whilst you've invited lots of people to join the average member hasn't invited ANY, and there are even some members of this forum who haven't made full use of this feature (which has been there since we opened 9 years ago).

Peter your comment on referrals prompted me to go back to see what had happened to all those I had previously invited. To those who had taken no action I re-sent the invitation, however, they were quite old so some of the email addresses could be out of date. Fingers crossed they're not.

I then went to the My Cousins page to see which had actually entered anything after registering and was pleasantly surprised to see that most of them had done entries. At least I assume they have as they are shown as being connected to me.

Three of my original referrals were to ppl who I knew had no connection with me but I still wanted them to be part of this great facility and have emailed them separately just to jog their memory. I assume that it is OK to invite those who are in no way connected with us?

Can I please ask a question? Well, yes, of course I can ask it....duuuhh. What I mean is, on my Home page is a sentence that I don't understand and wonder if you would please tell me. It's this: "Your coupon code is: XS??????? (use this at the LostCousins forum)" replace ? with numbers.