Room

works

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Update

As you probably have noticed both R-D and the blog haven't been updated much lately, I am not closing either site and the reason I launched R-D and the blogs as tutorial/advice type sites is because this isn't a news type site so the first tutorial wont be out dated if someone finds the site a year from now, I do plan to add more over time but lately other projects have been the main focus, including the creation of 'Stick Dude' on stick guy comics.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Ad Pacement

Something I have asked myself several times since re-launching RD where the best place to have advertising is, the one thing I have always done is place the ads in there own area so they aren't hidden with regular content to trick people into clicking. I have found that the best place to put them is on the right column and footer, this is because if the ad server is slow it will cause your site to stall while it waits for the ads, if they are in your footer or in the right column your website navigation has already loaded with the main body of the content, so it causes less disruption.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Search Engine Friendly URL's

This isn't about creating Search Engine Friendly URL's, if you are looking for one RD has one.

Until recently I was not a big fan of these url's as I liked the old fashioned file.php?id= type link, but search engines aren't the best at indexing that type of url so I decided to switch.

Some advice when implementing these URL's:

Includes are done at server side so they are fine to be left as they are

If you have a style sheet, instead of 'includes/style.css' use 'http://domain.com/includes/style.css' as if your url is domain.com/news/05/index.html it will think the style sheet is at domain.com/news/05/incudes/style.css.

Same goes for links, use the full url.

Also check the image urls are the full ones.

Be careful with the url's, I add index.html to my urls as if I ended it news/05/ then its easy to make a mistake, for example if I link to news/05 it will give a page not found error, take myspace for example if you link to your profile say myspace.com/somerandomexample and you post a link too myspace.com/somerandomexample/ it will give the user a page not found error

The reason for this is because your computer renders the html side as far as that knows the url you are viewing is the directory/file in the address bar so renders it as it would any html file.

Search Engine Friendly URLs are mostly about trial and error, when you implement them try all the links and check everything appears as you want them to appear.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

The power of branching out

As you have probably seen from what started as a website with a forum (BSP) the network has expanded with the addition of Rampant Designs, Stick Guy Comics, blogs and the recent addition Herpes Radio, the entire network has a huge diversity which helps all the websites as they are all connected together (through advertisements and the forum) so if one gains popularity it should help the others. I look at the network as 3 sections the Rampant Designs section which is the technical side, the BSP section which is the entertainment for all ages and the Stick Guy Comics section which is entertainment aimed at a more mature audience (such as the new radio show).

The main advantage of branching out your network into new areas is you let each have its own voice, we could have had bsp.rampant-designs.com, stickguy.rampant-designs.com and radio.rampant-designs.com but all the sites would be compared to Rampant Designs as they contain the same url, but at the same time as the other sites are referenced in some way through the other sites is still allows users to move around the network. If you do branch out I suggest having a lot of diversity don't have your website then a sub site with pretty much the same content because it becomes confusing for users who are on your website looking for information related to it who have to search around several sub sites for it.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

The easiest method of designing a website

Been a few days since I last 'blogged' here mainly because I have been busy with some other things including a new website which is soon debuting, anyways I thought I would post a quick blog on how I usually do layouts. I will say now I do code, I hate using a program like photoshop to just slice up the image and generate code.

Dimensions

First I work out the dimensions I want to use, such as the overall width, the left nav width, the center and the right. I usually draw it in an image editing program, just a plain background with squares to see how it will look when its layed out.

Design

Next using an image editing program I draw the layout how I want it to look as a whole to see what I expect overall.

Cutting

Next I cut the layout up into smaller chunks, discarding what I would see as irrelevant content (such as the background if I am using a single color for the background and spacer images).

Create a tabled layout

When I have the images I open a html editor (sometimes notepad) and design a template page, I use tables and keep all of the content in the table tags (such as width), I know I have stated before css is a better option but that comes later. Once the layouts done I open it in internet explorer to see it looks as I expect, I then open it in firefox and fix the coding so it uses code firefox will acknowledge.

