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Posted by: Manu RASSE Jul 29 2023, 07:40 AM

Hi there,

This message to give my opinion on the change of guitarmasterclass.net.
Since my return, I find the site less attractive, less user-friendly.

I'm disappointed not to see the new lessons anymore. This allowed a certain spontaneity: Ah, this lesson is great, I'm learning it!
Many quality instructors have left and I confess to having difficulty finding my way through the maze of GMC research.

It was just my opinion, but I wanted to give it.

Posted by: Kristofer Dahl Jul 29 2023, 08:48 AM

Hey Manu,

Thanks a lot for sharing these thoughts with us!

My philosophy for GMC has always been the same - whatever revenue the site generates goes back into the site.

So when we had many students we also had many new lessons. Now we have less students so we can't have as many new lessons.

However I am working hard to get new students to GMC, which is why I am creating content for 4 social media platforms daily and doing livestreams, almost daily.

Other lesson platforms (aka our competitors) have whole teams in place for marketing, web development and content creation, whereas GMC is just me and the instructors I can afford to hire. I think this has advantages in terms of community, but I simply to do not have any big funding to back me up in difficult times.

I know you have helped spread the word about GMC - and if you keep doing it we will be able to have more students and instructors in the future ❤️👊

Posted by: Manu RASSE Jul 29 2023, 10:30 AM

Hi Kris

It's true. I did a lot of advertising on a French site.

My feedback : The French are quite pretentious and criticize negatively.
They think that GMC is too academic a site and that the exercises are useless.
It sometimes makes me laugh to see the poor level of these guitarists. They spend thousands of euros on equipment but don't know how to play.

Only the most humble and open-minded guitarists have joined GMC.
I hope a few more guys will join us.

Have a nice day.

Posted by: Monica Gheorghevici Jul 29 2023, 11:19 AM

As in everyday life, there are good and bad moments. I personally stopped thinking in the past (but I'm grateful for having amazing memories) and I'm more focused on what we can do to improve things.
I'm sure at some point we will have more students again. I think if each of us will continue to try to bring a few students to GMC per month, it would be a tremendous help.

Lately, I have spent more time in GMC than ever (and to be honest, I changed a lot from my daily schedule to do this) and I try to be useful for everyone who needs help. Personally, I will always be here (mostly in difficult times) and I will enjoy each day. We are a family and this is all that matters to me.

Posted by: Kristofer Dahl Jul 30 2023, 08:13 AM

QUOTE (Monica Gheorghevici @ Jul 29 2023, 12:19 PM)

As in everyday life, there are good and bad moments. I personally stopped thinking in the past (but I'm grateful for having amazing memories) and I'm more focused on what we can do to improve things.
I'm sure at some point we will have more students again. I think if each of us will continue to try to bring a few students to GMC per month, it would be a tremendous help.

Lately, I have spent more time in GMC than ever (and to be honest, I changed a lot from my daily schedule to do this) and I try to be useful for everyone who needs help. Personally, I will always be here (mostly in difficult times) and I will enjoy each day. We are a family and this is all that matters to me.

QUOTE (Manu RASSE @ Jul 29 2023, 11:30 AM)

Posted by: Gert1973 Jul 30 2023, 12:29 PM

Hi everybody,

Let me join in on this topic with some thoughts of my own...

Guitarmasterclass was recommended to me by a friend who has been a member for many years (Kris and Monica probably know of whom I'm talking about but it's not really important )

If GMC was not recommended to me by this friend, I would have never joined GMC by only looking at the website. Because of the structure and the overall 'look' and 'feel' and the way I have to navigate trough the website also don't appeal to me.

But luckily I have listended to my friend and disregard my feelings upon the view of the website and joined anyway. The first months I had a bit of a struggle of finding my way around using the website. But with some help from Monica and some own effort I'm now familiar with the website.

I am aware and it is obvious that GMC is not run by a team but by mainly one person and that's Kris. So one can not expect a flashing website with little amount of financial recourses.

