Maintaining a happy community

[Enchant]

Jun 11, 2008 17:21:03 GMT -8 bourd said:

My boards is very small.

And so is your post. Please make sure when you join in these discussions, that you make a post that is a minimum of 4 sentences and also make sure that your post is relevant to the topic being discussed. Thank you.

[Sunblossom]

Basically what I think is that you should have many events, contests, and plenty of things to do on your board, so no members will get bored. I’ve put a lot of thinking to this, actually, and also the members themselves. You do not want your forum to be only about Role Play, or even out of character talk on certain boards. I would think that if that happened, your members will get extremely bored, thinking that the only thing you can do on the forum is RP, talk, or play word games. Then that will end with complaints, banning, or even the members deleting their accounts and leaving the forum. Because of my theory, I’m still really confused on how to maintain your community if members get bored…contests and advanced Role Play plots work, but what I was thinking was something much more realistic, yet exciting.

For example: I’ve been on a RP site that is really fun to RP in. Why? Because in most threads, there is action, excitement, and lots of interesting things to talk or role play in. I think that will let the members RP even more to find out what happens next, so they will get on more too. Also, new members will sign up when they’ve seen how much fun the RP threads are.

[nyaccent]

I agree...there should be a lot to do on your board besides just the topic of the board. My board is a graphic site.... Teaching PSP with tutorials..... But it has computer knowledge information..... Threads about the members so we can get to know each other.... Games for those who like to play games, contests...Snaggable Graphics... Freebie tags being given away.... Gems to be earned to buy tags from peoples shops..... and much much more.... There is something for everyone and those who post seem to be having a lot of fun......

Having a variety keeps everyone interested.... We are just finishing up a posting contest....and I have some more contests tht will be started in a week or two.....

I have some more ideas that I will add to my board, but I don't add them all at once..... I let them play with whats there...then add something new....and when the new thing dies down a little I will add something else... I change the look of the board every couple of months..... I change the smilies out....and I am always looking for ways to make the board function better like collapsing cateogories so there will be less scrolling....

[Michelangelo "Spike" Scarlatti]

I just recently added in a challenge section and myself and one of my friends did them and noone else bothered with any of the challenges.
I thought it would make my members happy to have something new and fun to do
but nope I was wrong.So now I am trying to think of something else that I can do with my members

[SHIMAKA S-S-STARSTRUKK]

I quite agree with most of you. An admin's job is not only to control the site but also ensure that the members are content with this. They should also put up suggestion boards, so that others could suggest how to make the site a much more better place. Another thing is, from my admin experience. It is best for Admins to stay active, as without an active admin, there wouldn't be an active board, and it would break off the 'happy community'. So I guess Admins play a big part in this eh?

[Sunblossom]

Of course. Staff members are very important in helping their other members, or new members, or even guests into either persuading them to join (guests) or making them happy. I've also noticed that if you have a site plot of some sort, you should keep it moving along. My Harry Potter RP site has term plots, so each term, there is a new random, but Harry Potter-related plot to keep the site fresh and so everything keeps on moving.

I also think that if you have a forum based on a show, movie, or some other RP category, you should also have a discussion on that topic, but a RP plot too. That way, members can read your opinions, talk about it, and share their ideas too. Another idea I thought was best was to have a debate thread, once again, to get to know everyone better and what they think. That would help the Staff understand their members better, and vice versa.

[Dan]

On both of my boards I tend to put a firm but fun policy on mine. As the Admin I see it as my job to create rules and to obviously have some restriction in posting. I have created threads which basically tell people it's a zero tollerence on posting pornography links in the Advertising and links section. This is mainly because they're forums for people aged 13 and above. I think that making rules also improves the fun factor for people because nobody wants to go on a forum and be bullied for the next hour. I treat each and every member of my forum with respect for registering and provide a suggestions thread in both boards so people can have their say in what happens to the forum. I think that being a good staff member is one of the best factors in bringing in new members and maintaining a good community and a good atmosphere.