CSS

Now I take the template and integrate a style sheet to the design. I then test it again in all browsers.

Develop the pages

When everythings working I create all the pages for it, if I use a database (which I always do) I add the code to take the information from the database and add test entries just to test the layout.


Anyways thats all for today have fun and happy coding.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Anti -affiliates a little addition

As I stated in a previous blog I am not a fan of these 'get a free iphone' type sites and I recently read an article in PC Advisors 2007 security bible (its a small leaflet and thats the name, I don't worship security or anything), I would post the article but as its in print that means re-typing it which well isn't going to happen. Anyways I came across an interesting article about a website where you get a free laptop for registering (iwantmyfreelaptop.com) well as you would expect when they say register they mean register with them then 10 other sites to buy/subscribe or get a nice new credit card to pile onto that nice little debt, well the writer (Kalpana Ettenson) stated they found it suspicious you would just get a free laptop so they proceeded to check the website against the Better Business Bureau website and the website had a few complaints well by a few I mean 457 where pretty much the user got 9 credits was going fine then dang it the website started to act up not loading and confirming orders so no one was getting there laptop, some people just have bad luck.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

A nice new type of file hosting

When I was a younger newer person to the Internet I posted on a few message boards (I know I sometimes refer to them as forums but that's habit which I am trying to phase out because message board sounds nicer and gets less confusing when you talk about the forum as a message board but some think you mean a category within the message board) anyways one thing which was common was file sharing (still is with most boards) and there was a lot of options for remotely hosting files (obviously a lot less than there is now with the recent upsurge in free hosts who use advertising to cover costs) and in every thread it would be a case of a few thanks, a lot of 'Can you use another host that one doesn't work for me' or that one member who signs up searches for something a year after its posted and rather than request the file in a request thread decide to bump the thread just to ask the user to re-upload it.

This brings me to this website I stumbled upon earlier today which is something I looked for in the past as the constant re-upload requests and general ungratefulness based on the host which was used, this website allows you to upload the file it then remotely hosts them on Megaupload, DepositFiles, RapidShare and Sendspace which are some of the most common hosts, it also re-uploads the files for you when they expire.

The sites available at Share Bee, definitely worth checking out.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Adsense websites

Ever notice how many companies sell AdSense ready websites where your entire site is nothing but advertisement after advertisement and they claim they will make you a nice bit of money, I have never purchased one of these nor do I desire to buy one for simple reason if they claim it can make you thousands why are they selling them for $20 to $40 when they could just open more sites and make thousands more, the reason for me is obvious, the sites have the potential to make thousands but only if you chose the correct domain, if you had something like thisisalongurlitishugeohwowthisislong.com then its unlikely anyone will randomly stumble upon it, now if you had a url which was similar to a popular sites except with different spelling or a different TLD such as gogle.com or google.net or gomummy.com then theres a higher chance of someone stumbling on your website and maybe clicking ads if they are relevant especially if one of the ads go to the actual site they wanted, but if I owned such domains I would simply place my own ads on the layout instead of buying a glorified template.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Its all in the first 2 clicks

A wise search engine once told me its all in the first 2 clicks when it comes to success, the design of a website can have a real effect on a websites success because within those 2 clicks a user sees the style of your website and the ease of access to information based on your website, its why when you go to Rampant Designs, Baby Seal Productions or Stick Guy Comics that the layout/style is continuous and from click one you get an idea of what the sites like (all be it for Stick Guy you get a disclaimer). Even the blogs are set out this way you go to the blog and you get the latest posts plus easy navigation. It brings me to something I have always seen as a hits killer and that is splash screens, theres no point to them and they give the visitor no idea of your websites style and I think they break that golden rule of not owning a forum driven website where your forum gets all the attention and your website gradually fades away and the reason for that is most splash screens give you the option of viewing the website or entering the forum, now I think that most visitors who go to the sites url say domain.com want to view domain.com if they wanted to see the forum they would go to domain.com/forum or for those who want to view the forum they can easily select the forum from the navigation.

