Layout - Red, black, white and blue is a color scheme that is easy on the eyes. Font is readable, the buttons are crisp and nothing makes my eyes want to bleed. The forum logo at the top, however, throws things off a little because neither the grey nor that shade of blue are found elsewhere in the site.
Using tabs for each of the forum categories is almost refreshing. But at the same time, I’m not sure that there is enough in each tab in order to make it worthwhile. It defaulted to the “General” tab which doesn’t include rules or anything. It does include the general discussion as well as the introductions, and both of those are important, but normally you want your members to see the rules and the announcements first.
Each tab only has two forums on it, which almost seems to be a waste. Combine tabs or add more forums (and drum up activity if you’re adding more forums). Maybe you could have it formatted like this:
- (Tab 1) General
- TGT Information Forum
- Ask the Staff
- Introduction
(Tab 2) Discussion
- General Discussion
- Game Discussion
- Internet Discussion
However you’d like to do the second tab (maybe that one you want to keep divided into multiple tabs; I don’t know), I highly suggest keeping the information in my Tab 1 there as the default information people will initially see when they view your site.
Staff – Make yourself personable! I just see a “GenTalkAdmin.” So? Who is that? Use an actual unique username and not the name of your board. This is a discussion forum, and people want to feel at home so they can sit around and talk, so give them someone they can talk to.
Content – I don’t know what differentiates your site from other discussion sites. Are you going to have new features or are you going to focus on having a unique community of individuals? There are some sites that can get by without doing anything crazy because they have really nice members who are intelligent or creative and engage in constant, exciting discussion. But you need to find a way to draw people in to your site, whatever you choose.
Ask members questions. Bring them into the discussion. Things like, “What is your name?” are nice questions, but that’s not going to engage members. “How did you get your username?” is better, but something like, “Why is your username significant to you?” is best. It draws on members to really think about a topic that is obviously appealing to them, and it gets them to talk. Word questions carefully so that they’re open and people are more likely to engage in discussion.
I admit that I’m not sure why you have the website management section, but then again . . . I really haven’t figured out who your target audience is. This section just seems awkward. You’re assuming that people who want general discussion and to discuss about videogames also happen to run websites. I’m sure you’ll get people like that, but how many? Enough to start off with that forum that doesn’t quite fit?
Your Big Challenge – Your site needs a purpose and it needs to find its niche in the general discussion board community. Why should a guest choose your site over the next discussion forum? At this current point, your site has next to nothing. That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have potential—it could become something down the road—but it means that there is no reason right now that someone would join your site. If you are making this site because you want to make a board and show off numbers and get the “best” general discussion forum out there, then you may want to rethink your decision to make this board.
But if you made this site because you really want to administrate a discussion community and facilitate engaging discussions with members, then you have your work cut out for you. It might be hard, but the payoffs could be great. Choose a better nickname, invite members to come be with you and build an exciting forum with lively discussions. Find out what topics are relevant to your target audience, and add more forums / remove unnecessary forums. Things will start to fall into place once you recognize
why you want to run your forum.
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There is your review. Good luck on your site. ^^
