Successful Experience listing: FAQ

A descriptive and engaging Experience page is a great way to attract more users and make your Hub stand out! In this article, you’ll find all the crucial tips on how to make your listing shine and what to keep in mind to complete each step successfully. 

We recommend you to read these guidelines alongside this article, so that your onboarding process runs flawlessly! Do also keep in mind that we take the points below into consideration when reviewing your Experience page.

Of course! However, you may only select one mode per listed Experience. Hybrid Experiences are currently unavailable on our platform.

If you have two Experiences with similar content but one runs physically and the other online, you would need to submit two individual Experience listings and tweak your descriptions and/or titles accordingly.

We always encourage our Hub community to express their creativity and innovative ideas in any type of Experience they deem suitable. However, every Experience that is listed on Mereka Connect should preferably have a booking element to it, i.e. should require preliminary registration from participants. 

Hence, the most suitable types of Experiences include but are definitely not limited to:

• Hands-on creative workshops (e.g. watercolor workshop, macramé class, woodworking session)

• Events & concerts (e.g. minting party, music concert)

• Educational seminars & webinars (e.g. reproductive health talk, environmental sustainability webinar)

There are several Experience types which can be uploaded on Mereka Connect, however listing those would not always yield the desired results. Such Experiences include walk-in events that do not require a ticket, e.g. community exhibitions, booths, markets and bazaars. We also do not encourage listing any type of e-commerce content as our platform does not have built-in e-commerce features.

Feel free to list the Experience nonetheless! Our team would assist you with generating a QR code with the signup link for walk-in participants and would usually require to place the code at the venue to make it easily accessible for users. Upon further request via [email protected], we also assist with creating a check-in form to track those who did register on the platform.

Although it is currently possible to select such Experience categories as "Course" and "Program" when submitting your listing, the module functionality is unavailable at the moment. Hence, we recommend that your Experience sessions are conducted independently and have similar content throughout each session. 

You can always set a schedule for your Experience in case it runs on a recurring basis. In fact, we do recommend listing recurring Experiences! This would save you time as you wouldn't need to update your page whenever there is a new session planned.

Unfortunately, Mereka Connect is not an LMS platform - hence, it is not possible to embed video content in the Experience form. However, you can always insert a link to any external video conferencing software (Zoom, Google Meet, Microsoft teams, etc.) in a dedicated section when you choose to run an online Experience.

This means that only the users with the direct URL can access and book this Experience. Otherwise, the Experience would not be reflected on either the homepage or the collection page, and would not be visible to others.

Currently, you can only set a maximum number of users you can host. However, the 'minimum number' feature is in the works, and you can track its progress here.

Fear not! Your target audience selection simply helps users ease the process of filtering and finding the Experience they need. However, if users from other categories wish to participate in your Experience, they will be able to do so.

A private group booking means that all tickets for your Experience can be booked in one go, e.g. for a corporate training, team building session, school students' field trip, etc. Enabling this feature would increase the chances of your Experience seats being sold out all at once.

The Mereka Pass feature is designed for:

• Learners to explore the Mereka Connect platform and book Experiences for free, and

• Hubs to make an impact on the community and gain traction. 

There are 2 types of Passes offered through Mereka Connect:

• Discovery Pass - an opportunity for all first-time users to book Experiences for free.

• Learner Pass - an opportunity for users from the underprivileged community to book Experiences using platform credits.

Whether to offer Mereka Pass tickets to your users or not is at your sole discretion. The Experience form allows you to select the type of Pass, as well as the number of seats offered via each type. Please note that it is only applicable to paid Experiences, and by enabling this feature you agree to sponsor the respective tickets. To learn more, visit this page. 

We recommend you take into account the target audience for which your Experience is designed. For example, if you run a workshop for working adults it's a good idea to schedule your sessions either for evening hours on weekdays (e.g. after 6pm) or morning/afternoon hours on weekends (e.g. 11am). If your Experience is for school children, it is best to consider their semester breaks and times when they don't have classes.

Based on our Hubs' sales data, Experiences get most bookings on weekends during afternoon hours. However, we recommend you consider a multitude of factors when scheduling your Experience, including your host's and user's potential availability. If you're not sure and need assistance from our team, feel free to reach out to us via [email protected]. 

You can set the Experience occurrence in the "When will you be hosting your Experience?" section. It is possible to either make your Experience one-off or make it recur daily, weekly, monthly or even annually. You can also set a custom occurrence depending on your individual schedule. Don't forget to click "Save Slot" once you're done!

To determine an optimum price, you may want to take into consideration your target audience and cost to run, as well as conduct a market research to compare your services to what is offered on the market. Do keep in mind that a percentage of your earnings will go to our platform to support and maintain functionality. To learn more about our fees, read this.

A member rate is offered at a discount to those users who either choose to become a member of your Hub (e.g. loyal customers), or receive a personalized membership invitation from you. As our team is still working on improving the membership functionality both for users and Hubs, providing the member rate is optional - you can either keep it as 0 or type in the same price as indicated in the standard rate.

