How Many Boards Should I Have On My Forum?

[Little Blind Earthbender]

Right you are pcdude. Depending on the situation, more or less boards are needed. There are many types of computers and problems, so, that can equal up to, *mentally counts probability*, over ten boards. So go with as many boards as you need. But RPGs require at least 10 boards to be good. I also think of it as a good idea to add boards according to the interests of the members, to keep them on the site and entertained.

[whitewulfm]

well i counted my boards and I have 7 catagories with an average of about 3+ boards each. The two main catagories Chat Zone and Developer Zone are the largest because that is the main focus of the forum. However i have several relating boards included. I have been told by many that the forum is well orginized (natural organizing talent) however i think due to more populer forums in the same related subject (IMVU) that it hurts the forum. of course its a new forum so it may just be me being impatient.
I have to say though that since reading this thread I have made a few adjustments to the forum.

[Beatle Aimee]

When I have a board that is not being used as much as I'd like, I combine it with another board. For example, my "Beatles Quotes" board had about 14 posts, so I moved all the threads into the General board, and then deleted the quotes board. It greatly reduces the number of boards and makes my main page faster to load.

[devin79]

One of the things that has always irritated me when I've taken over a board (and I've taken over a couplein the past) is when there are too many boards and I've had to do "cleanup" on the site because of this.

Right now I've gotten PAGIN down to seven boards and three sub-boards I believe. Just from reading through this thread and finding advice about where to blend threads. Thank you all so much for putting your input here so that I could improve my forum. Not that I'm getting a whole lot of new members, but it's cut out ALL of the 0s. Thanks!

[Beatle Aimee]

I have two boards for locked threads:

Classics- this one is open to the other members, it's threads that are to be remembered, like the profiles and picture threads of ex-members and that. And threads that are old but are amusing.

Locked Threads/Recycle Bin - Only I can get in it, it's threads that are not to be remember, like thay gone out of hand, like spamming, flaming, dead links, and that.

And there's another board in the Read Only category on my board which is an organized directory of Beatles lyrics. Took me a few months to make. The directory is a board, each album is a subboard and the lyrics are threads. Had to copy and paste 'em all in. Open to guests too. ;D

[freakaboutsims]

Well as for me, the board I have makes me feel like they are nessisary. I have sixteen boards on my forum and they all all almost used. Not to mention subboards, including 38 subboards in my episodes section. Where you could watch fulle length episodes of Avatar the Last Airbender

All of my boards are good and being used so I am not complaining. I think that before you start a board, you need to decided what you really want it. I finally realized that all I really wanted the most is an Avatar the Last Airbender board and now look. Mine is growing and is already up to 23 members.

You should also deminded how many boards you need and if you left something out or think a new type of board will go perfect with the theme of your board. Make it. Because of this site and learn as I go. I have became a master (not a perfect one through) at the way ProBoards board are ran. I even tried to open an InvisionFree board and I just deleted it, before I didn't know anything about that company. So I guess I just had to say:

I Love ProBoards!

[dexmax]

I run an Airsoft Forum for my Club;

I started out with 3 categories (General Discussion, Technical Discussion, and Announcements), General Discussion had originally 3 boards (General Talk, Pictures and Videos).

At first I opened all boards to guest accounts for a week. Although there were some spamming, it was fine since I was trying to get more members.. Then after a week I disabled guests from posting.

A little over a week, membership grew to 50+ then I added 3 more categories(Public Market, Offtopic, and Events). I also added polls, videos, etc and made a custom skin.

When membership was over 200+, I disabled guests from viewing the forums.. I did this because the forum was intended for club members and affiliate clubs.. And since spamming began to become a problem, everyone was required to register. I also added a Password Protected Board exclusive for some members.

So far the most popular category is the General Discussion. The most popular board is the Pictures and Videos board...

[Beatle Aimee]

Well, if getting rid of three boards is drastic, I must be getting REALLY drastic....I merged about 10 or 20 boards! lol!!

