Tuesday, January 01, 2008

Website Review

This is a review of http://my4ums.com.

First Impressions: It's nothing special, but its not bad. On the first page when you first go there the article telling about what the website is for is a bit long and it looks/seems alot like an ad for something. I don't think it should take up the whole page and maybe you could make it shorter, because the majority of people won't spend time to read all of that if they read it at all.

Guest's Outlook: You can see just about everything.

Logos, Banners, and Advertisements: Its has one banner stating the name of the forum on top, and an ad on top. I see you give away prizes for things including advertisement space. This isn't a bad idea, but you need to watch how many ads you put up, and make sure the site isn't overrun with ads.

Quantity of Forums: For a forum so small I think you should have less boards. Maybe you could eliminate some boards and make them topics inside other boards. Or, you could make the child boards of other boards. Also, when people request new boards I would watch just creating any board somebody requests. I would first decide if its worth making and that it would have enough traffic then I would try to make it a child board and if its popular enough a regular board.

Sizes, Colors, and Styles: I honestly don't like the theme especially if it is supposed to be acasual forum. The current theme makes it appear as though its abusiness forum; which I don't think is what your aiming for. You mightwant to find a theme more inviting and is brighter. A dark theme maynot be the best choice. Also, on the forum stats at the bottom some of the stuff is in white font, and the color of the background behind it is white; that makes it so you can't see any of it. I suggest changing it.

Content: Not alot of content, but that is probably because your board is probably new. You need to just try to keep getting new members, and keep posting content yourself so that when members do stop by there is stuff there for them to look at/post in.

Amount of traffic: Not alot probably because your forum is new. It does look like though, that you have four or five members that actually post. I would try very hard to keep them, to encourage them to invite others (don't overdo it though), and to try to make them more active (again don't overdo it).

Speed: Pretty good, but could be a little better.

Overall and other comments: One more thing that may hold your forum back is that your forum has no real central idea for the forum to be based around. Things will hurt you because you will have a hard time finding an audience to target.

Final Score: 7.5/10