The main reason why I'm still at GMC, although I have noticed a low amount of students and low activity in general on all the fora here on GMC, the heart of GMC is what keeps me here. I agree with Manu... only the open-minded and humble guitar players join GMC.

It's my collaboration with Monica, who's is gold for me, that keeps me here. And also te way the lessons are build up, the way I'm being guided, and so many more great things that this website futures are reasons why I'm still happy I joined GMC and looked past the 'front' of the GMC website. My progress in 9 months is prove of the fact that GMC works!

I wish I'd joined GMC 10 years ago because I can tell there was a very active community here with great instructors. But I'm sure things can turn around. I notice Kris' efforts to make publicity every day and I hope it will pay of. It would be great to see a revival of this community.

But in the meantime we keep on rocking and keep the GMC family alive

Cheers,
Gert

Posted by: Alex Arvedahl Aug 16 2023, 10:19 AM

Hi!

Have been with GMC for some years as well.
Sad to see that it's not as active as it used to be.

I think GMC has so much to offer. It may be a bit hard to find lessons sometimes.
But the community and the mentorship program are my favorite things about GMC.
As many others I notice that Kristofer is working hard each day to bring in more people.

I even think that there could be like a GMC membership plus for more personalized mentoring

Posted by: PosterBoy Aug 17 2023, 09:15 AM

I joined when GMC was at its peak. Where we had live instructor lessons each evening etc.

One of the big changes on the Internet is platforms like Teachable and Patreon which allows guitar instructors to do things themselves and they don't necessarily need platforms like GMC.

It's tough for Kris to attract talent due to this I'm sure, but it doesn't take away from the huge library of lessons amassed here.
I come and go as a paid member depending on my needs and spare time. At the moment pedal steel is getting my focus.

I still do what I can to promote GMC, I did earlier this week to a member of TGP who was looking at Truefire but was more into Metal and Grunge so I told them that GMC is a better fit and I used to be a moderator for Truefire!

Posted by: Kristofer Dahl Aug 22 2023, 08:17 AM

QUOTE (Gert1973 @ Jul 30 2023, 01:29 PM)

QUOTE (PosterBoy @ Aug 17 2023, 10:15 AM)

Posted by: Todd Simpson Aug 27 2023, 01:59 AM

I was teaching at GMC during it's peak and you are SPOT ON imho. I really think it was the live video chat lessons that gave GMC it's edge and was the foundation of what was then a thriving community. Each video chat lesson was a way to attract students on a certain time/day to a certain place on the web to be together and study music, interact, etc. It created the sense of community which then followed into the forum which was thriving.

I still remember when Kris told me that the video chat plugin was going away and we were not going to be replacing it. I knew then that this was going to have a hugely negative impact on the site and the community. Sadly, I was correct. I don't know if bringing video chat lessons back again would fix all of the issues. But I do think that not having them is still a big part of the reason the community is not growing.

Todd

QUOTE (PosterBoy @ Aug 17 2023, 04:15 AM)

Posted by: sumitnxt Aug 28 2023, 06:42 AM

GMC is one of my favorite guitar sites. The members know the advantages we have on GMC so they will always keep it alive. I only discovered the site because I was looking to buy a paid membership a few years back and so kept searching to find where I would want to invest.
I think one area to improve in attracting new members is youtube.
I keep finding Truefire and JTC promos on the youtube when I am searching for guitar lessons on youtube. Since GMC has a huge amount of lessons as well If people find promo of these lessons on youtube should definitely attract more traffic to GMC. Recently I did find some shorts of Kris while swiping youtube. thats good too.

Posted by: Kristofer Dahl Aug 30 2023, 07:08 AM

Thanks for the great words Sumit ❤️

I'm obviously heavily biased, but I structured GMC exactly how I would have wanted a learning site when starting out. And although I would want to fix and improve many things on the site - I still think its' structure is far better than anything else out there. It seems to me most learning sites are just built like huge sales pitches, and not really with the user experience in mind.

I also agree about Youtube. I do regularly try to deliver Youtube oriented content but haven't yet found a sustainable content direction. Suggestions are welcome btw 😅