A Guide To A Successful Forum (Any Genera)

[Justin]

The guide To A Successful Forum​

---

Hey there, I wrote this for the users of FP as I have seen some good boards and some crap ones. So, if you don't mind leaving feedback and comments on this to help me improve my articles in the future. I used Bold and some color tags to help fast searching. Now, I am not the best forum owner in the world, I mean, seriously, I think I suck at running a board to be honest. So don't think I wrote this because I thought I was. Now on to the Content..

---

Section One - Tree Layouts
Tree Layouts, commonly refereed to as the basic layout or layer diagram, is almost every forums layout. An example has been provided below.

[b]Announcements and Site Information[/b]
---> News
---> Support & Feedback
---> Intros
[b]Main Content[/b]
---> Content 1
---> Content 2
[b]Other (MISC)[/b]
---> General Chat
---> Media Discussion
---> Games/Admin Discussions
---> Advertising and Affiliates

I have yet to see a board break this trend, it is the universal layout. To spice your forum up, mix it around. There is no other known (to my knowledge) board layout. Simply because it is never thought of.

Section Two - Copying
Best Advice Ever: COPYING SUCCESS WITH END IN FAILURE. You cannot copy success, it is not something you can highlight and CTRL+C to. You must work to make success. Remember, Hard work will pay off in the future, and good things come to those who wait. In some cases copying is illegal and can be brought to court.

Section Three - Board Staff
Hiring staff is, no lie, the hardest thing you will ever do as a webmaster. It is hard to trust anyone now-a-days. So you need to look for qualities in staff such as a out standing personality, leadership qualities, dedication, and interest. If someone has two posts on your board, that doesn't show too much dedication does it? You need someone with leadership qualities to take over when the board isn't doing to well or another member is on break, being quick on his/her feet. Remember when hiring, read over all applications, don't just pick your friends, and find the qualities.

Section Four - Themes
Themes are hard to make look good for everyone. Most of the time, not everyone will love your theme. It is their personality and traits, it doesn't mean the theme looks bad at all. Just try and find a good medium and have more than one, but not too many that you can't keep up. A good light theme and dark theme in your arsenal is the best success. Make sure you don't remove copyrights, or say you made it if you didn't. Make sure your smilies fit the theme, like on FP1, nothing fits, although I use it anyway :lol:

Section Five - Managing Dead Times
Every owner dreads this, Dead Zones. Every forum has them, heck even FP has them once in a while. IT may be caused by schools starting, a big news story, or holidays. Maintain the forum and make sure you keep them. If you see another member active on another forum that is on yours, try and win them back with posting contests, prizes, awards, a revamp or something to gain them. Advertise more and to exchanges to build activity again, you can even make a drone account, another account made by you to be posed as an active user.


Thanks for reading, this covers just content. Nothing with forum softwares or domains, servers, ect. If you want something added reply here. We are still under construction on this 😀 So be kind, and rewind.

 

[Red Herring]

Not a bad guide gent. :great: But truth be told, it's rare that a forum DOESN'T copy another (gaming forums copy gaming forums, music forums copy music, etc)

I think better worded, it'd be more of "Try to get content unique to your site, and to no one elses".

But overall, very nice. 😀

 

[Justin]

Not a bad guide gent. :great: But truth be told, it's rare that a forum DOESN'T copy another (gaming forums copy gaming forums, music forums copy music, etc)

I think better worded, it'd be more of "Try to get content unique to your site, and to no one elses".

But overall, very nice. 😀

thats why I made this, hopefully to break the trend 🙂

Thanks too :great:

 

[DevilKid]

Really nice topic. I used to do that but then gave up on 'CREATING' forums, now its just about me visiting and posting on other people's forums. 🙂

 

[souljaa]

I really like this guide, will definetly use it for my forum that is in the making!! 🙂
Good job

 

[PurpleCrow]

I think you missed out one huge aspect - content and the amount of it. Great article though!

I always believe that people should build up content before they launch (each forum having roughly 5 topics in them as a minimum) and then keep up a steady flow of topics, making sure that at least one topic goes in each forum every 2 days, with a combination of staff and owner efforts.

Thats how I made my forums successful 🙂

 

[Justin]

I think you missed out one huge aspect - content and the amount of it. Great article though!

I always believe that people should build up content before they launch (each forum having roughly 5 topics in them as a minimum) and then keep up a steady flow of topics, making sure that at least one topic goes in each forum every 2 days, with a combination of staff and owner efforts.

Thats how I made my forums successful 🙂

I will add that in tonight 😉

I want to thank everyone for the cheers 😀

 

[cityStatic]

Announcements and Site Information
---> News
---> Support & Feedback
---> Intros
Main Content
---> Content 1
---> Content 2
Other (MISC)
---> General Chat
---> Media Discussion
---> Games/Admin Discussions
---> Advertising and Affiliates

Actually, there is one major forum that broke away (actually reversed) from that pattern. It's the top anime forum in the world (if you don't count Gaia Online as an anime forum)- obviously animeforum.com. 😛

 

[PurpleCrow]

Announcements and Site Information
---> News
---> Support & Feedback
---> Intros
Main Content
---> Content 1
---> Content 2
Other (MISC)
---> General Chat
---> Media Discussion
---> Games/Admin Discussions
---> Advertising and Affiliates

Actually, there is one major forum that broke away (actually reversed) from that pattern. It's the top anime forum in the world (if you don't count Gaia Online as an anime forum)- obviously animeforum.com. 😛

I've seen many forums that differ to this too. Actually, my forum was different to this layout, but now the same as this because I find it works well 🙂

 

[Justin]

Announcements and Site Information
---> News
---> Support & Feedback
---> Intros
Main Content
---> Content 1
---> Content 2
Other (MISC)
---> General Chat
---> Media Discussion
---> Games/Admin Discussions
---> Advertising and Affiliates

Actually, there is one major forum that broke away (actually reversed) from that pattern. It's the top anime forum in the world (if you don't count Gaia Online as an anime forum)- obviously animeforum.com. 😛

Huh, Didn't know that

 

[golfbunny]

I have yet to see a board break this trend, it is the universal layout.

