A Personal Message to Best Practices Course Members
I recorded this message at the end of 2011, and it is an interesting record of where things stood at that time, with my view looking ahead.
Hello everybody! This is Eric Bobrow, and for once, you get to see me talking to you rather than just listening to my voice.
I’d like to share with you some thoughts and my thanks. Just over one year ago I took a leap of faith and launched the Best Practices Course. I’ve learned a lot during this time.
It’s been a very exciting progression. At first, 15 people signed up for the live Best Practices classes in Los Angeles in August, September and October 2010. Then in November of that year, I launched the online version of the course, and 93 ArchiCAD users jumped in during the initial offering with another 50 joining during the year-end sale.
In 2011, membership quadrupled! In March, many ArchiCAD resellers and distributors started to promote the Best Practices Course, and 125 new members signed up. In June, I created and presented a free webinar series built around the most effective components of the course, and 92 more ArchiCAD users joined.
In the second half of 2011, over 200 registered for either the QuickStart Course or the full Best Practices Course. We now have over 590 members in our community, representing 49 nations around the world!
I’ve learned so much this past year about using the internet to communicate. In January I started to develop my YouTube channel to distribute free ArchiCAD video tutorials, which now has hit an incredible 109,000 views, with 638 subscribers.
My emails reach over 8,500 subscribers, and I have 500 LinkedIn connections, as well as 181 Twitter followers and 166 Facebook fans.
But the big news in social networking for ArchiCAD users is that the ArchiCAD page on Facebook has over 73,000 fans! I reported on the ArchiCAD page in February 2011, when they hit 15,000 fans; what an incredible explosion in just 10 months!
I am very thankful for the opportunity to work with all of you. When you signed up for the Best Practices or QuickStart Course, you placed your faith in me. I promised you a great experience and the highest quality learning resources to help you get the most out of ArchiCAD.
Your feedback has been incredibly gratifying. I’ve often heard members describe the course as one of the best investments in professional development they’ve ever made. I’ve received thanks and kudos over and over again for the quality of the materials and how they’ve made the mysteries of ArchiCAD much more understandable.
To be frank, I know I’ve only been partially successful so far. To date I have created less than half the lessons in the Best Practices Course outline. There have been many reasons course development has been delayed, including my illness during the summer, and other competing responsibilities.
I want to assure you that I am 100% committed to completing the remaining lessons in the course outline, and that you will have lifetime access to them at no additional charge. This winter, I will focus a large part of my time each week on this endeavor, with the aim of finishing the Best Practices Course modules as soon as possible, while maintaining my very high standards.
The original course plan was for 26 weekly installments of 45 minutes each, along with one coaching call each month during that 26 week period to answer questions from members. During 2011, these original plans expanded dramatically in response to your requests.
I added the QuickStart Course to the original curriculum to accommodate newer users. This 13 hour sequence of 29 lessons on the basics of ArchiCAD was completed in September, and has been well-received. I am very proud of it.
The coaching calls are now offered three times each month, and usually run longer than their scheduled 90 minutes as I answer as many questions as possible.
Almost 30 coaching sessions have been recorded and posted in the member area, totaling close to 50 hours of training.
These calls have been carefully indexed by three volunteer course members that I’d like to thank – Mariya Lilith, Mark Moscrip and Maura Lester. We’ve taken to calling them the “3M team” since their names all begin with the letter “m”.
The coaching calls have been an integral part of the course experience, and some members have commented that they enjoy them even more than the main lessons. They have provided me an opportunity to have direct contact with many of you, and to make sure that I am in staying in touch regularly. I enjoy the process and I know that it fills an important need, since there is nothing else like this coaching program available for ArchiCAD users.
All Best Practices Course members get 6 months of the coaching calls as a complimentary resource in conjunction with course registration. Until this point, I did not have a policy for what happened after the initial six months. I simply continued the coaching calls for all members for this entire year at no additional charge.
In 2012, I am launching the Best Practices Coaching Program for ArchiCAD users as a separate membership at a standard fee of $77 per month. But you won’t have to pay that amount to continue in the coaching program.
All Best Practices Course members who have completed their first 6 months of coaching calls are invited to continue in the coaching program at a special reduced rate of $37 per month. This rate is guaranteed and locked in for as long as you stay enrolled. This works out to about $12 per coaching call. QuickStart Course members may also join the coaching program at this reduced pricing.
To encourage you to sign up for a longer period, a six month membership is available for $197 (that’s a 10% savings, or about $33 per month), or you can choose a one year term at $297, which is less than $25 a month, a savings of over 30%.
You’ll find all the details explained in the member area under the Coaching Calls menu, on the page titled “Best Practices Coaching Program for Course Members.”
I imagine you might have some questions about the new fee-based coaching program, and I invite your feedback. Please email me or post a comment down below.