The Service fee bearer is flexible on Mereka Connect - this means that you can decide who bears the cost of the Service fee. By default, the Service fee is borne by users but it is possible for a Hub to absorb it by clicking the respective radio button in the Experience form.

If the Service fee is absorbed by the Hub, users would only pay the original booking fee. The final profit made by the Hub in that case would equal the original Experience price minus the Service fee. Please note that if your Hub is on the free Connect subscription plan, an additional Mereka fee would apply. To understand our fees breakdown, please refer to this article.

First and foremost, we recommend that you make your Experience title short and concise. We also suggest making the topic of your Experience very straightforward so it is clear to your users what they are going to participate in. Using a verb/call to action is a good idea as well (e.g. learn, make, create, visit, etc.). 

✅ Examples of a good Experience title:

• Learn how to make a 3D printer from scratch!

• Welding workshop for beginners

• From waste to wealth: Eco soap making

🟡 Examples of a title which needs improvement:

• Music concert on Jan 1st, 7pm - it's not very clear which music concert it is specifically (it's recommended to include a musician's name or the title of the event/festival); you also don't need to indicate the date and time as they would be reflected on the booking widget.

• Learn how to speak with persuasion with Dr. Jack Smith [FREE] + FREE Guidebook - the title looks very crowded; the host's name and free rate can be omitted (this information is already included in the Experience form), and the free guidebook can be included in the "Will you provide any materials?" section instead.

• ABCD Seminar 2022 - the title is vague since it is not clear what ABCD stands for; it is recommended to elaborate more on the topic of the seminar, rather than include an abbreviation/acronym.

This is one of the most important sections of your Experience page - below is the list of dos which make a great description and don’ts which make it less engaging and informative:

DO

• Make your description concise – the optimum length is 100-200 words.

• Include external links if you feel like they are relevant to the content of the description.

• Use friendly and welcoming language.

• Arrange your points into small paragraphs.

• Divide your description into logical parts, e.g. introduction, Experience agenda, and conclusion/invitation to join.

• In the introduction, welcome your users and provide general information on your Experience topic.

• In the Experiences agenda, provide a brief overview of the activities that your users will engage in during the session.

• In conclusion, invite your audience to join your Experience and explain how they can take their newfound skills further. You may also specify your target audience (e.g. “We are open to everyone” or "This Experience welcomes users aged 18 and above").

DON’T

• Leave this section blank!

• Write either a very lengthy description that exceeds 300 words, or a very short description which consists of 1 sentence only.

• Duplicate the information which is already contained in other sections of the Experience form, e.g. price, dates, location, etc.

• Make your description too general and abstract – the information should be clear and straightforward so your users know what to expect.

• Hesitate to have fun with your description – in the end, you’re marketing your Experience to pique the users’ interest and make them want to participate in your activities!

Choosing good photos for your Experience page is crucial since that's how your Experience would look like to your users both on the Mereka Connect homepage and in our promotional materials. 

Your photos should be high-definition, bright, clear and with a preferable ratio of 4:3 - 4.5:3 (landscape format). Please upload no less than 5 photos to the Experience gallery.

• For physical Experiences, it is recommended to include the photos that either showcase the final product your users will make (e.g. examples of artwork, handicraft, etc.) or the images from your past Experiences of a similar topic. Learn more about our photo requirements here.

• For online Experiences, we recommend that you use quality stock photos which portray the topic of your Experience. Learn more about our photo tips for virtual Experiences here.

Our team provides complimentary assistance with photos for your Experience page, so do feel free to reach out to us via [email protected] should you require our help.

Absolutely! Even if you feel like you’ve provided all the necessary information about your Experience in the description, please make sure to summarize at least three learning outcomes in the form of bullet points, as well as several preparation tips and guidelines for your users. These might include recommendations on proper attire, navigation guidelines, etc. 

If you intend to provide certain materials for your users (both physically and online), please make sure to list them all in this section. This information is crucial for users and will help them come prepared for your Experience.

Once our team has received your Experience submission, we will begin the review process. This will take between 1-3 business days, after which you will be notified of your further steps either via email, phone or WhatsApp (depending on your preferred method of communication). In the meantime, the status of your listing on the Hub dashboard will be "Pending" and yellow in color.

In the case that you have submitted an incomplete form or further edits are required, the Mereka Connect team will request you to edit your submission and/or provide additional information before publishing it. Please ensure you address our team's feedback within the appropriate timeframe to avoid compromising your listing and not allowing sufficient time to make your page live before the actual Experience date. As a general rule, we require our Hubs to list the Experience and address our team's feedback at least 2-3 weeks before the Experience commencement date.

If your Experience submission is successful, it will be published on the platform as soon as possible. You will be informed of your next steps via email or phone communication. We wish you all the best!