Also, if you're merging boards and that, I recommend you make an annoucement about that you're moving the posts about so the members don't go "oh no, the board's missing, where the %@^@& is my post?!?!" lol

I have a board for links on my forum, but i didn;t want a seperate board, and I didn't want everything to get mixed up with the computers and internet board so I made a subboard.

I have a board for Beatles pictures, I seperated it into one subboard for each Beatle, one subboard for general pictures and another subboard for miscellaneous pics (for example the Beatles themselves aren't in it but it has to do with them)

Also, my forum is a year old today ;D It started with one board, and now it muchly organized and that.

[Avery ♥]

I was having problems with the amount of boards I started my forum off with and then the posts per board issue came up. Then I got this idea when I posted it in the GOAYB board from another member. They said that I should start off with one category and place all my boards there. The point was to use what I would normally have been categories as boards and use sub-boards. Then there would be less of the empty boards effect if one of my sub-boards didn't have posts but others did. I haven't really given it a true test because I'm still working on it but I'm pretty sure that will help with the over all look of the forum to just follow that person's advice. It makes the site look better too. It doesn't make it look like there's a lot of inactive boards.

[mort666]

for my site i have one catagory for each section of my world
which is about 10 at last count
including general/member/anouncement catagories

each with 2 boards average
but i will be adding more with the introduction of other races

*cough* Dragons and imps *cough*

[DonJuan]

I have two categories, with four boards in each. Worked fine for me since day one.

I agree with the others though, when you start its best to have very few boards. That way, when you start and only have a few members, all the posts are more or less in the same place, giving the illusion that your board is busier than it is... as you get more active members, you add more boards.

That's how I see it anyway.

[DMOC]

I agree with not having too many boards.

My current proboards has 8 boards fully viewable for the site, and staff boards which are HIDDEN. I think hidden is better than viewable.

I have divided my 8 boards (not including sub boards) into a general category, members only, and important stuff. I put in my header links to the boards guests can post in so they don't have to worry about wether they can post in or not. I have games, entertainment, general board, and a suggestions board where guests can go in. Guests can't go in the members only place, which includes Introductions, Role Playing, and a Get Opinions about Your Board rule.

Do you think that's okay?

[ell]

Hi DMOC!

Anyway... I think the number of boards is dependent on the type of forum. A RP board is bound to have more bords that a normal one, same with Harry Potter forums.
My forums... well I dont know... anyone wanna help?

[DMOC]

Hey what's up?

Your forum...the boards look fine for now maybe a little high but nevertheless fine.

Yeah RPG sites should have more. One harry potter site I know has 60000+members and over 50 boards on the main homepage. And if you complain about that site, just want until you hear this: the average of those 50 boards has 6-7 sub boards in each so really its like 300 boards. Wow.

[Beatle Aimee]

Boards with only about 3 threads on it make the forum look like #%@&. At least every few months, the admin should do a "cleanup". They look for boards that haven't been posted in and/or with very few threads (or boards that can just be combined with others), move the threads to another board, and delete the original. It makes the forum look cleaner. My forum was a mess until I did a serious cleanup. I had about 10 different baords and made them into one. And got rid of some categorys too. Combined 'em as there were two categories that were similiar and they each had about 3 boards.

Also, if you want to delete a board but aren't sure if anybody will suddenly start using it, hide it. If anybody misses it, put it back. If not, delete it.

When members leave, I move all their profile/newbies/etc. threads to a Classics board for members to read but not reply. Also, several things (such as my Beatles History Of The Day thing) are a subboard in the classics board. If anybody wants to continue it, they can PM me and I'll tell them where to get the history and move the board back. Nobody was reading them it seems. And there were too many threads to either delete or move into another board.


It's better to have about 5 boards with 100 threads each than 20 with 5 thread each. Too many small boards gets annoying