[cartoonfreak]

I think the skin colors are also a necessity. You wouldn't wanna keep going back to a board that's hard on your eyes now would you? No you would want a nice forum with a good color combination. And a nice backgroung image. Now you can't go wrong with a nice landscape. For examply my forum has a beautiful picture of the ocean in the background.

simmershideaway.proboards85.com/index.cgi

Now isn't that pretty? So if you want regular members choose your skin colors and images wisely. Make it easy on the eyes.

[Macy]

It is extremely hard to maintain something like this when you have a certain member that causes almost a virtual war within the website. I had one member on my first role playing site I created who was extremely rude to myself as well as the rest of the staff. He made many sex-related posts that went in detail even though it was a PG-13 site. The only thing was that half the site adored him, while my staff and the other half did not. I ended up banning him after one of his final outbursts.

I think that in order to maintain a happy community, you need to be ready to make sacrifices of losing some members in order to gain more and keep the ones who are loyal. I think that's what I learned throughout this ordeal, and even though my site isn't as active as it once was, everyone who has returned is loyal as well as happy that they can return without being harrassed.

[Nacku]

I think it's important to have a "Rule Board" and list what is expected of the members. Otherwise you get the idea that you just may be at the mercy of whatever mood the owner is in and those rules can change whenever it suits him/her. If they prefer a member over others, hey look at it this way, they deserve each other, eh?

I try to keep my list of rules simple; no flaming, if someone is bothering you please try to resolve it privately, if not, please tell me so I can review what has been said, etc. and go from there. Like you, Macy, I've only had to ban one person (well two actually). For the same thing basically, except he wasn't flirting with all the women he was actually trashing women. I think Yuri had the same guy on his forum at one point. This was some time ago. I think he's lurking over at the Wizard's Gate (can't remember the whole name offhand) but it's a Lord of the Rings themed forum. Even the best of us cannot reason with some. Scratch it off as a failure to communicate and shrug it off.

But I'm lucky because everyone gets along in my rooms. Then we're back to the fun stuff.

[glassguy]

Hi, I am one of three staff Members/Mods of a ProBoards message board and car club. I have read over this thread, which has somewhat touched on my question, but not exactly.

After several years as a club, some members began to feel the need to discuss "controversial" subjects such as politics and religion, which were interfering with the happy order of things on our message board. Thus, we created a section for discussing such topics. While most are respectful of one another, the topics often become heated, with occasional name calling and "flaming". We added to the main thread topic a warning, and even made a sticky stating our "rules" and told everyone, basically, that if they did not enjoy reading or participating this type of debate to please stay out. The warning also stated that this type of confrontational posting does occur and if you can't take it, don't post or read.

Since doing this, we have lost some very valuable members and friends. People still go here and read, despite the warning, out of curiosity, obviously, and go away mad, discontinue posting all together, or delete their accounts. I must add that this is a car club with get-togethers and drives and is not only a virtual cub. Quite a few, of the dominating un-named political party affiliation, would most likely protest to the removal of this section, thus risking the loss of more members.

We (mods) are not really sure what to do at this point.

Your suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[HoudiniDerek]

Something I did on a forum where I am a moderator, I suggested we set up the debate section similar to how it is on this forum. Only the mods can make threads in the debate section and that helps keep the tone of the debate more civil because the opening posts are more neutral. There is a warning system and what not for flaming because you should attack ideas and not people. Otherwise, if a thread gets going down the wrong path, it is locked and not allowed. It has worked quite well. No one has left due to that section of the forum.

[romvon]

What can you suggest this holloween season.....what game can i facilitate for my forum

[kelendria]

Oct 17, 2008 18:06:36 GMT -8 romvon said:

What can you suggest this holloween season.....what game can i facilitate for my forum

This isn't really part of the discussion of maintaining a happy community.
Try the GOAYB section.

[camwatcherscafe]

Our board discusses wildlife cameras from around the world though mainly in Africa. We have a small core group and a lot that only read and look at the pix we post.
We have threads for jokes, recipes, forum games, freebies available on the web and one for misc pix.
We post daily holidays~some are pretty inane and encourage members to change their signature and avatar to reflect these.
We have also designed backgrounds for members based on their interests and have holiday ones like Halloween, Christmas etc.
All members contribute to ideas as the forum belongs to everyone.
We post awards for the every 1,000th post per month as well as every 1,000th post per member.