G2KMaster's blog
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| packmule | Sep 29 2008, 04:32 AM |
Site founder - Your best nightmare
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One of the first things I discovered, after starting Monsterland Forums back in late January, 2006 was how much work it was going to take in order to have a chance to build a message board that would simultaneously look decent to others on the web looking it over and also appeal to those who took the time to register and then started posting here. This thread is a "diary" of sorts, in which I will post some observations, suggestions, gripes and other objective, and subjective, content on my experience as the message board administrator for Monsterland Forums. It will also chronicle how I went about building this site, including mistakes I made and what I did to fix them. It is my hope that this topic thread, which will be "read only", will prove useful to others reading it who run their own boards or those who may be considering starting up their own discussion sites on the internet. I also hope, in the event of any absence on my part, either temporary or permanent, from this site, that this topic thread can prove helpful to those staffers still here who will ultimately be tasked with continuing to keep Monsterland Forums going. I will strive to post on a regular basis in this thread but only when I have things I believe should appear here in this thread. _ _ _ _ _ -From the first few moments of this message board I knew right away that several things must happen very quickly in order for this site to gain any kind of attention from potential members: 1. a forum banner had to be installed, one which was related to the primary theme of Monsterland Forums and also looked good as well. As I have never been very good at Photoshop I communicated with several other people at various message boards. all of whom were kind enough to make me usable, and very decent looking forum banners. 2. the main index page: it's what people see first so it had better look good. Initially, and for months, MF was not as "lean" as it should have been. There were too many topics about that died out after 2-3 posts, which contributes what I call "clutter", and something I've seen in great amounts at the really large kaiju themed message boards as well as Gojira's Sanctuary. I believe related topics and forums should be consolidated whenever possible. The site main index page here at MF has undergone numerous changes, which I expected from the start. It now has better structure than ever before, which makes navigating it easier for members and non-members alike. 3. construction of board rules: this was obviously important and had to be one of the first things posted on the main index page, a list of rules that would provide a guide which every member(including myself) would have in order to have a reference for the site do's and don'ts regarding message board behavior and etiquette. 4. Forums, forums, forums and topics, topics, topics: the quickest way to spook away those looking over a message board is to display huge voids on the main index page of the site, and nothing does that more than no topics in forums and/or no forums. First, categories must be created, then forums, and finally topics. In that order! 5. security: I learned quickly that NOT selecting admin validated member email registrations(under board settings in admin cp) was an open invitation, while MF was hosted by Invisionfree, for spambot and other program generated email member registrations. Some of these, from what I've been told, can result in the posting of pornography and links to porn sites on the index page. I have been asked, at other message boards, about what has helped me stay motivated to continue to put forth work into the continuation of this site. Mostly it's seeing so many boards abandoned and/or ruined, mostly the former. I knew beforehand that this site would take, realistically, 2-3 years to establish itself. I also started up MF without the "entitlement" mentality I see so often with admins elsewhere: that people should join a board just because it's there. Monsterland Forums is, to me, much like a restaurant or other retail business: the members are the "customers". You keep your customers coming back in a retail business by making them want to come back. It's no different, IMO, regarding a message board. Things like interesting features, forums and topics, coupled with a casual and relaxed atmosphere seemed to me the best way to make registered members want to participate in the forums around here. I've also found that being a good admin also involves asking your members questions. To me the best message boards are those where the staff work to get members involved in topic and forum discussions. |
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5:35 AM Nov 27