When I see a splash screen it puts me off the website for the simple reason I am there, they have got my attention using whichever method and now I want to see what the sites about so why do they keep hyping it when they could put the efforts into making me want to return again, also no matter how big your forum is and how popular it is theres hundreds of thousands of forums on the web and its alot more difficult to show how unique you are using the same software as thousands of others while with a website thats something you have thought up, designed and coded its a reflection of you and alot more unique.

My advice when it comes to websites is you should try and be unique, don't go searching on google for inspiration when Soulz designed Baby Seal Productions he just designed what he wanted it to look like, when I designed Rampant Designs I just sorted out the sizes then looked at the color scheme and Stick Guy Comics I decided simplicity was the best option. The point is those layouts are unique, they arent some immitation of a bigger website or something we found on google and I personally believe that helps websites success because its something new to the user not the same thing they see on other sites.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Myspace Affiliate Abuse

It seems that the majority of myspace users post trying to get you something free, by free they mean when you enter your credit card details and spend lots of money they will send you the free gift. What gets me most is that its always an ipod or iphone two things I never desire to own as you will have seen from my first ever blog talking about the great Zen Vision M: from Creative (highly reccomended as always) but its so annoying to see the comments list filled with that crap, I havent had any on my personal myspace but theres been some I have deleted on the Baby Seal Productions myspace.

Also the other annoying one is the 'want to know whos spying on your myspace', I have a quick and simple method I use on my own blog and that is setting it to private so to see it the person has to become my friend.

Then theres the ones who say myspace wont let them display the content of there pictures and to click to view them on another site, I pitty the horny idiots who click that and get taken to a virus ridden website, and you know people click it otherwise most comment boxes wouldn't have them appear multiple times.


Also blog 14, the curse that never existed would be lifted if it existed, anyways:

The answer to life, blogger wouldn't let me post it so click the link**


**Bad joke, does not point to any risky site, unless you enter the stick guy forum.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Stupidity with advertisements

It still baffles me how so many website owners still tell visitors publicly to click there advertisements, companies haven't become as successful as they are at offering advertising opportunities without finding ways to stop unauthorised clicking, it still seems most webmasters (especially of smaller websites) think if they say 'hey click one ad a day' then they will make money and get away with it, for one telling people to click violates most (if not all) advertising companies terms of service but if the same people click 1 ad each day the advertisers going to pick the pattern up quickly and more than likely terminate your account, its better to look at your account and see in a month you have made $10 than for it to say several hundred then one day that your account has been banned and you get nothing, I mean a few dollars may seem like nothing but that's if you think here and now, yes it will barely (if at all) cover your websites overheads but websites rarely (if ever) gain in popularity at a straight line, in fact theres no set measure which can be used to explain it, some websites start getting popular fast while some are barely getting hits for months/years then suddenly bang they gain a lot of steam, the best description I have seen is that websites popularity increase logarithmically meaning its like a snow ball effect one user links a few friends to your website then each of those friends links more friends and they link more friends and it keeps going. Anyways the point of that little sidetrack from telling users to click ads when the alternative is you make little per month is simple, if you get banned from the company now then your losing a few dollars a month, what happens when your sites big and you want to make money from advertising, sure theres a lot of companies out there but they may not meet your needs (for example I chose bidvertiser because they pay through paypal while most others I saw used cheque.

