oh my god, are we dying.

[wynnyelle]

I recently moved our forum from Proboards to SMF. Our members were thrilled with it and are pretty much all still with us, posting like normal and enjoying the features and faster load time.

But NOBODY new is joining. Oh my GOD.

We were averaging 13 new signups a day on the old site. We got one Saturday and not a one since. Now, I know that the old site is gone and our new one isn't ranking very high on Google yet, and I expressed concern about this and knew there'd be a slowdown, but bear with me. The stats show that guests ARE still pretty frequent on the site, there are a few on at any one time--even in the dead of night. It still has the same rules, content and everything the same just with a new look. So people ARE reaching our site, but nobody is signing up.

I got it set on high CAPTCHA settings, might that be it? Do you think that setting just makes it too hard to sign up?

Site: http://warriorcatsrpg.com

The current members are all from our old site. They're very devoted. I don't want to let them down.

Oh--to answer some questions before they come--Yes, we've got most of our affiliates changed over now, only about a quarter of them left who have not yet. We've got a few new ones too, all other busy forums. I have ads on 4 different popular directories and have begun a referral programme for forum money, which the members go out of their way to earn.

Nothing.

[WeWantRevenge]

Your forum definitely looks like it is doing well, and I congratulate you on how hard it looks like you've tried to make the site look better.

A Few Tips-

• Make it apparent to new guests that the site's layout is new. Post an announcement, or add an alert in the scroller box along with a *NEW* sign to attract people to the alert. Make it an exciting new feature on your site and list the reasons why it benefits your members.
• CAPTCHA may be the case. Some of my members have complained about captchas in the past, stating that they were nearly impossible to read, and that I needed to change the look of them. I suggest not removing the captchas, but instead changing their appearance.
• Listen to the cries of your members. It seems as though your members may have helped you out with this thread unconsciously because I just found this thread.

[wynnyelle]

We had porn bots on the site last week so I set teh CAPTHA higher because of that. We got kids on there. But we also installed a question thingy that should probably keep the bots out...well unless someone unleashes x-rumour on us...but anyway. I'll set it back to medium and see if that helps.

...That thread is OLD, from when the entire site was actually down. It was a redirect problem with the domain that has since resolved completely. But oh yes I was on there labouring away till I figured out the problem. That was a dark, dark day. XD

We have our topmost forum dedicated to learning the new software. It was a success with our current members. I'll try lowering CAPTHA back to medium and seeing how that goes.

Thank you so much for your compliments and advice. I need everything I can get.

[WeWantRevenge]

Thank you so much for your compliments and advice. I need everything I can get.

You're welcome. Reply to this thread if you need further assistance!

[wynnyelle]

Well, my trusty top programmer {HCF} suggested I place a welcome message that is only visible to guests or new members. Is there a code for that? I'm going to loook for one. Like, I see on some forums a message that disappears after you make 5 or 10 posts or something, telling you to read the rules, and basic guidelines new members gotta know.

Thinking this might help. We were averaging 13 new signups a day on the old Proboards forum so I'm thinking there is some kind of physical barrier to signing up, or just something that makes us look less welcoming or easy to do on the new board.

[WeWantRevenge]

If you upgrade to 2.0 RC2, you can use http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=355756.0

I'll continue searching.

[adbrad]

wouldn't say you was dying not with so many users on over 24 hours.
how did you get the users online over 24hours with all the different member colours i wanted this for my site

[wynnyelle]

We just assigned each post rank its own colour. Very easy actually.

...still no new joiners yet plenty of guests. We made the CAPTCHA easy and installed a guest welcome message. I honestly don't know what else to do. We appear as #6 on google for our most common search term last I looked so it's not like we're invisible. At least some of those guests have got to be human.

[adbrad]

We just assigned each post rank its own colour. Very easy actually.

i have done this but they don't appear coloured are you using any mod

[rd]

We just assigned each post rank its own colour. Very easy actually.

...still no new joiners yet plenty of guests. We made the CAPTCHA easy and installed a guest welcome message. I honestly don't know what else to do. We appear as #6 on google for our most common search term last I looked so it's not like we're invisible. At least some of those guests have got to be human.

In proboards you don't actually have to sign up, doesn't one account allow you access to all the forum hosted in proboards?

[wynnyelle]

No, I just input hex values for each postrank. It has a field on each member group, post rank or non post rank that just lets you do this. No mod needed.

...No, on proboards you have to sign up for individual forums same as you do here. They're all hosted on the same set of servers using the same software, but that's about all they have in common.

I installed a guest welcome message, and eased up on CAPTCHA and am working out a new rules draft trying to make the rules a little simpler to understand. But we didn't have any issues with having no rules, and no welcome message back on the old board and people were joining like crazy.

[adbrad]

at the bottom of the info center you got

Members Active in Last 24 Hours
   203 Users

how did you get that to show

[Arantor]

There's a mod for that IIRC.

[Adish - (F.L.A.M.E.R)]

You have had 183 new members this month so far:
http://warriorcatsrpg.com/index.php?action=stats

I suppose things gradually make an impact ?

[wynnyelle]

Yeah, it's an existing mod that can be dowloaded and used. I highly recommend it.

...Well, still no new signups. Is there some kind of physical block to our site going on? No one's reported anything wrong...and I had no problem making a test account. I'm concluding that somehow this new site is just not as appealing as the old one was.

...Those members are being remembered from the signups on Proboards. All the dates transferred nd we were averaging 13 a day then. We moved less than two weeks ago and most of the signups happened right after the move with people having problems logging into their old accounts, so they created new ones, even though it was eventually sorted out.

[adbrad]

which mod is it

[Adish - (F.L.A.M.E.R)]

Have you set a redirection from proboards to your new URL ? It might be that people still don't know about the new site. It will take a while. I suppose you have just moved your site since past 2 weeks.

[wynnyelle]

The old board was deleted.

See here:

http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Webmasters/thread?tid=1cdab3d5f9db067c&hl=en

I'm trying to get a response on how to get something set up.

Meanwhile, I found out that that anti-spam puzzle mod was preventing EVERYONE from signing up over the past 2 days sine it was installed.

STAY AWAY FROM THAT MOD LIKE THE PLAGUE!

[Ozysites]

Hi

I think your forum looks great, lot of work there.

BUT

If I may I just mention my first thought as I was going through it. I have no idea how your last forum looked so as well.

The Background image of falling stars and the color of your text do not go together as it makes me have to squint my eyes a bit to be able to read it. The background is too over powering.

People that need to get close up or squint there eyes i found never stay long on that page or website as they either get annoyed or sort eyes after a little while.

May I suggest not making the actual proum pages transparent at all or as least far less.

Like I said it's not a complaint but just an observation.

Cheers

[wynnyelle]

Really? Not a single person complained at all about the text being hard to see. I can replace the current transparent background with a slightly less one, or maybe make the text lighter? Do you mean the plain old text on the board names and stuff?