I want to start by apologizing for how delayed this is. I take 100% responsibility for the delay so please don't take any anger you may have out on the rest of the review team. Things came up that I unfortunately could not fit this review around. Due to delay this review will be on me, free of charge. I hope this delay doesn't prevent you from requesting in the future.
🙂 Once again, my apologizes.
Your Forum Review
First Impressions & Appearance - (Out of 20)
- When you first visit a forum the first thing that you see is the header. Usually administrators put a banner in the header, however sometimes they put opt to put text. You went the route of placing a banner in your header and aced it. The execution and creativeness behind it was super! I honestly could not find another adjective to describe it. Well done mate!
- Out of the forums I've reviewed since day one I don't think I can ever recall coming across a red style. I'm not sure whether that makes you unique or whether that means it’s disliked by most people. I can understand the color choice as red = blood which is associated primarily with war. However it just didn't seem to "flow" with the rest of the style. Red is one of my favorite colors so please don't think I'm saying this because I hate red as I don't. I feel another color in place of red would fit, for say a color in your banner to increase the flow as I find flow very important.
- Your new and old buttons were a disappointment compared to your statistics buttons. You have small icons on your statistics buttons but nothing on your new and old buttons. I would have loved to see something else there besides a red block but unfortunately that is not what I found. I’d love if you found a way to enhance your already existing buttons.
(Scored 16/20)
Site Layout - (Out of 20)
- I see no major issues with how you laid out the boards and categories of your forum. I was expecting to see you’re important, please read the topics inside these boards towards the top above everything else followed by your main role playing areas, and then your admin shop and personnel forums boards. I think this is to best way to organize this boards and categories that currently exist on your forum. Good job!
- I do have a board or two that I thought could be placed somewhere else. I really don’t like coming across a category that has only one board in it. You currently have a category called “Services” and it only contains one board which is an advertising/promotional board. I felt that board could be thrown at the bottom of your “Other” category. Placing that board in its own category takes up more space than simply adding it into an already existing category. An advertising/promotion board would fit fine in a category titled “Other” so I don’t see any issues with placing it there at the bottom of the category.
(Scored 18/20)
Statistics and Activity - (Out of 20)
- I haven’t reviewed many role playing forums but after being open for a little shy of one year I was expecting more than 10,000 posts. However you’ve only been able to rack up about 7,500 posts. I understand role playing forums are harder to get posts on but I feel you could have racked in some more posts within this time frame. You currently are averaging about 20 posts per day which isn’t bad but I would have liked to see more within a year.
- 91 members in almost a year? Once again I was expecting more. You are currently are only averaging .25 of a member each day. To sum that number up you’re averaging one member every four days. After about a year, which is 365 days I would have expected way over 100 members, if not 200 members by today. Work on recruiting new members to your community.
- Some areas of your forum are out of place statistics wise with others. This means some of your boards have more topics and replies than other ones do. Try your best to balance out all your forums equally statistics wise. You don’t want active boards and then have some inactive boards with nothing current.
(Scored 13/20)
Staff Moderation - (Out of 20)
- You currently have three staff members according to your “Administration and Moderator List” in the footer of your forum. I don’t think you’re overstaffed or understaffed at all. As you don’t have many active, posting daily members there would be no need to have more staff than what you currently have as there isn’t much to moderate at this time.
- You have some inactive staff. If staff member haven’t logged in for about two months without notification to another team member it shows that they aren’t truly in it for the long haul. You currently have one inactive staff official who last logged-in on Jan 20 2010, 11:42 PM and you have another staff member who last logged-in on Feb 27 2010, 09:04 PM which is not nearly as bad as the other staff member you currently employ. Inactive staff can actually hurt your forum. Try to get in touch with these two staff members to see if they truly are into the forum and are dedicated and willing to work in their free time to take it places. If there answer is no then I’m sure you could find someone else who would be able to contribute more to your forum.
(Scored 15/20)
Spelling/Grammar & Professionalism - (Out of 20)
- As I’m reviewing this forum as guest I saw your “Welcome Guest” box and decided to read through it as most potential members of your community would do so. I found no errors what-so-ever. Having an error free welcome message to guests which are the potential of your community is a great thing. Personally if I saw a forum with a guest welcome box that contained slang and overall poor English I wouldn’t join the forum. Based on grammar strictly from what I can see as a guest I would join your forum.
- The descriptions of your boards were nothing short of “blah” to me. Some of your descriptions weren’t even sentences and they all appeared to be thrown together quickly without a second thought. The descriptions were boring and if I was completely new to your forum which will be the case for all your guests I would personally have been confused about what I would find inside all of your different boards. I’d love to see all of your board descriptions spiced up by adding more content to them. Guests to your forum probably
(Scored 16/20)
Total Score - 78/100
Final Remarks:
You have good role playing forum that with a few corrections and considerations could be great. It has a great foundation and I have confidence that you will be able to continue to grow this site into a wonderful and active role playing community.
What was most liked about the website/forums: What I liked most about your forum was the layout of your forum. For the most part it was well thought out and executed and I almost could tell what the next category and it's boards would be. Once you fix the few things I mentioned I believe I would be worthy of a 20/20!
What was disliked most about the website/forums: What I disliked most about your forum was actually a tie between two things. They were your inactive staff members and your "blah" board descriptions. Like I mentioned more in depth in the review focus on getting new, active staff members and spicing up your board descriptions.
How could I get you (The Reviewer) to join my website? What you could do to get me to join your forum would be to boost activity. I'm one of those (and I hate to say it) people that when it comes to being on inactive forums I have a hard time staying active.
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