Should i advertise my forum?

Hello guys, as you know i am very private about my forum, i never tell anyone, so i got some members and word of a mouth doesn't work well for me, and i decided to contact a newspaper about banner prices, they didn't give me the price, said to e mail them, which i don't understand, but i do have people on my forum, and i don't want to lose them.
My site is for women only, and i am bloody scared of man coming and being nasty. What should i do?

ok, they sent me the price list, not bad.

Julia, I understand your concerns. But it will be difficult for potential new members to learn about your forum if you continue to hide your lamp under a basket.

Maybe you need to re-think your philosophy. Promote your site and then rely on your forum staff members to keep the undesirables from disrupting the balance of the forum. Lay out the ground rules and don't be shy about enforcing them. Otherwise you are always going to have a forum limited by the enforced secrecy.

I completely agree with Mike!

I completely agree with Mike!
And it's a good thing you do, too! :giggle:

smartass, lol

Also you could set your forum so that you have to approve new members. Might help in keeping the guys out.

I was thinking about that, the problem is that that place where i am going to put my banner, the environment there is very hostile. It is a forum too, without the rules.
As for permissions i work untill 3 , will this be ok ?

How do you manage forums if you work all day, and have restricted access on your work computer?

You'll have to do like everyone else. Do it on your free time. That is honestly the only answer. Make sure you have a good staff to so they can help. Your staff is a key part to your forum.

To add to what Chris is suggesting, look at your logs to see the times of day your forum is the busiest and then try to select some staff members that can be around during those hours. Also add staff members from other geographic areas, so they will be able to provide some coverage during the hours when you and others cannot.

I co-admin a forum that has a moderator in Western Europe, a handful in various locations in the U.S. and one in Western Canada. It's pretty rare when there isn't a staff member looking in, nearly every hour of the day.

But i am just starting out, it's only been open for 2 or 3 weeks, did you get the staff from the beginning?

Not unless you know the prospective moderators from another venue.

Selection of forum staff is something that has to be done with a lot of consideration, as it will usually be your moderators that the forum members will be in the most contact with. So you want to make sure that they have YOUR best interests in mind, at all times.

None of which explains why Peggy allows me to run rampant on this one. She obviously was caffeine-deprived when she made that decision! :giggle:

................None of which explains why Peggy allows me to run rampant on this one. She obviously was caffeine-deprived when she made that decision! :giggle:

ppfffffttt... I iz a shmart cookie :jiggy:

My site is for women only, and i am bloody scared of man coming and being nasty. What should i do?


I'm not sure what kind of forum you run or even what the link is, but what about keeping whatever is "ladies only" for the ladies, and making an off topic forum that is "for the guys" at the bottom of the site? I was tinkering with a similar idea lately. On my poker discussion forum I tried a special "ladies only" section for them women to discuss issues related to women and poker, and for ladies only talk generally speaking. I didn't go so well. I have more women on the site now so maybe I will try again.

-Raymond

Hello guys, this is the update, i disallowed pm for my registered users , and i am thinking about creating a new usergroup, say maybe after 30 posts, they will have an option of pms. I have done this because i am going to see a lot of new people, so just to feel safe. I also disallowed e mail to each other. I do have e mail to friend option.
What do you think about the pm thing ?

Julia, decisions like that are personal preference on the part of each admin. What works for one forum will not work for another and who is likely to know your members better than yourself?

Personally, I allow the use of the Private Messaging system unless someone has abused their privileges. I see it as one of the "benefits" of membership.

Every admin deals with the members that register and are rarely active. My thoughts are that if a guest never registers, then there is zero hope of developing that person into an active member, so I try to be as encouraging about registration as I can. Yes, we do get the occasional bad apples registering, but we deal with those problems when they crop up.

If you want to disallow use of the Private Messaging system until a member has 30 posts, then use that as a promotional tool. Be open about telling your members there is an additional benefit awaiting them, once they cross the 30 post threshold.

I recently joined a forum that requires moderation of all posts, until a new member reaches 50 posts. The forum deals with issues that will always be seen as being divisive, so I understand the rule. The problem lies in the fact that a post might be in the moderation queue for 12-24 hours. In an active thread, the post is "old news" after that long and the thread may have moved on another page or two. As a result, I rarely post there and will likely never reach 50 posts. This is an example of an effective tool not being used properly. If they had staff on hand moderate posts at all hours of the day, then I believe people would be encouraged to post more. As it is now, I see little reason to post, because it often amounts to talking to yourself.

Like I said, there are ways of using the forum permissions and privileges to your advantage. You just have to make sure that is what you are doing.

Thanks Mike, i went and made it 10 posts, and use it as a promotion. The only reasons were to stop spamming ( well i don't have it yet), but i have seen unmoderated forums, where it's sad to see , full of spam. So i guess i will be thinking about it, and making a lot of changes as it goes. On Monday i will pay for my first banner in the newspaper, and i will tell you the results.

Hello guys, as you know i am very private about my forum, i never tell anyone, so i got some members and word of a mouth doesn't work well for me, and i decided to contact a newspaper about banner prices, they didn't give me the price, said to e mail them, which i don't understand, but i do have people on my forum, and i don't want to lose them.
My site is for women only, and i am bloody scared of man coming and being nasty. What should i do?


Well here is some advice sweetie. I dont know what your forum is or how it is setup but with mine I was like this in the beggining. I have had mine open for 3 years in August. I run a parenting site and yes I have some dads on the site. But if you honestly dont want men on your site. Make sure your put FOR women only. I do have to admitt putting a add in the Newspaper will get you some attention. If you are that worried you can set it up to Moderate all new users. Here r a couple of Ideas. DO a lil survey Email it to them. Letting them know you are a private forum and these r some get to know you ?'s and if you really want to be on the safe side let them know that u have to fill it out to be approved. It is a chance but if it is a femaleand she really wants to be on the site and or has no hiddden agenda there shouldnt be a problem. Also you can google them, or even make sure U can edit your TOS and put in there they must use a real IP addie. Like Cox, SBC global and so on. No yahoo's or html accounts since those r so easy to get. There's alot of things you can do before you approve someone but it is time consumming. I was like this in the beggining as well. But you also have to have faith in your members that you have now. Everyone knows you will get a idiot that will cause trouble. It comes with the internet. But if you catch it get rid of it and have great members you can go on like it never happened. Good luck to ya