I have two pieces of additional news that I’d like to share with you before we finish. Course member Mark Moscrip, an architect based in Atlanta Georgia, is working with me to translate the Best Practices Course. I’m very excited that in 2012 we may be able to offer a native-language version of the course for Spanish and French speakers!
I’m also looking forward to sharing with you some of what I’ve learned about internet marketing and winning new business. After I complete the Best Practices Course materials, I plan to offer training and services that will help you promote your work. I can help you be more visible to prospective clients when they search for an architect or designer, so that you can get more inquiries and win more projects.
In closing, I want to again tell you how much I appreciate your trust in me, and truly am grateful for the opportunity to work with you to help you get the most out of ArchiCAD. 2011 was a ground-breaking year for the Best Practices Course, and I expect that 2012 will actually be even better!
I wish you the best for the coming year as we work together.
Eric Bobrow
Leave A Reply (24 comments so far)
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WilliamButtmi
13 years ago-
Eric Bobrow
13 years agoWilliam –
Thank you for asking, however I am no longer a Graphisoft reseller. You’ll need to contact your local ArchiCAD reseller or directly to Graphisoft to make arrangements for an upgrade.
My company continues to be a reseller for Cadimage, Cigraph, Encina Objective, Artlantis, and a variety of other add-ons and supplemental tools, so don’t hesitate to ask if you want advice or to purchase something else related to ArchiCAD other than the main program or Graphisoft add-ons.
Eric
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FardinGhodoussi
13 years agoI am sure with your passion and hard work you will have a very successful year as a business point of view and international recognition as a leading ArchiCad instructor.
Also ArchiCad Add-on training is another opportunity that you need to consider as well.Best Wishes
Fardin
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Eric Bobrow
13 years agoFardin –
Thank you for your kind words.
I will be continuing to work hard to serve you and all of your colleagues who use ArchiCAD around the world!
Eric
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MariyaLilith
13 years agoHello Eric,
Congratulations for all your success in 2011. I know your success will only grow in 2012. I’m very grateful that this program is available, but even more so, that you are the one that’s teaching it!
I’m so glad you expanded the program. All 3 parts are so beneficial; the QuickStart Course, Best Practices and Coaching Calls. The QuickStart is great because it’s short and sweet and can get a newby off and running quickly. I like the Best Practices because it’s so in depth. Then there are the Coaching Calls which is like a program to train your brain how to solve ArchiCAD problems.
I used to wonder if I was going about looking at an AC problem in the right way, or going about solving it in the right way. It’s refreshing to experience your thought process, your easy going manner, and the ease in which you explain what you are doing and why. As I watch you solve problems your student’s have sent you, “live” I compare to my own process and find my confidence growing because I can say “yeah, I thought of that…”, or “ah, I was so close…” and I’m learning a lot.
I would have dropped ArchiCAD if I hadn’t met you. I’m so glad that I didn’t have to.
Again thank you, and best wishes for an even better 2012.
Sincerely,
Mariya Lilith
USA-
Eric Bobrow
13 years agoMariya –
Thank you for your kind words about the course and about the coaching program specifically.
And a thousand thank-yous (mille grazies as they say in Italian) for your work on indexing the coaching calls for the benefit of all course members!
Eric
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NicolaasFourie
13 years agoHallo Eric,
I’ve just subscribed to your Best Practice Traing course and I’m extremely excited to complete and stay in it as long as I’m involved in AC (for the rest of my remaining life of about 30 years !)
I’ve started about 2 years ago to engage in AC and the past year became seriously involved as a reseller in marketing AC. Architecture has been my hobby since 1975 when I started my articles as a lawyer and bought my first draughting equipment. After 36 years in law practise, I’m now pursueing my hobby with AC and can’t wait to become an expert and highly skilled in AC. I was first introduced to Revit but fortunatley instantly changed over to AC by a good friend.
I’m being confronted with a huge contingent of Revit users here in South Africa. I need some serious marketing tool and ammunition to convert them over to AC. There are a lot of comments and statements comparing the two systems but not any organised, basic and systematic document to utilize.
I do consider your Best Practice material as a possible marketing tool thou. How, I still have to workout. Any suggestions by you or any one out there.
It is my vision to convert 80% of the South African Revit architects in the Gauteng Province, over to AC in the next two years !
Kind regards,
Nico Fourie
Pretoria
South Africa-
Nico –
Thank you for your enthusiastic words. I look forward to helping you succeed with ArchiCAD personally as well as as a reseller!
Eric
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Bill Ellinger
13 years agoEric:
Congratulations on the success of your Best Practices. Will those who previously joined still have access to the recorded Coaching Calls that you’ve posted so far, even if we may not subscribe for continuing CC’s?
All the Best and a Very Happy Healthy New Year!
Bill Ellinger
Pasadena, CA-
Eric Bobrow
13 years agoYes, Bill, you will continue to have access to the recorded calls from 2011.