The point is always look to the future, it may seem like a nice way to try and make cash now but if you get banned then the money you will lose from advertising will sting. I like the idea of advertisements since they can be a nice way of making revenue to pay for the website and (in theory) mean webmasters wont continually put up donate now buttons with every post, although some probably still will to try and get every last bit of money they can, I have donate buttons on Baby Seal Productions and Rampant Designs but they are placed on there own page because if someone wants to give me money, I wont stop them but I refuse to pressure anyone to donate money by saying something like 'Save this site', 'Keep this website open' and so on, mainly because I wanted to open the site, the work I do on them is because I enjoy it (same as the webmasters who run there relevant sites on the network) and thats why I continue to do it, yes money probably would make me do more but I am happy with the websites current progress .


Anyways to just summarise, my tips with ads on your website:

If there pay per click don't tell people to constantly click them at least once a day because it creates an obvious pattern, Don't tell them on the website with the ads to click the ads to support the site and finally ignore how little your making now and think how much you could be making over time.

This is where I would insert some joke telling you to click my ads but lets not risk violating any TOS just for my crappy sense of humor.

Also expect a new blog soon, this is my 13th blog and I am not superstitious, I just don't want to die.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Aims always a necessity

When designing a website of any type (or blog) I feel you should have some personal aims/goals you would like to achieve, when I had sites where I never set any aims they generally just had no direction and eventually died.

Now I never share most of the aims since if I fail to achieve them it means only I know I didn't make my own goals but I have felt aims have helped take R-D for example I didn't expect it to suddenly become huge which it hasn't I realise because of the type of site it is patience is the key and as a result my aims have reflected the content which is being added (first software, then tutorials and now templates) with each section being focused on (speaking of which I have done a nice amount of work with the rampant news application). I will share the aims for my myspace and blog since I am a nice guy, for the myspace it was to hit double digits with the friends list and have a layout that was readable and I have achieved both, as for the blog well if you have heard of 6 figure bloggers (bloggers who make $100,000+ a year from ads) I like to think along the same lines but simpler, now our ad company pays out when we pass $10 from clicks and based on that, my aim is to be a 2 figure blogger by the end of the year, I know skys the limit.

Until next time , also remember if you want to dig any/all of the articles on the site feel, and check out the sites below:

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Few Changes

As you can see I have made a few changes to the blog layout, after countless attempts to add a digg this link to the footer in the template but I eventually realised it wasn't possible and searched google, however I did add a more organised table to the bottom of each post for sites to check out.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Link To Us

Some banners if you want to link to the blog, if you don't like them feel free to make your own :D

Affiliate Size






Banner Size (click to view properly)

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

PHP or CGI

When I originally taught myself web programming I had to chose between learning either CGI or PHP, they both offered options which more than matched my needs for what I wanted to do at the time and even with most popular php programs there is cgi alternatives (same for the reverse), but the main reason I finally decided on php was the simplest (and one I never see mentioned much in php vs cgi discussions) was when I write php code if theres a mistake I get a white page that pretty much says this error occurred on this line which usually makes it easy to fix quickly or at least you know what it causing the error (for newer programmers generally a missing ;). While with CGI if you make a mistake you get a server error page that tells you nothing, this isn't a huge issue if your script is a few lines long but taking Rampant Designs as and example one of the heavily php files contains 1182 lines of coding, so if you had a cgi script that long which didn't work you would be in for a hell of a time fixing it.

The other main fact is I always find php much easier to customize while cgi I find more difficult but that is mostly due to the fact I haven't spent 3 years learning cgi on and off.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Message Board Software

Me again, twice in one day I know but I just set up the email setting in blogger and wanted to try it, this is a topic I have been contemplating a lot lately and its message board software, with so many packages which is the best, well I have worked on lots of forums and I have had the opportunity to work with a lot of packages.

The free ones

As with most things most people want the free alternative, there is several good packages available, the most popular being PHPBB, now I have to go against the crowd and say I have never really liked the software, it just never felt very good compared to the other packages available, there is also SMF forum software, I like SMF to a point but its so annoying to customize but that's just me, I like to be able to play with the software and feel like I am unlikely to mess something up completely. Finally in the free software list MYBB, great software, I was originally going to use it for the club but because I had added several modifications it caused issues moving the database when we changed servers and I had always planned to move to VBulletin at some point and wanted to start with a fresh database so we decided to go with SMF.


