Guide : How to start with your forum

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Guide : How to start with your forum

Here is a guide that will give you the steps to follow when starting a forum. 7 Steps 1- Before even creating the forum, you must know what to talk about. Indeed, you will spend time on your forum, it is preferable that you are experienced so you can talk and argue about the subject.2- During forum creation, choose a short name, easily remindable, attractive and if possible linked to the forum subject. Describe in a few words the forum and if possible insert keywords (eg for a forum on motorcycles: it will be interesting to include at least 2 times the word "bike"). Avoid inserting special characters (ex. \==> V01TuR3 <==/), text messages language and spelling mistakes. These are obstacles to your forum expansion both for visitors who are annoyed by the errors and other languages SMS or Search engines can not index many pages on your forum because of special characters etc.. 3- Once in the administration panel, create your categories and forums. They provide a structure and hierarchy to your forum.  Do not create more than a dozen at the beginning, in fact, with few messages, and few members your forum will look empty and therefore unattractive. You will grow theù with your audience. Keep in mind that your forum should be simple, clear and pleasant. The structure is the key to an active forum.4 - Once the structure of your forum in place, it will lean on the graphic aspect of it.  It's the first thing a visitor sees when arriving on your forum. If your theme is too heavy, it does not allow easy reading. If incomplete, it will scare away visitors. ► For novices : Install freely and quickly a theme on http://www.hitskin.com► For intermediate users, accustomed to using forums: You can also install free themes from www.hitskin.com and then modify them, or even make your own theme with your pictures , colors etc.. ► For advanced users that have skills in HTML and CSS : You can create your theme from A to Z with CSS,  templates and create HTML pages.It is not necessary to impress visitors with colors and patterns in all directions. The best themes are refined, comfortable with fonts not too aggressive and legible.5 -  It's time to create content and begin the discussion. You need to create the first subjects that will later enable your visitors to respond. Visitors will be hard pressed to be interested in your forum if there are no content. During the first weeks of life of your forum, you will have to be very active and do not leave messages unanswered for fear of seeing your forum faster decay. You will be the engine of your forum to launch it and make it grow.Warning: We strongly recommend that you leave your content available to guests. If guests can not see your subjects and messages, they are much more reluctant to join because they have not seen the contents of your forum. By default, all forums and categories are visible to everyone. Otherwise, you can see this option under "Permissions" in your admin panel.6- Here begins your forum promoting. Another guide will detail the key points to increase the audience of the forum. Click here -> Increase your traffic7- The following summarizes some tips and advice on managing your members and your content. ► In all cases (as forums, descriptions, messages, etc..) Avoid special characters, SMS language and spelling mistakes.► Make the visit simple and enjoyable► Get your forum regularly updated, always looking on the net, new ideas for your subjects (Caution: Do not copy text from other sites, for fear of being penalized by Google)► Try to make your forum as interactive as possible by adding polls, holding competitions etc.► Insert pictures and videos to illustrate your topics or messages.► Send occasionally a newsletter to your members so they can be kept abreast of developments in your forum.► Treat and welcome your members with respect, courtesy and politeness► Listen to your members and take into account their views in order to change your forum.► Take a team to help you manage your members and/or to promote your forum. Finally, here is in order of importance all the elements that contribute to have a forum with a good audience: • 15 % : Forum theme• 20 % : Forum structure• 25 % : Forum promotion• 40 % : Forum content

This tutorial was written by The Forumotion Team