I'm going to assume you exclusively observe forums advertised on FP, for the vast majority of successful forums (ones that just so happen not to be influenced by promotion forums) do not cater to what you have labeled the 'tree layout.'

There is no other known (to my knowledge) board layout.

Of course there is. Take a glance at the twenty-five largest forums on the internet. How many different layout themes can you identify?

Section Two - Copying
Best Advice Ever: COPYING SUCCESS WITH END IN FAILURE. You cannot copy success, it is not something you can highlight and CTRL+C to. You must work to make success. Remember, Hard work will pay off in the future, and good things come to those who wait. In some cases copying is illegal and can be brought to court.

Well said.

Section Three - Board Staff
Hiring staff is, no lie, the hardest thing you will ever do as a webmaster.

Hardly. The selection of staff may be of utmost importance, but by no means is it difficult. There is always an abundance of mature, rational, levelheaded, bright members. People just don't look in the right places.

Remember when hiring, read over all applications, don't just pick your friends, and find the qualities.

Asking for applications is where most administrators go wrong. Applications inherently attract individuals who moderate for the sake of moderating, administer for the sake of administering - not individuals with legitimate leadership qualities. It's always best to hand pick staff members.

Section Four - Themes
Themes are hard to make look good for everyone. Most of the time, not everyone will love your theme. It is their personality and traits, it doesn't mean the theme looks bad at all. Just try and find a good medium and have more than one, but not too many that you can't keep up. A good light theme and dark theme in your arsenal is the best success. Make sure you don't remove copyrights, or say you made it if you didn't. Make sure your smilies fit the theme, like on FP1, nothing fits, although I use it anyway :lol:

Not sure exactly why you bothered including the sentence about FP1, but otherwise you make legitimate points. Remember, though, that the difficulty of theme customization is far overestimated. Grab a capable graphic designer, take an image from the theme, customize it, and swap the two via FTP - it's that simple. 😀

Every owner dreads this, Dead Zones. Every forum has them, heck even FP has them once in a while. IT may be caused by schools starting, a big news story, or holidays. Maintain the forum and make sure you keep them. If you see another member active on another forum that is on yours, try and win them back with posting contests, prizes, awards, a revamp or something to gain them. Advertise more and to exchanges to build activity again, you can even make a drone account, another account made by you to be posed as an active user.

In legitimately active communities, one drone account isn't going to cut it. If there is a legitimate reason behind a drop in activity (ie. school starting, a big news story, a holiday), you really have nothing to worry about. I wouldn't sweat it.

'Genera' is the plural of 'genus,' which usually pertains to scientific subdivisions, as opposed to the topics of forums. Seeing as you (grammatically) shouldn't be intending for the word to be plural, I'm going to hazard a guess the word you are looking for is 'genre.' I'm really not a grammar Nazi in the slightest, but seeing as the error is in your title, I thought you might want to know.

Regards,
Zane

 

[NetworkLabs]

Nice information! But I am planning a different plan for my forums!

 

[Fergal]

Helpful guide The Hat Tipper, thanks for sharing it with us. Some comments;

I keep the Announcements, Intros, etc, section to the bottom of my business forum. My opinion is that including the main content forums near the top makes it more obvious to first time visitors, as to what the forum is about and how it can help them.

In relation to copying you might want to advise your readers to be aware of their competition. Then take some time to 1) describe their target market, 2) outline how their forum will benefit their members 3) define how their forum will be better than the existing competition and 4) utilise steps 3 & 4 to come up with a single but very attractive benefit of their forum that puts them head and shoulders above the competition.

 

[David]

I reckon you can expand significantly. You've made quite a few important and relevant points, but some of them are obvious. Maybe a few external examples, not just FP. Nice work, keep it up.

 

[juststeven]

Good guide although I knew everything, knowledge came with experience for me. My first 30 forums all failed. I found a good one settled down then hackers just killed it so now finnaly after learning a lot I have made a succesful forum that hasn't being hacked.. much.

Any guides on how to protect yourself from hackers?

 

[Fergal]

...My first 30 forums all failed...

If at first you don't succeed, try try again!

Did you ask yourself why they failed and what you can learn from each of them, to make the next one better?

Any guides on how to protect yourself from hackers?

You might consider the following;

1. Ensure that your admin password is really secure, preferably containing upper and lower case letters, numbers and perhaps some symbols
   Change your admin passwords regularly
   The two steps above should also be applied to the passwords for your hosting account and forum database
   Ensure that your forum software is kept up to date
   Password protect your admin directory, through .htaccess or cPanel
   Make regular back ups of your forum database.

 

[Lukas]

Sweet guide, I'm sure it will help those who need it.

 

[Blackwolf]

Great advice :great:

Super guide The Hat Tipper :great:

 

[faviouz]

N/A