The none free ones

I know message board software can seem expensive especially if you don't see your website having a lot of longevity however I suggest if you do take the chance get the lifetime license its better to always have it than too close a website within a few months then a year later decide to relaunch and no longer have access to the software.

There is two major packages one being IPB and the other VBulletin, the first forum I owned was IPB and I loved the software but the free host I used eventually folded and while I did move the forum to a server using the old IPB software (before it was paid only) and as it quickly went from a free program with an optional re-branding and support package I had to decide what I wanted to do with the forum and at the time a friend and another friend were discussing opening a new forum where we combined all out forums into one and I liked the idea as it would have been a VBulletin forum at which point I hadn't had much experience with VBulletin and this was the first licensed package I used so I had the option of installing hacks (back when they meant editing code not just a file upload) and since switching to VBulletin I have never looked back, VBulletin is without a doubt the best package available, it can easily become load intensive (especially if you have a lot of hacks) and it has a query for every little thing and around 1000 options you will never use but its like a super car, there expensive to buy and to run, theres plenty of cheaper options, it eats up resources but it looks great and you feel great owning one because VBulletin is the best package around and if you use anything else people just wonder why couldn't they have VBulletin.

So in summary, avoid the cheap option, get VBulletin (do it legally, there supposed to be sharks when it comes to illegal copies) and be happy.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Webmaster and Admin wheres the diversity

Me again, which shouldn't be a big shock since this is my blog, I was talking with a friend recently and joked about how he always opens with a generic comment and he said it helps get peoples attention (or something like that, I had been drinking at the time - hmm pear cider :D).

So hope every ones having a great day(was that nice enough, let me know, leave comments or PM me on the club.

Anyways I was on a forum earlier and there was a big issue with someone complaining about the admin but suggested his admin skills reflected him as a webmaster, this raised an issue with me I have had for a while, so many people link admins and webmasters as the same thing when there the same thing. Most admins are pretty much useless when it comes to websites, I have even seen forum staff refer to themselves as webmasters when the only site they have owned is a page generated one (such as geocities and tripod) where they couldn't even make text bold.

The point of this post is to show what in my opinion an admin and a webmaster does, as I consider myself to be both (because I run/design websites and I administrate forums).

Webmaster

Compared to administrators a rarity, there seems to be so few people who actually know anything about web design/running a website, I have seen far too many forums where theres no one who can create a basic html page, some I have worked for as admin and then been pushed into re-designing or upgrading because the owner/admins are clueless to anything that isn't BBCode. In fact from recent memory theres only one website I worked for that I offered to do the layout for and that was jakeisawesome.com (which has since closed), the rest I was forced into. So to summarise webmasters are the guys who can run the website and keep it running without needing help for every little thing.

Administrator

It seems these days every ones an admin, its simple to just sign up for a free forum, I have seen smaller forums which as soon as they launch say get 10 posts and become an admin, my first admin job that wasn't on a site I owned was pretty much handed to me and as a result I received a lot of bitterness and while I feel I did well in the long run when I admined there all I was is what I would call a glorified moderator, I ran the boards but did nothing technical, it was after that the owner of jakeisawesome.com Thomas Rule the owner of Stick Guy who had then launched a forum (the smack talk forums) where I was eventually made admin and was offered the opportunity to work on the technical side, modifying the VBulletin templates, creating skins and working with basic php.

Its hard to define the position of an admin, I usually call myself a technical admin as I usually deal with the technical aspects of forums and let Soulz deal with the people side of The Club, I would also call Soulz an admin because while I adminster over the technical side he adminsters over the front end and adds content such as smilies and skins.


