Forum Review

[Jessica]

I asked for a forum review on phpBB communities

Here is the result:

Your Review!
S & C Forum

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Design
- Banner, including alignment. 0 Out of 2
- Choice of Style 1 Out of 4
- Colour Choice 1 Out of 3
- Professionalism of Design 1 Out of 2
- Does the Style Suit the Site? 1 Out of 2
- General 'feel' of the Style 2 Out of 3
- Free Style, or Custom Style 1Out of 4

Comments
You need to make an attempt to customise the basic style, with forum & post icons, the banner and heading are poor to say the least, what I see is prosilver so much could be done to make the site a lot more attractive to users.
7/20

Technical
- Use of Forum Software Default Features 1 Out of 2
- General Customization 1 Out of 3
- Domain Name 0 Out of 2
-- Related to Niche 1 Out of 1
-- Correct Spelling 1 Out of 1
-- TLD 0 Out of 2
--Uses paid hosting/url/forum software 0 Out of 3.

Comments
This is a very low score which is down to you using a free host, to move forward a TLD is needed, so that you can start to fully SEO your board, and drive more traffic to it.
4/14

Layout
- Placement of Ads etc. 0 Out of 2
- Forum Index Layout, including Categories, Forums and Sub Boards. 2 Out of 6
- Navigation 2 Out of 3
- Organization, is everything organized etc. 0 Out of 2

Comments:
To me this board is totally disorganised, your topmost forum is “Other Forums” which is not related to your niche in any way, why have it as the primay category ?. Your niche category is the lowest in order, and takes second place to games. !
4/13

Content and Professionalism
- Spelling and Grammar 3 Out of 3
- Quality of Content 1 Out of 4
- Uniqueness 4 Out of 4
- Post Relevancy, including ratio of On Topic to Off Topic Posts 1 Out of 4
- Professionalism 1 Out of 4

Comments:
Spelling and grammar is excellent as you would expect from it’s subject matter, but the rest of the forum needs some serious TLC, it’s very difficult to know where to start. I’m virtually speechless!.
10/19

Statistics and Activity
- Posts, Threads and Members Per Day. 1 Out of 4
- Activity relating to the age of the Site. 2 Out of 3
- Are posts evenly spread out between all categories. 0 Out of 2
- Member Activity 1 Out of 3
- Member to Member Interactivity 1 Out of 3

Comments:
Another low score, which is down to the totally confusing layout of the board, activity even in the niche categories/threads are low, which is hard to understand when as far as the UK is concerned we have gone through the busiest period in revision and exams (March – May 2011)
5/15

Staff
- Interaction with Staff and Members 3 Out of 3
- Is the forum clean of Spam etc. 2 Out of 2
- Are the Staff doing their jobs? / Being Active2 Out of 2
- Amount of Staff, Including Amount of Staff Compared to Members. 2 Out of 2

Comments:
Perfect score ! down to the efficiency of how you and your staff deal with members questions, and how the members interact once they are posting, when called upon the staff are working.
One of the benefits of a free host is less spam
9/9

Features, MODs etc.
- General Use of forum Add Ons 0 Out of 2
- Custom MODs, Add Ons 1 Out of 3
- Unique Features to the Site 0 Out of 3
- Integration of forum into the main site. 0 Out of 2

Comments:
You must have every MOD and add on phpBB have ever released !. It’s like you were given a $100 bill and let loose on the candy store, some of them.. ok... are good, and keeps members logged in, but do you really need a stats MOD that tells everything about your board, down to the BBcodes you use, which can be a hackers paradise, because if they use a {TEXT} string it gives them a way in. The MODS are also increasing the length of the profiles in viewtopic to the point where it’s a pain scrolling down the page, so much blank space to get through.
8/10


General Feedback
The board needs a complete rethink and it is difficult to know where to start, there is a point where you can easily have too many MODs and add ons, and you are way past that point. Ask yourself “Does the board really NEED that MOD?” in a lot of cases on your board it should be “NO”
The custom profile fields need attention to shorten the pages.
You need to seriously think if knowing how well someone knows phpBB,HTML,CSS and php is relative to your niche. Do members really need to know what the local time of another member is ?.
Try to customise the existing forum, some relative forum and topic icons will brighten up the board and make it a little more unique.
A TLD (Top Level Domain) is a must, as is paid hosting, you will be able to do so much more if you invest a little, hosting prices have come down, mine for instance is just over $17 a quarter.
Make use of all the services available on here :
Graphics
phpBB support
use the free week to it’s full extent, a new banner is a must

Once you have a TLD you can make use of a lot more of our services, plus you will be able to take your site a lot further forward.

We are here to help, so ask questions… we don’t bite LOL

Final Score: 47 Out of 100

The opinions in this review are those of the author and he alone.
The author and phpBB communities reserve the right to archive this report for future reference.

I need help on making S&C better...suggestions are welcome