Markiplier Fan Forum
Review by Cosmic
First Impressions
There are a number of thoughts which come to mind when first visiting your website. The first is "Who is Markiplier?" Many people who are interested in joining your forum will already know that, but some will not. I think it's a good idea to have some way of conveying that to them, either through a guest box displayed at the top of your forum when a guest vists your website, or an "About Us" page.
Second of all, there are elements of the design which are not pleasing to the eye. I will expand on these further in the next suggestion, but I'd like to stress that it is very important to have a good design which does not distract from your forum's content. Otherwise, a user's first impression might very well be their last impression.
In this category I am going to give you a "Poor," because I did not see any reason to join your forum. As someone who doesn't know anything about Markpler, I couldn't really tell what your forum was about. As a forum user in general, I did not like the style, and found that very off-putting.
Very Poor
Design Quality
I do not like the design you are using. It appears to be a temporary seasonal design, but nonetheless, it is very important that a temporary design still appeal to users. This design simply does not, in my opinion.
First of all, the selection of colors is very old-fashioned looking. The colors which were chosen are, overall, not very original colors. A very standard blue and a very standard white. This does not make your website appeal to the visitor, who wants to see something vibrant and interesting.
Also, some elements of your design seem very distracting, such as the hover effects when a mouse moves over a forum on the index. I do not recommend using such effects, as they can be very off-putting to a user.
Finally, I complement you on the good quality artwork used in the header, but caution that you choose something which is more readable. It is very difficult for me to tell what your forum's name is, without reading it somewhere else.
Very Poor
Site Statistics
Statistics is another area in which your website needs some serious work. You do not have very many posts in much of your sections. "Video Games," for example, does not have any posts in it at all, and "New Videos" only has 5 posts. If your forum is going to become active, I highly recommend that you jump start activity by creating threads and replying to them. Once you start discussion, other people will begin to join in, and conversations can start to pop up.
Very Poor
Final Remarks:
Your website needs quite a bit of work. What is most important is focusing on your website's design, and also on its statistics. If you can do that, then your forum has a chance to become successful.
Good luck!
Your Score