To sum things up it feels like the lines separating admins and webmasters have become blurry in a time where webmasters are fading away, why would anyone want to learn web design when they could just create a myspace and load it with crap. Finding a webmaster is a lucky thing because you are usually in a better situation if something messes up since a webmaster can quickly fix it, while the average forum admin would be clueless.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Popular Websites

Something I have never been able to grasp is how to make a website popular, a lot of it seems back to front, organised, nice looking and easy to use websites seem to be on the lower end of the popularity scale while hard to use and weird looking websites are more popular.

Take for example myspace, I have a myspace here and I pretty much never use it, in fact when people started adding me to there friends list I just decided that I will modify the style, nothing is worse than keeping the default style it looks to repetitive and gives off the impression on not caring. As you can see from it I simple changed the colors, that's it and I like it, but so many other users seem to think the idea of style is to add as much as possible video after video and songs which they set to auto play and images for backgrounds that clash with everything making text almost unreadable.

I always used a simple set of rules when I design a website or simple web page, sure my designs aren't always great but I think there easy to use and that's because I follow the following rules:

No music

If I want to hear music when surfing a website I will load up media player so why should I force others to put up with my tastes especially when the song loads every time the page loads or changes and it can cause lag with your browser.

Pick colors which wont clash

Simple, if I want readers to read the content on my websites then it has to be well readable, if the text clashes with the background then in my opinion it will put users off.

No intrusive ads

I only recently started using ads with my websites because in the past the most common ads were pop-ups and pop-unders which I find off putting when I visit websites so staying with that logic I decided from the start not too use them, same goes for flash ads they usually involve some annoying audio such as someone talking or annoying sounds.

Know the audience

You should have an idea who your website is aimed at and ensure the content is focused on the audience, I have seen a lot of websites suddenly stop and decide they want to go in a completely different direction which is fine but the problem with changing direction is asking yourself how it will effect the current user base.

Don't lie to the audience

Its never nice to be treated like an idiot and giving your users false impressions because you think it will create a stir it can easily backfire, some websites act big and make downtime seem much longer than is needed because they see bigger websites having longer downtime so they think if they do the same then users will assume that the sites popular. In reality this may work with some users but most web designers will know its either a lie or a lack of efficiency.

Be commited

Making a website popular requires hard work and you should make sure the direction of the website is something you can keep committed to, if the website is rarely updated or has a long dry patch hits will take a dive, I made a mistake when I first launched R-D and focused it as a design website, which was the reason it eventually closed, then when I decided to re-launch it I wanted to make sure it would focus on an area I enjoy which is why its now coding/software/template based as that's areas I enjoy working within. I have also seen websites which continually close and re-open and while it can give a boost on hits when it re-launches it eventually gets old and turns members away, since every time its the same site that closes and then re-launches. Its simple why visit a website that continually opens and closes when theres similar websites which offer the same content and are always open.


Don't be bitter

Theres nothing worse than a webmaster who complains about other sites for whatever reason, if you say a website beat you to some content (such as a news article) or they ripped off one of your ideas then if you target them not only will they have gained extra content but they will also gain traffic from other users and not to mention the internet is huge its not unheard of for an idea to have been thought of before. Also who wants to visit a website with a moody webmaster, unless that's part of the sites style such as with Stick Guy.

Take criticism in a good way

If someone criticises your website (and trust me they always will) then the best way to take it is too look for the constructive criticism which will help you improve the website, don't just shoot them down if theres no constructive criticism then just treat it as spam, theres nothing worse than looking on a forum and seeing a user say 'ha this site sucks' then a staff member replying with insults, it will put off other users from giving feedback.

Advertise properly

Ensure your advertising isn't misleading, the best example is ads that use the suggestion of porn as the focus of the advertising, this will get you a lot of hits but whats the point of having 500 users click the ad see the site isn't a porn site and closing the window never to return.

Be realistic

Don't expect your website to be popular the instant it launches, most websites take time to build up a user base (sometimes years) if you make a website with the intention of instant popularity then it will more than likely fail.

