Forumotion Interviews : Today "Bearville Guide"

by **Shadow** Tue Feb 23, 2010 8:40 am

Forumotion Interviews : Today "Bearville Guide"

Hi All!

For our third encounter, we decided to interview the Founder of http://www.bearvilleguide.com, which currently has 6,700+ users for 376,000+ messages.
All the major forums have their particular way to climb to success, so let's discover the whole genesis of this forum...

Hello Forumotion Team -

Thank you for noticing our humble community! It's an honor! As the owner of Bearville Guide, allow me to answer your questions below:

1. Tell us about your forum. What do you think is the secret of its success?

Bearville Guide is a community of players from Build-A-Bearville. Build-A-Bearville is a flash-based multi-player game developed by the widely renowned retail chain worldwide, Build-A-Bear Workshop, Inc. Our community is a mixture of the young and adults who are huge fans of Build-A-Bear-Workshop.
Having mostly kids in our site, Bearville Guide has always maintained a kid-friendly and fun but very safe forum community. We have rules and guidelines that we strictly abide. We have adult presence in the forum - the Administrators and some members - who share our passion and goals.

We do not look at the population or how many people register to our site, but we always make sure that everyone abide by our rules and regulations. We do not hesitate to permanently suspend offending members, as long as our community remains safe.

Alongside this, we always change our forum layout to match the season or an event in the game. We strive to give utmost entertainment for our members. We always think of new ways that other forums do not have. Not to mention, being always the first for news and updates about everything Build-A-Bearville, our members run to our site for news and updates.

There is always a balance between setting rules and having fun.

I think those are the secret to our success.

2. After its creation, what are the tools that you deem necessary and that you were lacking to advance and publicize your forum? Then, what strategies have you followed to solve this problem ? And which of these methods have been the best?

I never actually thought Bearville Guide would make it to 100 members. I was surprised to see new sign ups each day. Our forum was created on May 10, 2008 and until now, we still get new sign ups everyday!

I never went to great heights to advertise our forum. All we did was throw parties in-game and invite players to come visit the site. We did not even communicate with people from Build-A-Bear Workshop and asked for materials to post in our forum. As a matter of fact, they came to us and offered a partnership, which we gladly accepted. Hence, the forum appearances of their employees. Smile

3. What are the major decisions that have really improved the popularity of your forum? Do you have tips, ideas, methods you use to maintain interest, activity and loyalty of your members?

There are really no big decisions that were made to improve the popularity of Bearville Guide. The site simply evolved on its own. If there were very big decisions that I had to make, that was letting go of very fine people who helped me build this community from scratch.

To maintain the interest, activity and loyalty of members, you should always know and understand what they want. Love what they love. Listen to your members' feedback and suggestions. No matter how simple or big these ideas are, they are special because they have been carefully thought about. My favorite section in Bearville Guide is Bright Ideas for BGF. This is where members share their feedback and suggestions for the forum. I always make sure to consider every idea and try to turn it into something bigger.

Be innovative. Give your members something to look forward to.

Be original. Do not copy another forum's ideas. Something that is not your own will never last.

Lastly, as the site owner, listen to your team of admins/mods. Listen to their feedback, suggestions and grievances. Learn how to compromise. Work as a TEAM.

4. How much time do you spend per day to take care of your forum? You get help?

During the first months, I've spent almost 24 hours working on it myself. Eventually, I got help from friends and earned members deserving enough to be mods, whom I've eventually promoted as Admins. We all have shared responsibilities and devote time for the forum.

5. Based on your experience, what advice would you give other webmasters who wish to see their forums as active and successful as yours?

a. Pick the right people to promote as admins/mods. For Bearville Guide, we have the Chief Officers, (the adults) who are basically admins. Next are the Junior Officers (teens, from 15 to 17, who all are very academically inclined), who are the Mods, and have shown very admirable and impressive qualities in the forum. Job Promotion in Bearville Guide is not based on how long you've become a member or how active you can be. Though we consider activity and visibility, I personally regard core values, good qualities and attitude as major key indicators to promote a member. I need to make sure that my team is trustworthy, among anything else.

b. Open doors of responsibility for your members.

c. Always throw something new, fresh and unexpected.

6. What would you have done at forum creation (a thing which you may not think in the beginning by lack of experience) that would have made you gain time and traffic more quickly?

I think we have exhausted all efforts, though we are still doing some ways. Well, now that Forumotion may publish this interview, it will definitely help push traffic towards us! Smile

Thanks to http://www.bearvilleguide.com for this interview, see you in 2 weeks for another success story! Very Happy

Want to be interwiewed? PM me!

Best,
Forumotion Team

by TheListener Tue Feb 23, 2010 9:07 am

Nice forum & interview!

by Codyy Tue Feb 23, 2010 1:03 pm

its a nice website. however, it could be shut down.

it seems to be missing the "phpBB" on the footer.

You might want to fix that ^^

by BearvilleGuide_Admin Tue Feb 23, 2010 5:21 pm

TheListener wrote:Nice forum & interview!

Thank you!

by TheListener Tue Feb 23, 2010 5:28 pm

You're welcome!

I completely agre that is neccesary to hear member's feedback and opinions. They are the ones who really need to build up the community!

And I'm amazed to know that forums that deal about Flash gammes (this one and last week was Pet Society) are that succesful!

Congrats for your forum.

by BearvilleGuide_Admin Tue Feb 23, 2010 5:28 pm

CodyCFS wrote:its a nice website. however, it could be shut down.

it seems to be missing the "phpBB" on the footer.

You might want to fix that ^^

It is done, thanks!

by CarlyAllHeart Tue Feb 23, 2010 7:02 pm

Great Forum! Smile

by JeannaBearFun Tue Feb 23, 2010 10:56 pm

I joined here!! OMG Yay BGF!!!!! Very Happy

by BearvilleGuide_Admin Wed Feb 24, 2010 12:09 am

TheListener wrote:You're welcome!

I completely agre that is neccesary to hear member's feedback and opinions. They are the ones who really need to build up the community!

And I'm amazed to know that forums that deal about Flash gammes (this one and last week was Pet Society) are that succesful!

Congrats for your forum.

True, social gaming is topping it, at the moment. Though my forum is directed towards a specific age group.

I could also add that Forumotion's tools and features have helped me think of a lot of ways to make our community interactive. The Chat Box has become very useful for us. As well as points that you can give and award to members. I converted it to something they can bid for, for virtual items donated by our admin team and generous members. It's how I opened an Auction House. The Visitor Messages are well loved by our members. The newest features regarding spamming and Private Messaging functionalities have helped me make the site more safe for our younger audience. Smile

There's just so many things you can do from the simplicity and efficiency of Forumotion.