Professional Forum

[Scott]

This came up in a discussion with the admin's on my board. Basically, we're trying to get a more professional feel and I'd be interested in what you think makes a forum professional. :iunno:

[writespeak]

Appearance plus content.

Appearance

I've come across several forums lately that I didn't want to look at beyond the first page. The colours weren't appealing, the contrast wasn't strong enough, the font was too small, or the forum looked cramped at 800X600 squeezed onto a page with other content. At one forum I was at, ad posts (on-topic and off-topic) hadn't been removed, which showed that the forum wasn't moderated very well, if at all.

OTOH, the forums that I like have none of those problems, and they have good content.

Content

Content covers a few areas:


The forum discussion topics
What the forum owner provides (tutorials, directories, etc.)
How the members post


I like to see people contribute their knowledge and opinions and discuss topics in an informed way, without self-promotion. Relevant questions are good too -- they enrich the discussions. I like to see advertising kept separate. Rudeness of any type takes away from a professional appearance, as do sig spam posts and posts by people who just like to see their words on the screen.

Clear expectations (rules) that are enforced fairly help give that professional feel. More important than that are quality members. They help set the tone, and sometimes goodness rubs off on other people. :)

Putting them together

Quality members are more likely to be attracted to a forum with a professional appearance, so appearance and content work together. OTOH, if the content is valuable enough to the target audience, people will come despite any problems. But valuable content in itself doesn't make a professional forum, which is what you're after.

Lois

[spechackers]

it depends upon members posting and contents in the forum

[Jan]

Normally one would set the tone at the very start of a new forum and continue on from there. You have a plan in mind as to the type of member you would like to attract from the outset. Some forum owners don't care who joins, as long as they (and future members) see numbers. If you plan on a more professional forum, it is better to have a lower signup rate so future members don't have to sift through the not so intelligent posts to see what you are about.

But to change an existing forum to a more professional one, you might need to discuss with your staff as to how they would like to see it improved and the best way to go about it. Discuss tweaking of the rules, so that certain things that were once tolerated, will no longer be. It is always possible to set higher standards in an existing forum. Those that don't like the new changes, are probably the ones that you can do without anyway :)