Create your own audience

When I first started working on forums/websites it was with friends from another forum and as a result the majority of our users were from the same forum, this is great at first because there active and the sites looks good but very quickly they will drift away and focus on the original forum also it makes it easier to create enemies as theres always users who feel they have allegiances to the upper staff of the other website so will be quick to report back any negativity towards the forum, we had a bad case of this when the forum name, its address and the owners name were censored on the original forum and as it was made public knowledge all our members just vanished. Now don't get me wrong you will pick up some good members who visit the site/forum because they enjoy it and like the users and continue to come back we have some members like that on the club who have been there since the start and as I am sure the rest of the admin crew will agree they are the best members from our old forums.


I know the last tip was heavily message board/forum related but I will now focus on using message boards with a website:

Don't let the website be forum driven

The entire point of a message board is for discussion and should focus on the website, its far too easy for a website to lose focus with a message board, the key is to keep the website up to date and keep content exclusive to the website, I have seen numerous sites where the main website hasn't been updated for months but the forum still has some activity.

Be active

The only way to keep activity up on a message board is if you are active yourself, why should a member be active if you are inactive.

Don't harass guests to register or inactive users to post

Theres nothing worse on a website than seeing 'register now and get less ads' or 'registered users don't see this message', unless theres something that will interest them a user is unlikely to register and theres plenty of forums which don't give users messages telling them to post.

Plan the structure

Its always best to work out the main categories you will have and which forums you want to be on the forum index and which you want to be sub-forums, I have seen a lot of forums which has every forum on the index page which means the index is bigger and if theres forums which are rarely posted in it stands out.

Adapt

Don't keep your message board as is permanently, if one forum is becoming popular then move it up towards the top of its category, if one is unpopular then move it to a sub forum or down the list.

Rules

Okay order is needed with a message board but there shouldn't be a huge list of rules, the key to a message board is to make it a friendly place and things such as spam/flaming can effect that but when you list rule after rule effecting every part of the users experience, the key in my opinion is to keep the rules short and simple not to make it a case where a user has to check all there activities against a huge list of rules. There is also the issue of the style users type, personally I don't like to see things like 'OMG he PWND you' or constant mistakes in the users syntax but its a message board not an english class and users shouldn't be forced to type in the style you like, how would you feel if you joined a message board and were banned for typing properly.

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Same as with sites, keep it simple message boards have a lot more pages than websites in general, so if you have a pop up load every time a page loads then to view the second newest thread from the forum index they get 1 pop up on the index, a second on the forum list and a third when the thread loads and that's just viewing one thread it all builds up the more posts the user looks at so eventually it gets unbearable and the user leaves so your left with the users who get the pop ups leaving and the ones who have good pop up blockers staying so you make no money anyways.

Layout

A custom layouts always the best way to go, no one likes default message board skins and if you just buy one off a website or download it off a free skin site then chances are theres a lot of other websites which use the same skin of there forum and if there bigger you will just be compared to them.


I have always tried to stick with the above rules when working on a website, at the end of the day the best advice is keep it simple and logical and be original.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog

Theme Days

A lot of website seem to use theme days for publicity, some examples are shut down day and naked css day (where you removed the style sheet from your website for a day, not replaced all the backgrounds with porn, although that's an idea).

This got me thinking why not have a day for Rampant Designs, so here's what happens on RD Day you tell 2 people about the site and on each RD day the website traffic will grow in a snowball effect, now I know what your thinking if the site doubles annually then in 10 years we will only have about 40 users so that's why RD day will start today and run till Sunday (April 7th 2075), I know theres people checking there windows calendar right now to see if I actually checked that date falls on a Sunday and to help you keep busy I will let you find out for yourself.

So spread the word its RD Day and tell 2 people to start visiting the site, if they refuse then ask someone else.

Sites to check out:

Rampant Designs Baby Seal Productions Stick Guy The Club BSP Blog Stick Guy Blog