Here is my Review of Agora:
Registration:
Easy process with nothing that forces me to click a picture and hope I picked all the right ones, and all I needed to do was fill out the form and then confirm my email. The email was sent to my inbox, as opposed to the Spam folder where some forum emails end up at, so that was pleasant, as well as the speed with which it arrived.
Welcome PM:
I usually dread signing up on a forum and being inundated with notifications or PMs, yet the one PM I received in my new inbox was surprisingly efficient without boring me with added excess. The necessities for the forum were given to me cleanly and with proper organization.
Account Settings:
Nothing out of the ordinary in going through the process of changing things, and it was easy to go through each of the settings as needed. The one issue I came across was that after I changed my settings, uploaded an avatar and saved it all, I found that the top showed “Log in” even though I hadn’t logged out. I clicked Log in and the system told me I was already logged in and to please Click Here to return to the forum list…but it still didn’t show me as being logged in when I did that. Once I clicked on the forum to write my Introduction post, then it showed my avatar as being logged in. But then once I went back to the home page, it showed that I wasn’t logged in again…even though I was. This happened repeatedly.
Forum Design:
The forum design is efficient, not overwhelming and is visually pleasing. The colors are not any of my favorites, but that’s okay because they are used to give subtle hints of color anyway instead of overloading the senses.
Scrolling to the bottom of the page is fast, and yet nothing seems to be missing on the index in the way of categories.
Forum Categories:
There is no confusion as to which category you should choose from, depending on your needs, as you could select from the top bar pull-down menus, the top rectangle categories, or you can scroll down to the four divided areas of the community. Plus, you have four sidebars for extra quick information on what’s happening within the forum. I didn’t have to try to hunt down anything.
Creating my first post in the Meet & Greet:
Thinking of what to write was the hard part since this is more of a business type forum rather than a General chat one. As soon as I was done writing, it posted to the site without delay which would make posting on the community a breeze.
Feedback Feature:
What caught my eye was the Feedback Feature as soon as I posted my Introduction thread. I clicked on it, and even though I had nothing to show, I could see the separation of Feedback For me and Feedback Left by me. The right sidebar showed the latest feedbacks and I clicked on the owner’s to get a feel for the types of feedback that was normally written up. It seems to be normally succinct, and that’s fine and probably better unless a negative feedback is needed. Thankfully I didn’t come across any negative feedback in my perusing.
Content:
I am the type of forum user who likes to look through old threads, and I’ll even click to the last page so I could get a feel for how users have been represented throughout the weeks, months, etc…
What I found was a wide variety of different posters creating threads. It’s good that not one person is filling up the site with content, and that means that there are active users on the forum.
As for spelling, grammar, etc…everything seemed spot on. If I had to be picky, I would say that the inconsistency of “Hire a Freelancer” link at the top isn’t the same when the bottom button says “Hire Freelancer” without the “a”. But that’s no big deal.
Contests:
The Referral Contest is no joke! The time for it seems sufficient and the prizes are above and beyond what is normally given for forum contests. I really liked the contest page that has all the information I would need without guessing and as long as it syncs up, that makes it super easy for the user!
Finding the Staff:
Not that you’ll need to know who the staff members are on every forum, but it’s nice to be able to contact someone if a problem arises. It didn’t take long for me to find them under the Community pull down menu. Seeing the staff faces gave that human touch which also added a feeling of trust in the site.
The Shop:
The Shop presents valuable offers for members and has a good start. I’m sure it will grow as the site builds itself up.
What’s missing?
I’m really used to seeing how many threads/posts are in the various areas of the forum on the index. Leaving them out keeps it clean looking, so I didn’t even notice at first. If you’re there at the site to get work done, then it doesn’t even matter. I found that those stats are included when I clicked on those categories, so they’re really NOT missing because users really only need to see if there are responses in a thread.
Nice Surprises:
The Recent Activity page was such a delight! I enjoyed waiting for the graphics to change in the center field. This page is akin to a member personal homepage or “feed” where all of the nitty gritty can be found in one central location. I didn’t even know I needed this until I tumbled upon it. 10 stars out of 5 for that!
Final Thoughts:
The brand is consistent throughout the site, and also in the advertising, signature, avatar that I see on other sites, as Agora is marketed. It’s good that Cedric isn’t confused when it comes to branding and has a clear vision for his colors, designs, the feel for the site, as well as his goals for what the site should do. What surprises me is that other users haven’t discovered this place yet, and once they do, they’ll see its value.