I’m not going to take anything away from you!
Eric
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Takis Apostolides
13 years agoHi Eric,
I wish you and your family a Happy New Year, healthy and all the best.
Thank you for all the support for Archicad but also for all the help with other matters.
I am very glad that the past year was so creative for you and I wish you the next coming 2012 to be even more successful.
Takis.-
Thank you Takis for your kind words.
I wish you the best for the coming year!
Eric
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Bob George
13 years agoEric, count me among the ArchiCAD users who have been so satisfied with both your QuickStart and Best Practices courses. I am concluding my 46th year in practice, the last 12 of which I have been an ArchiCAD user. Over the past 4 months, I feel as though I have made a greater leap in confidence and capability with this software than in any one of the previous years I have been using it. It’s been a frustrating struggle, and, at times, I had dreams about my old pencils and triangles and parallel bar…not a good sign, eh? Anyway, thanks for finding a need among us ArchiCAD users and filling it. At last!
By the way, we recently visited our family’s home in Seattle where we struggled with their multiple-component, high tech entertainment complex for several hours at the end of a CD movie in a futile effort to find a news channel on TV. Any way you could bring your superb teaching skills to help with that exasperating task???? Just thought I’d ask….-
Bob –
Wow!
I am so glad that you have been able to make such strides in the past few months.
I wish I could help you on the high tech entertainment center, but it’s a bit beyond my current focus…
;->
Eric
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Hi Eric,
I hope you and your family have a really great New Year and a very happy, healthy and prosperious coming year.
Thank you so much for your training and support!
Will
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Will –
Thanks you for your greetings and good wishes.
You are very welcome.
I wish you the best for the coming year!
Eric
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Ken Brooks
13 years agoEric,
Your willingness to expand your reach and put yourself “out there” may be the greatest part of your teaching for me. I find this “Best Practices” resource you have created both invaluable and timely. To be able to have a medium of peer interaction to learn ArchiCAD is more than this line drawing pen and ink rendering sole practitioner could have hoped for. I appreciate greatly my “old school” foundation of my practice and also appreciate your support for the expansion of my practice in the BIM arena. And, I await with anticipation (some dread?) that which you may share with regard to internet promotion and marketing.
Ken Brooks
Architect AZ NM-
Ken –
Thanks for your feedback. It’s always interesting to know what parts of my work are the most impactful, and sometimes it’s a real surprise!
Don’t worry about the internet promotion stuff – it’s really all about getting the word out there and being yourself, providing value and building a relationship with prospective clients so that they feel comfortable and interested in working with you. There are some tricks to learn, and tools, of course, but it’s really not so hard once you learn what to focus on.
Eric
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Charles Youngblood
13 years agoEric-
Happy New Year to You!
Your offering(s) are the most effective vehicle to our firm in transitioning away from REVIT and Autocad…
We are so happy you made it through your summer health “Speed Bump” without perminent impact ( that we can notice). You are gifted in your ability to communicate the ins and outs of the Archicad platform to our immense benefit. Your instinct to provide the variety of offerings is “right on”.Charlie Youngblood PE
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Charles –
Thanks for your feedback.
I’m very pleased to know that my offerings are helping you to succeed in your transition.
I am feeling good right now, and enjoying life, thanks for your kind words.
Eric
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RajagopalaHathwar
13 years agoDear Erric,
Advanced best prosperous new year wishes. I have tremendous faith in you,accepting you are my best teacher in Archicad course. Your dedication, commitment all admirable. Quick time course,best practices course, coaching call made me very familiar with Archicad and create love towards Archicad. I kept maximum of my free time to study and practice projects with your wonderful tips. I am so much hungry to study Archicad that don’t want to skip your small tips.
I wish all your future dreams,plans come true.
Warm regards
Rajagopala Hathwar
mobile 9880080187-
Rajagopala –
Thank you for posting your comments here.
I’m so glad you are in the course and are learning a lot!
Best wishes for the coming year,
Eric
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George Buckley
13 years agoEric,
i too have jumped into the abis. You talk about our trust and confidence in you, however you are a person who lifts the confidence of people to use Archicad. I have trained in Autocad for 23 years and still haven’t come across a training program that takes the time to explain the concepts as clearly and as explicitly as yourself.
Please keep up the great work and have a safe and prosperous new year for 2012.Kindest Regards
George Buckley
Guildford Design
Perth, Western Australia.-
George –
Thank you for your kind words.
I will work hard to make sure the rest of the course materials are just as good as the ones to date!
Eric
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Hi Eric,
I’m interested in updating my ArchiCAD 14 at this time. I do know the new release of 16 is coming soon and I would like to update before falling futher behind.
Is this something you can help with?
Thank you
William Buttmi
wrbuttmi@buttmiconstruction.com