Medium Forum Review
First Impressions
It feels like I am walking into an entirly different forum from last time. This theme suits your forum much better, it is a nice deep blue colour which isn't too common on forums, which is a great aspect. Something which I find a shame is that you have managed to find another theme that creates an empty feel in the center of the header. This due to the pale blue circular gradient that is positioned right in this area.In my opinion it would work much better under the logo. The shoutbox is very off-putting for me, the reason for this that I have seen so many forums lose activity due to having a shoutbox. If you want to keep it and your members enjoy it without you losing too much activity then I suggest moving it to the bottom of the forum or at least underneath the welcome banner. The welcome banner should be the very first thing a new visitor sees. Your logo is much more attention grabbing now, it could be even more so if you let the background C4D that is on the logo sweep into the forum more. On a whole I am very impressed, the feel of the forum is a whole lot better. I feel much more welcome and at ease when arriving at the forum, even before I have logged in. The sign up button could be made a whole lot more noticeable though, you do want people to join your forum.
When I actually logged in the profile that appeared under the shoutbox really started to get at me. When someone visits your forum it is the top part, before they scroll down that determines if they are going to stay on your forum or not. The shoutbox being there means that all your visitor is seeing is your members rants and rambles in a chat. You want them to see the forum, see something that catches their eye and makes them want to keep reading and reading and reading. You should have the latest news at the top, then the profile, smaller than it is currently, and then you should let the forum begin.
Appearance
As I have already mentioned, I love the new colour scheme of your forum, the whole design has a great flow which gives a very relaxed feel. The images next to each board help to break the colour scheme a little which is great, a nice touch with well selected images, but some of them are a bit fuzzy. You should look into getting new images for the Introductions, Suggestions, Networking and Current News boards. The logo is looking much better, it is great to see that you are using the robot as your mascot and letting it appear on and around the forum, you could do so even more. All forums strive to be unique and find ways of being more popular than other forums in the same niche, so why not add some querky and unique tweaks. Use the robot on buttons and on each section heading. The section headings could do with some work as right now they don't tell me much or draw any attention to themselves. If you take a glance at them you will feel how your eye is pulled away from the text and towards the lighter blue area on the right side, this is what you don't want.
Something I do find a little disappointing about the design is the bottom of your theme, there really isn't anything there. The same goes for the sidebar as you scroll down. We have a great balance of colour and images on the top half of the forum and then it all just sinks into a white emptiness when we scroll down. I find this a real shame, just adding some advertising would help to keep the flow going. At the bottom of the forum I would expect to see some more information. Maybe you could add some affiliates or something down here, even a small ad that isn't too bright would help. It may sound odd that I am suggesting advertising, but there are times when it can be a great way of making your forum work better and finding a flow.
Ratios
Now, coming to this area I am very disappointed. Not much has really happened or changed here since last time. The posts per board are still far too low. The Building Comptuers board only has 9 posts and the General Computer Talk, where I would expect a large amount of posts only has 14. I really feel that of the 9 boards you have in the computer section you only need 2. One for Software and one for Hardware. If you really wanted to have more then a third board with general discussion about computers would work, but more than 3 you really can't do. Looking at the Lounge section, Tutorials could easily be a sub-board on the graphic design board as it only has 4 topics in it. All of the boards in the Lounge could easily be only one board, you have far too many boards in all sections. I would suggest one Technology section with 4 boards; Computers, Media, Gadgets, Networking/Gaming and then just have one general discussion board and scrap the whole Lounge section, putting those posts into the General board instead.
You only have 2 members of staff, which is fine for the size of your forum. Both have a good post count too. You haev a toatal of 817 posts and 38 members which is a small but positive improvement since your last review. Your forum has now been open for around 90 days which gives you an average of 9 posts a day which is a slight drop since your last review. With an average of 21 posts per member you shouldn't threat too much but you should look into putting more work into boosting your members posting, maybe remove that shoutbox?
Posts
A large amount of the posts on your forum are of a good quality, especially those that are made by your staff. You do have a few members that post in a way that really doesn't look good for your forum but this is something for your staff to work on, not that you can always do something about it. As long as your staff always post well then in the end your members will follow suit. The posts aren't very well spread around the board with a large amount being in the introductions and General discussion thread. While browsing I also see the odd spambot post, which isn't a great thing to see on a forum. While you have a lot of quality and unique content then you still need to do some work on the other aspects, such as moderation. If you have users that keep making very short posts then don't hesitate to do something about it. Quality over Quantity any day.
Content
Your board descriptions are still very uneven. Some are very well-written whilst overs could still do with some improvement. Aim to make all your descriptions 2-3 sentences long and make sure they are all around the same length. Make them sound interesting and engaging, make your member what to read whats in the forum. Your announcements are long and very well-written even though there are quite a few obvious grammatical errors in them. Run them through a word processor before publishing them, to give you that final professional feel. Your rules are well thought through and well-written. Very informative and cover all aspects.
Final Remarks
It is great to see that you have taken some of the advice you recieved in the last review you had. It was a joy to return to your forum and see the improvements made, I am very impressed with your commitment. I believe that with a bit of work and a lot more advertising then your forum will do very well, the outlook is much brighter than it was last time I reviewed it. Don't give up, there are good days and bad days, January is never a good month online. Work on expaning your advertising circle, browsing through FPs basic promotion section will give you at least 10 new places to advertise. I wish you all the best with your forum and I am looking forward to reviewing it again in the future, I will be keeping an eye on it.
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